Are you useful to God, or have you made yourself useless? When we come to know Jesus Christ, we are transformed into a holy instrument to be used by the Lord. We all have a purpose, but some of us choose to make ourselves useless by not allowing the Lord to touch us with His hand. To put it plain and simple, we get our fire insurance and then withdraw from the scene.
The Lord does not desire either isolation or insulation from us. Some of us go into isolation. We withdraw from the world and say, “I don’t want anything to do with those sinful, no good, heathens.” We might also withdraw from the church and declare, “I don’t believe those people at church like me, so I just won’t go.” We separate ourselves from those who need Jesus, and we also separate ourselves from those in the body of Christ who will love us and encourage us.
Others, instead of isolating, will insulate themselves. They will form a holy huddle by rejoicing with other Christians in the church and saying, “Praise the Lord that He has saved us,” however, they don’t bother with the salvation of those outside the church walls whose souls are destined to hell. They seek the safety of other believers, and insulate themselves with the comfortable padding of fellowship, not wishing to get hurt on the spiritual battlefield.
This morning we are going to look at what Jesus has to say about our usefulness, or perhaps, uselessness to Him. Hopefully, we will come to understand what Jesus is trying to tell us and begin to act. If we fail to understand what He is saying, then some of us will remain as we are, being disobedient to the will of God. I don’t think any of us desire to disobey our Lord; so, let’s see what Jesus has to say!
What Kind of Salt Are You? (v. 13)
13 You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.
“You are the salt of the earth.” “Salt has been used in many cultures as a valuable commodity. The word salary comes from an ancient word meaning ‘salt-money,’ referring to a Roman soldier’s allowance for the purchase of salt. Someone who earns his pay is still said to be ‘worth his salt.’ Salt has also been used to express promises and friendship between people . . . Today, in many Arab cultures, if two men partake of salt together, they are sworn to protect one another – even if they had previously been enemies. In some cultures, people throw salt over their shoulders when they make a promise. Who knew that sodium chloride was so important!”(1)
Some uses for salt are the preservation of meat, seasoning food, cracking and melting ice, and killing weeds; and I want us to reflect on each of these uses. First, let us look at the preservative power of salt. A lot of people know about the saltiness of the famous country ham, but why is there salt in it? It is there to preserve the meat from bacteria while it is curing and to keep the flies out. So, how do we serve as the preservative power of salt? Well, we are going to come back to answering this question after we learn about God’s covenant with Israel.
“In the ancient world, ingesting salt was a way to make an agreement legally binding. If two parties entered into an agreement, they would eat salt together in the presence of witnesses, and that act would bind their contract.”(2) In the Old Testament, we read about the “covenant of salt” existing between God and Israel.” 2 Chronicles 13:5 says, “Should you not know that the Lord God of Israel gave the dominion over Israel to David forever, to him and his sons, by a covenant of salt?” Salt was commanded to be used in all grain offerings to signify Israel’s covenant with God. We read in Leviticus 2:13, “Every offering of your grain offering you shall season with salt; you shall not allow the salt of the covenant of your God to be lacking from your grain offering.”
When we accepted Jesus Christ, God made a covenant with us. Jesus is from the lineage of David, and when we are covered by His blood and by His salvation, we are made heirs of God’s kingdom; heirs according to the promise. We become children of the God of Israel. And the Lord has given His children dominion over the earth by a covenant of salt, meaning that we are here to preserve the earth, and to practice stewardship of what we have been given. The responsibility that we have been given is to make this world into a better place, to share the message of salvation with the world, and to transform this whole world into a people of God.
Allow me to share a quote from the Christian website Got Questions. It states, “The idea of a salt covenant carries a great deal of meaning because of the value of salt . . . To the people of Jesus’ day, salt was an important and precious commodity. So, when Jesus told His disciples that they were ‘the salt of the earth,’ He meant that believers have value in this world and are to have a preserving influence. The salt covenant is never explicitly defined in the Bible, but we can infer from the understanding of salt’s value and the contexts in which a salt covenant is mentioned that it has much to do with the keeping of promises and with God’s good will toward man.”(3)
Let us now look at the seasoning power of salt. In 2 Kings 2:19-21, we read how Elisha used salt to sweeten and purify the bitter waters of the Jericho Spring. The Scripture says, “Then the men of the city said to Elisha, ‘Please notice, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord sees; but the water is bad, and the ground barren.’ And he said, ‘Bring me a new bowl, and put salt in it.’ So they brought it to him. Then he went out to the source of the water, and cast in the salt there, and said, ‘Thus says the Lord: I have healed this water’.”
Many of us like to put salt in soup, on a cucumber, or on a big juicy tomato. It makes certain foods more palatable. As Christians we are called to make the world tastier. We are to be sprinkled on the whole face of the earth, and slowly penetrate the worse tasting places on this planet, and work our way into the people in those places until they start looking unto Christ and are healed of their spiritual bitterness.
Salt is also used for cracking and melting ice. This world is full of hearts that are as hard as stone, and as cold as ice. Jesus calls us to go out and tell others of His love, so they may be broken, and their hardness cracked by the power of love. Salt is also used to soften water, and Jesus wants us to soften the hearts of others so they may melt when the warmth of Christ washes over them.
Another huge statement in verse 13 is this: “But if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned?” The New Bible Dictionary reveals that when salt was mined, the miners found that “because of impurities and the occurrence of chemical changes, the outer layer was generally lacking in flavor. The reference in Matthew 5:13 is to this latter, much of which was discarded as worthless.”(4) In application, some of us can become tainted by the impurities and sins of the world. Our salt, or our Christian walk, gets contaminated. The salt, which was once white and pure, is now dark and dingy, stained with sin. When our purity becomes contaminated, we become useless, and something to be thrown out and cast aside.
Now, salt can still work even when it is thrown out, but it is not something glorious. You see, salt can also be used for killing plants. In Deuteronomy 29:23 the effect of salt on vegetation was to render the land infertile. The “parched places of the wilderness” that Jeremiah spoke of in Jeremiah 17:6, were synonymous with a barren salt land; and in Judges 9:45, we see how Abimelech followed an ancient custom in sowing ruined Shechem with salt as a token of perpetual desolation.(5) When an enemy land was conquered, salt was spread on the fields to render the land useless.
If you have fallen in your devotion to Christ, and have become tainted by the world, then you have rendered yourself useless. You have become that dingy salt that is worth nothing but to be cast out, and you begin killing plants. If you are familiar with the parable of the wheat and the tares, then you will recall how the plants are representative of people or souls; so, as you are tossed out you can begin killing those around you.
For example, you might say to the lost, or to the tares, “I am a Christian,” and yet, you participate in sin. You will make them want nothing to do with the Lord. You will drive them away, and then they will eventually die without having ever known the everlasting life found in Jesus Christ. In the church, you will contaminate the wheat by portraying that it is alright to be lax in your relationship with Jesus. You will portray the message that Christians do not have to be concerned with flavoring the world, and then you will lead them astray right along with you.
Where Does Your Light Shine? (vv. 14-16)
14 You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. 16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
A.T. Robertson says “the [imagery here] is taken from lowly cottage life. There was a projecting stone in the wall on which the lamp was set [and that was the lampstand]. The house consisted of a single room, so that the tiny light sufficed for all. It was not put under a bushel [except] to put it out.”(6) The bushel is what was used to snuff out the flame when ready to “turn in” for the night and go to bed. It was not a “bushel basket” as we might imagine. “The bushel was an earthenware grain measure,”(7) and it would have probably looked like a measuring cup made of ceramic.
According to Jesus, we are filled with light, and it is a light that is seen when we get out there in the world and share the love of Christ through good works. “In the Greek there are two words for good. There is the word agathos, which simply defines a thing as good in quality. There is [also] kalos, which means that a thing is not only good, but that it is also winsome and beautiful and attractive. The word which is used here is kalos. The good deeds of a Christian must be not only good; they must also be attractive. There must be a certain winsomeness in [our actions].”(8)
Let me see if I can drive this point home with an illustration. I want you to imagine that I have a flashlight in my hand, which is turned on. Now, take a moment and picture that I am waving it around in a lighted room. All right, now imagine that I am waving it around in a room that is pitch-black. So, what is the difference between shining the flashlight in a lighted room, versus shining it in a dark room? The difference is that the flashlight had the most effect when the room was dark. In the lighted room it was barely even noticed.(9)
Now, what does this say about our light? Well, if we as Christians insist on associating with only believers and staying in our holy huddle, then our light will not be seen. It will blend in with the lights of all the other Christians, as it will remain within the church building only. Sometimes the church is like a jar full of fireflies who have become accustomed to their captivity and forgotten the adventure of flying and shining. They are not only stuck inside, but a tarp has been thrown over the jar so that no one on the outside can see the light within. If we will do as Jesus said, and let our light shine before all men, which includes those who live in darkness, then our light will stand out.
Allow me to share an account by Leonard Sweet. He says, “I shall never forget an Amy Grant concert at King’s Island in Cincinnati in the midst of the controversy that swirled around her during the summer of 1986 for ‘crossing over’ into the secular market. Many Christians laid into Amy Grant, outraged that people could tune to any rock station in the nation and hear her sing about her love for Jesus.”
“At the concert Grant told about songs she was working on and how her tour was going. But then it became very quiet, and out of the silence she confessed to feeling great pain over all the abuse and derision from her sisters and brothers in Christ. She then visibly straightened up and spoke of her resolve not to listen to it. And then came out these words, so powerful I wrote them down on the spot: ‘Some people think I should stand in the light and give my witness. But I believe God has called me to stand in the dark, and there give off my light. I know there is danger in the dark, but God’s Word has told me that I’m all right as long as I don’t lose sight of the light’.”(10)
If we stand in the darkness with the sinners of the world, it does not mean that we have to partake of their sin and evil. Others will probably talk about us behind our back when we spend time with the lost; but if we let it worry us, then may never spend time with those who do not know Jesus Christ. If we always keep our sight on the light – at all times – then we will not stumble. Keep in mind that we must enter the darkness in order to point others to the light.
So, where is the support for what I am sharing? In Matthew 9:10-12 we read, “Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, ‘Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ When Jesus heard that, He said to them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick’.” So, we see that even Jesus was criticized, but He still spent time among the lost.
Now, in order to be a light unto the world, we must be in a right relationship with Jesus; and then perhaps we can be like Moses, whose face shone with the glory of God when he came down from the mountain. A rabbi once asked his students, “When can we know that the night has ended and the day begun?” No one got the answer right, and finally his students asked, “What is the correct answer? When can we know that the night has ended and the day begun?” The rabbi answered, “It is the moment when you can look at a face never seen before and recognize the stranger as a brother or sister. Until that moment, no matter how bright the day, it is still night.”(11) People should be able to look at us and know that we are a believer.
Time of Reflection
I want you to think about your relationship with the Lord. How is it? Do others see the light of Christ shining in your eyes and from your face? Do you serve the Lord by letting your light shine in the darkness, or do you only allow it to shine in the light, among other Christians, where it is not truly seen? Does your salt flavor the world or does it kill the people around you? Are you living in sin, leading the lost and other Christians to their destruction?
We need to break the holy huddle. We need to get outside the church walls and salt the world and lead the lost to the light of Jesus Christ. We need to mingle with the publicans and sinners. If we are not, then we need to ask the Lord to forgive us where we have failed Him.
Now, to those who have never walked in the light of Jesus Christ and felt the warmth and radiance of His love, I want you to know that He offers His light to you this morning. He will pull you out of your darkness, and open your eyes so you can see clearly that the world is not where your joy is found. Satan has put a blindfold over your eyes, but it can be unloosed if you will hone in on the light and aim straight for it. I encourage this morning to receive Jesus Christ as your personal Savior and Lord. Come be forgiven of your sin, receive eternal life, and find new joy and meaning as you become useful to the Lord in serving His kingdom purposes.
NOTES
(1) “What Is a Salt Covenant?” Got Questions: https://www.gotquestions.org/salt-covenant.html (Accessed July 10, 2023).
(2) Ibid.
(3) Ibid.
(4) The New Bible Dictionary, (Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.) 1962.
(5) Ibid.
(6) A.T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1930), pp. 42-43.
(7) Ibid., p. 43.
(8) William Barclay, “The Gospel of Matthew,” The Daily Study Bible (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1958), p. 121.
(9) Leonard Sweet, Aqua Church (Loveland: Group, 1999), 51.
(10) Ibid., 46.
(11) Ibid., 46-47.
