You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden.
Matthew 5:13-14
If you are like me, you probably get easily discouraged when you read the daily news. The world seems increasingly polarized and divided. How are we even supposed to minister to such a world? Jesus makes it sound so easy: “You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.” But what does that actually mean?
How can we be light if we are so afraid, and how can we be salt if we, ourselves, are filled with bad thoughts towards our “neighbors,” the ones that we see on the news?
I have always known that salt was valuable and essential to life. (My father was a nephrologist who led the team that invented Gatorade at the University of Florida in 1965.) I knew that Gatorade replaces salts lost in sickness or exercise, and restores the body to health.
So naturally my interest is peaked when I read anything about salt in the Bible. I knew most of the standard interpretations of salt: the spice of life, the preservative that keeps our culture from decay... but imagine my surprise when I came across a passage in Leviticus that I had never noticed before! “Season all your grain offerings with salt. Do not leave the salt of the covenant of your God out of your grain offerings; add salt to all your offerings.” (Leviticus 2:13) The Lord then said to Aaron that “it shall be an everlasting covenant of salt for you and your offspring.” (Numbers 18:19) This means that the covenant is still in effect, but WE have become the salt!
It was like getting a new pair of glasses - suddenly things that were blurry came into sharp focus! Being the salt of the earth is ultimately about sacrifice, it’s about following the cross of Jesus and pouring our lives out as a living sacrifice.
We are called to sacrifice our time, our money, our things... But even more importantly, we must sacrifice our animosity. We place it on the altar and begin to pray for our enemies.
So be encouraged when you read the news! Our cultural moment is not that different from Jesus’s time. Social and political animosities threatened to unravel Israel, yet Jesus transcended it all by teaching his disciples to be “the salt of the earth.”
God bless you!
Phoebe
