Monday, April 18, 2011

"Ye are the Salt of the Earth"

A couple weeks ago, the text for Sunday School included part of the Sermon on the Mount. Something that was said really struck a chord with me.

In Matthew 5:13, the Lord says, “Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.”

Generally at that time, salt harvesters would find salt on the shore of a body of water, like the Dead Sea. They would gathered up this salt (very possibly with a good portion of sand). So when the people would talk of salt losing its savor .. chances are they were “salting” their food with the sandy portion of what had been gathered.

Salt is salt, and it's always going to be sodium chloride. Thankfully, today, our salt-gathering is much more reliable, we don't get much silica in our sodium chloride!



If salt is to be effective in bringing flavor and as a preservative, it must be in actuality- salt. It has to maintain its chemical makeup.

If we are to be the salt of the earth, effective in bringing salvation and as a preservative to our fellow man, we must be in actuality holy. We have to maintain our personal righteousness.

The only way we “lose our savor” is if we change our very nature…. And become common sand.