Sermon On The Mount # 1 Ye Are The Salt Of The Earth - Aren’t You?

After she had worked for many years, she decided she would retire. Her son Martin, the owner of the restaurant, was concerned about her retirement because he knew that her good cooking was going to be missed by his many loyal customers. He requested that she write down everything she did in the preparation of the food she was famous for, so the next cook could follow her instructions to the detail, and cook as good as she did. She retired and the next cook was hired, and she was doing fine until she came to the part of the recipe that stated that she needed to add a “tad of salt”. She went to Martin and said, “What is a “tad of salt?” He explained what a “tad of Salt” was, and everything came out great.

All good cooks know that sometimes a teaspoon or tablespoon of salt is to much. They know sometimes it takes only a “tad of salt”, because just a tad will drastically change the taste of something.

• Add a pinch of salt to a jug of water, and in a short time all of the water will be salty.

• Put a pinch of salt on the tip of your tongue, and in just a matter of minutes it will permeate your entire body.

Because small amounts of salt can make a difference, the Lord had this in mind when He said that Christians are the “salt of the earth”.

Salt has been used in many ways.

Illus: Some companies have used it in hiring people. For example, if a company wants to hire someone that has to do a lot of thinking, some of them will take a potential employee out for dinner. When the food is brought out, if the potential employee reaches for the salt before they taste the food, they know that this person is not a thinking person. That is, they are salting the food before they taste it to see if it needs some additional salt.

Since earliest times, salt has been associated with value and worthiness.

• Homer called salt “divine”

• Plato terms it a “substance dear to the gods”

• Shakespeare mentions “salt” 37 times in his immortal plays

We rightfully refer to salt as the “fifth element.” We are as dependent on it as we are on air, earth, water and fire.

God knew how important salt was to us, and when He created this earth on which we live, He gave us an abundant supply. Salt is abundant on, and deep within the earth.

• Great veins stretch throughout Canada and the United States, many hundreds of feet below land

• Louisiana has scores of great dome-shaped deposits, mined much as coal is mined

• Utah’s Great Salt Lake is a source of much salt

• The oceans of the world contain 50 million billion tons

• Forty million tons are required each year to fill man’s needs

Here and in other parts of the world, salt is also produced by what is called the solar method. HOW DOES THIS WORK? The salt water is pumped into ponds. The sun evaporates the water and leaves the salt to be harvested.

The significance of salt in the history of mankind has proven to be amazing.

Many folks do not know this, but it has been said that more wars have been fought over salt than over gold. For example:

• The early salt road via Solaria from Rosettia to Rome was constantly guarded by Roman soldiers who fought off marauders and hostile armies seeking salt.

• The Germans waged war for saline streams. In our own country, many of the Indian wars were fought over salt licks or salt springs; these were few and widely separated, and the Indians protected them at all costs.

• During the Civil War, one of the principal purposes of the Union campaign in Virginia was to capture a source of salt of the Confederacy at Saltville.

• The Northern army’s objective in Louisiana was to cut off another major source of salt supply from springs and deposits near New Orleans. The North’s success in this attempt materially helped to shorten the war.

• Salt in 1865 sold for up to a dollar a pound in the South.

• The importance of salt in ancient times is equally apparent.

After looking at some of the significance of all the salt God has placed on this earth, we can appreciate in a greater way that the Lord is saying to Christians, “Ye are the Salt of the Earth”.

Look at three important things in the Bible about salt and how it relates to Christians.

I. THE SALT

What makes salt so valuable? It is valuable because of what salt can be used for.