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Matthew 5:13 - “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.”
Our function as salt is to resist decay. Salt is aseptic. It cannot change corruption into incorruption, but it does prevent corruption from spreading. It is used to hold decay and putrefaction at bay. Before the days of refrigeration, it was the most commonly used preservative.
Salt is a miracle. It is chemically composed of sodium and chloride. Pour a little hydrochloric acid on your hand and it will be burned away in half a minute. Drink hydrochloric acid and you will die in agony in a few minutes. Add sodium to hydrochloride and you will have salt, one of the most common, most useful substances on earth, a substance essential to life itself. Similarly, when God pours His grace into the hydrochloride of our lives, the result is a miracle: a regenerated person placed in the world for the blessing of all mankind.
Jesus said, ’Ye are the salt of the earth." The word translated "earth" is ge, which refers to the earth as distinct from Heaven. Ge is a parochial word also suggesting one special land or country as distinct from other countries. Ge suggests the soil as well and conveys the idea of the material side of life. People are viewed as of the earth and Christians are the salt of the earth. Where we live, surrounded by people who are occupied with material things and earthly considerations, we are to be salt. We are to have an arresting effect on the general corruption of society.
The earth, as divorced from Heaven, is corrupt. We are to be the medium through which the heavenly side of things exerts its influence on the earthly side of things. We are to live as a heavenly people in an earthly environment. Just as salt adds tang and flavor to food, we are to exert our godly influence in a pungent, attractive way. We often give a wrong impression of Christianity. Oliver Wendell Holmes - American physician, poet, and humorist - once remarked, "I might have entered the ministry if certain clergymen I knew had not looked and acted so much like undertakers."
Jesus added a warning: "If the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men." This statement of course refers not to losing one’s salvation, but to losing one’s testimony and influence. If ever there was a day when the earth needed Christians to keep their testimony and influence, it is this day of the X-rated home movie, internet pornography, and the marching sodomite.
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