“Salt of the Earth:
Precious, Peculiar, Preservative”
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text is the little parable Jesus tells at the end of today’s Gospel
Reading: “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty
again? It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile; it is
thrown out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” That last statement, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear,” is like
an exclamation point, emphasizing that what Jesus has just said is particularly
important, and must be given careful attention and consideration. This
teaching about his followers being like salt is also included in Jesus’ Sermon
on the Mount, in the Gospel of Matthew: “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 by men.” We consider this teaching of our Lord under the theme, “Salt of the
Earth: Precious, Peculiar, Preservative.” What does Jesus mean when he says, “You are the salt of the earth”?
He means first of all that you are PRECIOUS. The most valuable item ever found on the television show Antiques
Roadshow was from a man in Tulsa a few years ago. He paid $5,000 for some
Chinese cups carved from rhinoceros horns, but they were valued at $1.5 million.
Makes you want to search your attic, doesn’t it? But, did you know you’ve already got an absolutely priceless treasure,
right in your own kitchen? At least they would have thought so in ancient
times. For, ALL our kitchen cupboards contain what in ancient times would
have been a vast fortune, in the form of SPICES. The wise men brought to Baby Jesus not only gold, but something just as
precious, even more precious, than gold: the spices frankincense and myrrh.
The book of Revelation gives a list of the most valuable worldly treasures:
“gold, silver, precious stones and pearls, fine linen, purple, silk and scarlet
cloth . . . ivory. . . bronze, iron and marble . . . cinnamon and SPICE.” Among the MOST valuable and sought after spices in ancient times is
something we don’t give a second thought to: salt. Salt was so important
to them because they lacked something else you take for granted: refrigeration.
Before the relatively recent invention of the refrigerator and the deep freeze,
for thousands of years the ONLY way to preserve meat was with salt. And you may not realize that salt does MORE than just preserve and give
flavor. Salt is also an essential nutrient, a mineral that the body cannot
manufacture, but is required for good health, and even life itself. But, in ancient times, salt was very difficult and dangerous to mine
underground, and very labor intensive and time consuming to extract from the
sea. So, salt was PRECIOUS. So precious that people were often paid,
not with silver or gold, but with salt. That’s actually where we get the
word “salary,” which literally means your allotment of salt, and from that comes
the expression “worth his salt.” “You are the salt of the earth.” Jesus means first of all that
like salt in ancient times you are PRECIOUS to him. All of us deserve, on
account of our sin and wickedness, the judgment Jesus pronounces in this
parable: “It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out.”
You deserve to be thrown out into eternal damnation in hell. But, the Good
News is, you are PRECIOUS to God, so precious that he sent his own Son to be
your Savior. As John says, “This is how God showed his love for us: He
sent his only-begotten Son into the world that we would live through him. . .
he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” “For God so loved the world,” Jesus says, “that he gave his
only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have
eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the
world, but to save the world through him. . . For the Son of Man came not
to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” You are so precious to God that his Son Jesus gave his life as a ransom
for you: by his perfect life fulfilling God’s will, to earn you God’s favor; by
his death atoning, making up for your sins; by his resurrection assuring you of
eternal life. “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as
silver or gold that you were redeemed,” Peter says, “but with the precious blood
of Christ.” When Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth,” he means that like
salt in ancient times you are PRECIOUS; and PECULIAR. Recently on Antiques Roadshow, they had a large, elaborate salt cellar
from the Middle Ages. They explained that because salt was available only
to royalty and the very rich it was put in such containers as a sign of
status—I have salt, and you don’t. If you were a common person invited to
eat with them, salting your food at the table would have been a new, unusual,
peculiar experience. When Jesus calls his followers the “salt of the earth,” he means you
are PECULIAR to the world, in the sense of something rare, not often
encountered, even odd from the world’s perspective, like salt was for most
people in the ancient world. “Let your light so shine before men,” Jesus says, “that they may see
your good works and praise your Father in heaven. . . This is to my
Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my
disciples.” That is the #1 way you bear witness for him, by living your everyday
life in a way that is considered unusual, different, PECULIAR from the world’s
perspective. The word “peculiar” occurs in this sense in two Bible verses in older
translations, in 1st Peter: “But you are a chosen generation, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a PECULIAR people; that you may show forth the
praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”
And in Titus, “He gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness, and to
purify for himself a PECULIAR people, eager to do what is good.” When Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth,” he means that you are
PRECIOUS; PECULIAR; and PRESERVATIVE. The people in the vicinity of Galilee, where Jesus was teaching both
times he gave this parable, were more familiar with salt than most in the
ancient world. Because, about 70 miles from the Sea of Galilee is the Dead
Sea, called “dead” because it is over ten times more saline than the ocean, so
salty that nothing can live in it. But, the concentration of salt in the
Dead Sea allowed for easy harvesting of this precious mineral, and the Dead Sea
was one of the main sources of salt in the Roman Empire. One reason the
Romans were so intent on conquering and holding onto the Holy Land was the
supply of priceless salt, essential for their empire, that they mined from the
Dead Sea. In contrast to the Dead Sea, the Sea of Galilee was thriving with fish,
including many species considered delicacies in the ancient world. So,
they put the two together: Salt from the Dead Sea was used to preserve fish from
the Sea of Galilee, which became like the caviar of the Roman world. Jesus grew up about 12 miles from the Sea of Galilee, most of his
disciples had been fisherman there, and he made his second home at Capernaum on
the shores of the Sea of Galilee. So, when Jesus says, “Salt is good,” he
knew what he was talking about. It’s like someone from Kansas City saying,
“BARBEQUE is good.” Thanks to the preservative effects of salt, Galilee had a thriving
industry. “But if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?”
If someone foolishly doesn’t take care of their precious supply of salt, but
allows it to become diluted and contaminated, “How can it be made salty again?
It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile; it is thrown out. He who
has ears to hear, let him hear.” Paul says in 2nd Timothy, “There will be terrible times in the last
days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful,
proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love,
unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good,
treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.” Reading the paper or watching the news confirms how accurate the
Apostle’s description is of our world today. Unfortunately, even some
Christians and church bodies have given in to the wicked ways of the world.
But, if we acquiesce to the ways of the world, we are like salt that has lost
its saltiness. In the old west, unscrupulous speculators would “salt” with bits of
gold an otherwise worthless mine. “You are the salt of the earth” means
that our Lord has “salted” this fallen world with his disciples, “salted” YOU
into this world, for a purpose. Our world is decaying all around us, and
YOU are to have a PRESERVATIVE effect on the world, by remaining faithful and
bearing witness to Jesus. “You are the salt of the earth”: PRECIOUS; PECULIAR; PRESERVATIVE. Amen. Return to Top | Return to Sermons | Home | Email Church Office
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