(Text and Audio)
Title: Salt and Light
- The Correct Understanding of Salt
Sometimes we hear a Bible passage or phrase so many times that it looses it’s meaning. We assume we understand the passage and it’s meaning, and, therefore, the passage lacks a certain “pop” or “power” that a newer section of scripture may have for us.
This morning I’d like for us to dust off an old concept and see if we can’t be blessed with some new insights that might spark our enthusiasm and motivations for holiness and purity.
Q: Why did Jesus use salt as the example of what believers are on the Earth?
A: This region understood the properties and worth of salt. The Dead Sea is one of the richest salt deposits on our earth, and everyone in the region of Judea understood what salt was.
Today, what is our primary use for salt? (Seasoning or Flavoring)
But this was not the case in the first century. Back then, before refrigeration technology, salt was not just a seasoning, but also a preservative for meats and other foods. So if Jesus says to the disciples, “You are the salt of the Earth” their understanding would not be “You are the seasoning and preservative of the earth, but if you lose those properties, what good are you?”
Q: How can salt loose it’s saltiness?
A: By being diluted, or “washed out” with too much water.
Again, using a geographical teaching, the reason that salt was mined from the Dead Sea region, and not just taken from the salt rock that lines the Dead Sea was because the salt on the top had been rained on so much that is was essentially useless, either as flavoring or as a preservative. It was just worthless rock at that point. So you had to dig down to the next layer, to the place where the salt had not been diluted by water to find the good, worthy, useful salt.
The Greek word in play for the phrase “has lost its flavor” is “Marino” (Like Dan Marino) and it’s definition is quite fascinating. In regard to people it means “to make foolish” and in regard to salt it means and “to make flat, to have lost it’s strength and flavor.”
Q: So what it Jesus’ point, exactly?
A: Those who follow Christ have a role and purpose. We are both seasoning (brining truth that doesn’t exist if we don’t preach) and preservatives (protecting and maintaining the Truth of Christ over the years.)
Furthermore, we can be made useless very quickly if we are washed out by the world. We lose the very properties that make us Christians.
I don’t want to spend a lot of time on this but let me just make one observation about this: Older denominations that have gone liberal, which I will simply define as “becoming like the world” are bleeding members. Every year these denominations get smaller and smaller because they offer nothing different from the world.
Tom Ostrowski bowling story.
II. The Correct Understanding of Light
So the next illustration Jesus uses it to tell his followers they are the light of the world, and we all understand how light works. Where are the lights in this room? Why are they up high? When it becomes night, what happens to the sun?
Light is best seen and used, when it is up high.
I’m not trying to blow your minds here, and I don’t think Jesus was trying to blow his audience’s minds either. He’s making a very simple, yet profound observation: Elevate Me, that men may see me!
Lift him up!
We often talk here about the purpose and importance of a “high view” of God, a “high view of God’s sovereignty” and I want us to fully understand why that is so important to grasp.
Imagine if you took all the light fixtures in your house, all the lamps, all the vanity lights, all the night lights, and put them in your basement, or in a closet. And then you tried to move around the house at night, what would that look like?
(Sad, dangerous/tragic, comical, hard to watch)
We look and act foolish without the light.
Who is it that looks and acts foolishly without the light?
- Non-believers.
- Believers who have put their lamps in the closet.
Christ’s Point: Don’t hide who you are. Rather, amplify who you are so that God (not you) is brought glory.
If your neighbor is walking around in the dark because he doesn’t know any better, and you bring him a lantern, and he sees the value, the worth of light, he’s going to say, “How did you get this? How can I get this?”
If your brother or sister in Christ is stumbling in the darkness, and you go to their place and help them find their lights and reposition them where they ought to be, now they are in a place where they can see the decisions they are making more clearly.
Light has properties that are much more amazing than salt. Light is the fastest thing known to man. Light travels at over 186 thousand miles per second. Light can help anyone see clearly in any darkness. Light can illuminate the mind, and bring understanding to what is a mystery. Light can calm our fears.
Let them see the good that we do in the name of Jesus. Don’t be ashamed. Don’t listen to the world and its petty accusations. Take pride in the name of Jesus Christ. Don’t deny Him, amplify Him.
Close:
Difference between microscope and telescope magnification.