What characteristic makes a Christian Christian?  Faith?  Love?  Hope?  Obedience?  Humility?  I believe—I hope—that I speak with you often about these virtues, these qualities.  These are what give distinctive flavor to the faith, this way of life that for us is the way to life, the Jesus way.  And Jesus also sacrificed, willingly placing others before himself.  He also suffered, with patient endurance.  All with the aim of reconciliation, forgiveness, restoration, salvation.  We can’t imagine a truly, fully Christian life without charity, though we can live with that gift and blessing mostly dormant for long periods.  Can we really imagine a faithful life without obedience to God’s Word?  In his first letter, John cautions the faithful against thinking that faith can be practiced without love; he cautions us that love must be practiced in the discipline of faith, which is Christ, the Word of God.  Love that suits us, faith that suits us, isn’t even a substitute; it’s just idolatry.

Jesus says to his followers that they, we, “are the salt of the earth” (5:13).  There was a time when I thought that term was supposed to mean something like common folk, down to earth, the lowly.  I don’t think that’s what the term really means, though.  To be honest, I’ve never quite understood what the term is supposed to mean.  It’s not one we hear that often, anymore.  It seems positive, though.  Jesus wants his followers to be like salt.  William Barclay observes that, “[w]hen we wish to stress someone’s solid worth and usefulness, we say of him, ‘People like that are the salt of the earth.’”[1]  Someone who is worth something, someone who isn’t worthless.  Well, you and I know, as good Jesus people, that no one is worthless, yet we encounter worthless people all the time.  What is worthless does not fulfill its purpose.  Every so often in Columbia Lakes, I see one of those big screen TVs set out at the curb.  My grandparents had at least three big, old televisions in their home, one from the ‘50s, one from the ‘60s, and the one from the ‘70s: the kind with the record player in the same cabinet.  None worked.  They used a little color set they put on top of the TV/stereo combo.  What were they even keeping those worthless things around for?  After about 1990, the tubes weren’t available.

Many things are useless.  Salt is not, but who thinks of salt?  Just try using no salt.  No flavor!  Needs something!  Lack, absence.  Wisely used, salt gives food just what it needs.  Faith gives life just what it needs.  Christians offer neighbors what they need.  Life without faith is just death warmed over.

Now, the ancient Hebrews did something that might seem odd: they included salt in the sacrifices they made at the altar.  They were commanded to do this.  We might know that salt is used to preserve foods, though I prefer sugar ham to country ham, city boy as I am.  In olden days, salt wasn’t just a preservative, it was also used to purify.  Maybe like me, your parents advised you to put a little salt on a canker sore.  Ouch.  I’m not sure that was good advice.  We’re advised to gargle with a salt solution for a sore throat.  This is an ancient and effective home remedy.  Salt preserves and purifies.  Barclay connects the dots for us: “if the Christian is to be the salt of the earth he must be an example of purity.”[2]  Blessed are the pure in heart.  I suppose we are familiar with the touted benefits of clean living—clean in what we eat, what we drink, what we put into our bodies; we can apply this also to what we do with our bodies and what we expose mind, heart, and soul to as well.  If there is nothing the least bit attractive in our living, what would ever make anyone outside the faith stop and wonder about us?

This reminds us of something we may not like to contemplate: “Christianity is something which is meant to be seen.”[3]  Yes, Jesus warns against practicing our faith so that it may be seen by others.  What he is warning about is faith as a performance, meant to be seen by others, meant for others but not really for God.  When we direct and devote our daily living to God, others will notice.  God knows this.  Others noticed Jesus.  Others noticed the apostles.  I suspect—I hope—that each of us can think of someone whose faith was noticeable, not because he or she was constantly advertising it but because it was so deeply and authentically who that person was in Christ.  That’s what God wants us to aim for, too.  This is part of why He sends the Spirit.  He has work for us to do while we’re on this earth.

The early Egyptian church father Origen read these words of Jesus about being salt and thought one thing Jesus was saying was that Christians are to help preserve the world from corruption.  That sounds like an impossible task, a losing battle; however, let’s also remember who is with us, whose work we are doing.  We preserve the world from corruption not by changing the world or even by changing laws—people disregard laws all the time and find clever ways around them.  Maybe Christians like you and me are called by God to preserve the world from corruption by providing another option, a better example, a more fulfilling way.  Pastor Harry Walls writes that “Christians, by their potent presence, can help to prevent and inhibit society’s corruption and evil’s rotting influence.”[4]  We cannot isolate ourselves from the world.  Monasticism is not for us.  We must be in the world.  How shall we be in the world?  How can we be a “potent presence”?

I’ve never tasted salt that has lost its saltiness.  Whether it actually can or not isn’t the point.  The point is the thought experiment.  If you’ve lost the essence of the thing, if you no longer have what makes the thing what it truly is—what makes a Christian a Christian, for example—you’re in trouble.  Going through the motions.  We say that about life, people who have lost their way, someway, and we shake our heads.  And what of faith?  Lord help us, if we lose the essence of faith!  But what is the essence of this faith?  Love?  We talk a lot about love, and love is good to talk about—it’s even better to have it, give it, and do it!  Faith without love or hope without love both seem sort of empty and cold.  But for us, love has a name: God, Jesus.  Christians have got to give love His name; otherwise, we risk deep and serious confusion, just like the world.  The name, the whole character, shows us what love is, and what love is not, what love does, and what love does not do.  The purpose of love is to make God better known, to open up in an ever-fuller way the very heart of God.  Love calls, saves, transforms.

Love is light and has no love for darkness.  Love does not love darkness.  Love does not praise darkness.  Love shines on those in darkness, to call them, call them out of the darkness; in the process, they are changed.  You and I don’t do the changing; we also are being changed.  God does the changing.  God causes the lost to realize they need saving.  God causes the deaf to hear Him calling, maybe through your love, the light you shine into the darkness around you, the light of your faithful living, your love for the Lord, which is love for the Word of God.  Our salt is meant to be applied, and tasted.  Our light is given to be seen.

Jesus tells us that we “are the light of the world” (5:14).  We are the light because we have the light.  But Jesus then seems to change the image or metaphor: “A town built on a hill cannot be hidden” (5:14).  Light is to be seen; light is for seeing.  A town on a hill is hard to hide.  There were annual pilgrimages to Jerusalem.  On the way up—Jerusalem is built on a hill—pilgrims would sing “songs of ascent”: psalms composed especially for the journey up to, and into, Jerusalem.  The very visibility of the city was a cause for celebration.  We like to see where we are going.  If you couldn’t see where you were walking, if you were walking in the dark, how long do you think it would be before you bumped into something, or fell?

No one uses salt to make food bland.  No one builds a city to hide it.  No one lights a lamp to cover it.  We hide what we don’t want seen—what we don’t want others to see and what we don’t ourselves want to see.  What are the things in your heart, your history, that you wouldn’t want others to see?  It doesn’t have to be some horrible, dark deed.  It could be cowardice or habitual weakness.  It could be unrestrained anger.  It could be unbridled lust—bridled lust is bad enough!

Purpose.  Salt has a purpose.  Light has a purpose.  Christians have a purpose.  Our Presbyterian Westminster Standards tell us that our chief end—that is, our main purpose—is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.  That includes here and now.  You and I can have an impact on the lives of others within this congregation, on the lives of those around us in our daily pursuits.  We can even have an impact upon our society and culture, by what we say and don’t say, what we buy and don’t buy, how we vote, by refusing to hide away, huddle, and hope it all will just go away.  Whether you love or loathe President Obama, he got this much right: you and I, we’ve got to be the change we’re wanting.

If our aim is to bring people into the church, let’s aim at taking the church out among people.  Another of the church fathers reminds us that light is for the benefit of all.  Everyone needs light.  Everyone needs salt.  Life requires both.  Jesus is talking about the basic necessities of life.  No salt, no life.  No light, no life.  I hear Jesus, then, and what he seems to be saying is be a life-bringer: this is to be children of our Father indeed!  Jesus reminds us that the light—the Word, the teaching—is put “on its stand and it gives light to everyone in the house” (5:15).  Light properly does its work when it is placed properly.  The Church is for light, we are in the light here.  And each of us, the church, take the light out with us.  Another of the early church fathers wrote of how each believer is a ray of Christ’s light.  Be Christ’s light for those around you: oh, how they need it!

               [1] William Barclay.  Gospel of Matthew.  Vol. 1.  1956.  Daily Study Bible.  Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1975.  119.

               [2] As above.

               [3] William Barclay.  Gospel of Matthew.  Vol. 1.  1956.  Daily Study Bible.  Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1975.  123.

               [4] Harry Walls.  “Salt of the Earth: The Church’s Witness in a Christless Culture.”  Right Thinking for a Culture in Chaos: Responding Biblically to Today’s Most Urgent Needs.  John MacArthur and Nathan Busenitz, eds.  Eugene, Oregon: Harvest House, 2023.  246.