Matt 5:13   You are the salt of the earth.

    

        

What an explosive little verse! Such a simple statement by Jesus early on in the Sermon on the Mount. In Jesus' day salt had at least two very important uses. The first use was as a preservative so meat might be soaked in a salt solution or even covered in salt to stop it going mouldy. Now if Jesus is saying, “You are the salt of the earth” then he is inferring that our presence in the world should have the effect of keeping evil at bay. The only way we can do that is by living and working in this world in such a way that we purify and preserve the part of the life of the world that we touch. Is our block of flats, our street, our neighbourhood, our school or college, or our place of work, a good place because we are there and are having the effect of restraining sin? That is challenging! To be able to do that we need great grace, great wisdom, but that is our calling.

 

But salt also has another effect; it brings out flavour. That's why some people put lots of salt on their food. In other words it makes the food more enjoyable. If salt as a preserving agent is a negative effect, this is now a very positive effect. To slightly change the emphasis of what we said above, we can do this by living and working in this world in such a way that we enhance the part of the life of the world that we touch. Is our block of flats, our street, our neighbourhood, our school or college, or our place of work, a better place because we are there? Does our presence add to the quality of the life there? Jesus is saying we should be a blessing to have around, we make life better.