If you ask twenty-five people what single thing they’d like to have with them if stranded on a desert island, the chances are at least one person will say “salt.” Personally, this mineral (commonly called Halite and symbolized as NaCl) would be at the top of my list, because I often crave salt or salted snacks much like other people crave sugar, chocolate, and other sweets.
Salt has always been important to civilization. Our word “salary” comes from the Latin word salis, which means salt. Early towns in Europe were located near salt deposits, and the salt was collected, shipped and sold. Salt had many uses in antiquity. Besides seasoning purposes (rock salt) and healing uses (mineral salts), a country’s military might sew (plow) salt into the farmland of a vanquished foe to make it impossible for their enemy to grow crops again.
In nature, salt could be collected from seawater pools that evaporated, leaving salt crystals behind. Or, it could be mined, though harvesting salt from mines was and still is dangerous, because of mine collapses and also because of the dehydration that occurs to a person who is in constant contact with salt (such as a castaway from a sinking ship in the ocean.) The Apostle John wrote Revelation while serving a sentence of hard labor in the salt mines on the tiny island of Patmos (less than half the area of Disney World.) Patmos is just off the coast of Turkey in the Aegean Sea, and the Roman emperor Domitian, brother of Titus and son of Vespasian, doubtlessly sentenced John for the criminal offense of failing to swear to the genius of the emperor, or possibly just for being a Christian, period. John survived to die of old age in Ephesus (Turkey.)
Today, it is also possible to retrieve salt by injecting water under the surface and extracting salt from the brine solution that occurs during this process.
Salt figures prominently in Scripture. We know that Lot’s wife ignored the order by the angels to not look back as Sodom and Gomorrah were nuked (in a matter of speaking) and she was turned into a pillar of salt (Genesis 19:26.) Even Josephus, the Jewish historian attests to this, and he was born six or seven years after Jesus was crucified. The location of this feature is near the Dead Sea, in proximity to where the two cities existed. The dead sea has a very high specific gravity (salt content) and nothing except for scattered microbes can survive its salt content.
Salt, as I mentioned above, has a number of uses. Beyond its usefulness as a sort of spice, it also is a preservative. Through the process of osmosis (water flowing through a membrane), salt can draw water from meat, and submerging meat in a brine solution (or just applying salt to meat) was a way of preserving meat. The rule “water goes where the salt is” explains why gargling with salt water relieve a sore throat. The pain comes from inflamed tissues in the throat which are swollen with fluid. As the salt in the water touches though tissues, the water is drawn out and the tissues shrink, relieving the pain.
Jesus speaks of salt. “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” (Matthew 5:13.) He is addressing his followers, essentially corresponding to the Church, today. The word for “saltiness” here (“savor” in some translations or μωρανθῇ0, literally “to be foolish”). This is from the Greek word moros which means “dull,” “sluggish,” “stupid,” “foolish” (Vincent) and therefore without value, since, without taste or the ability to preserve meats and other foodstuffs, salt has no use or value. The word’s appeal to the sense of taste is similar to the appeal to smell as with a fragrant flower. In the case of a rose, whose petals have lost their aroma, or a spice which has gone stale, there is no further use for it. We get the word “moron” from this word (moros), and it is used in English, perhaps unfortunately, to describe adults with IQs from roughly 7-12. The physical growth of these low IQ individuals may be within normal limits, but their intellect is not. However, they are nonetheless made in the image of God and their life should be equally precious, if of limited ability.
So, what is God saying here? I believe that Jesus, in choosing salt as a metaphor, is saying that the Church, and the people who form the Church, possess or offer the world a much-needed attribute. They have to offer an attribute with no substitute, one not available by any other means, or from any other place. But this attribute can be lost through neglect or if not refreshed, and if it can be recovered or restored at all, it would only be with great difficulty. Salt without savor still looks like salt. A dried bay leaf lasts 2-3 years. After that time, it still looks like a dried bay leaf, but it has lost most of its savor. Looks can be deceiving. A church with a spiritually dead congregation may look like a wonderful place of worship, but the Spirit Is not resident.
In a metaphorical sense, salt may preserve the purity of the Word and the commitment of God’s people to His plan. Martyn Lloyd Jones has an even better example. He points out that this fallen world is akin to a rotting, putrid piece of meat. And the unsaved inhabitants of this planet are likewise tainted. However, salt has curative and restorative properties, and can be used to draw out pus from a festering wound. So, the mere presence of a vibrant Christian in proximity to non-Christians has a beneficial effect to those stricken citizens provided that the Christian is walking in the light and focused on Christ and filled by the Holy Spirit. But if the Christian has let something else preoccupy him or her (money, material goods, partisan politics, drugs, etc.), then they no longer have that ability to heal on a spiritual basis. There have been times in my Christian walk where people have told me that they found some sort of positive attraction to me. It was not me, personally, but rather the Lord within me, though they did not know it. And I have been in the presence of some Christians, specifically Glenn Kaiser of the Resurrection Band and singer John Michael Talbot where I’ve found myself being edified and uplifted by just standing or sitting nearby to them. I think that might be something along the lines of the point Jesus is making here. In cases like this, you want to confess your sins and fears, and share your very heart with them because their spirit witnesses to yours in a meaningful way.
People likely lose their savor through sin, neglect of God’s Word, lack of prayer, fellowship, witnessing, or just “walking the walk.” People can also become compromised through doctrinal error or letting worldly things eclipse their faith. But how do churches lose their savor? I can’t be certain here, but I am fairly sure that this can happen through schisms, scandal, lack of outreach, false teachings (e.g. the prosperity gospel, God-wants-you-well, you cannot go to Heaven if you are a democrat, whatever), no teaching (more about Shakespeare or Fosdick than Jesus) and so on. Sometimes a congregation has a central figure, such as a pastor or elder and he is so revered and unchallenged that his congregation becomes cult-like. I’m thinking of one church where the pastor approved/arranged marriages and parishioners (including children and teens) were required to confess their sins to church members. In some cases, there is physical or psychological abuse. There was a time when some church leaders emphasized the need for everyone who is a Christian to come under some “authority.” This authority was another person who often had some degree of control over your life. I’ve heard of cases where a family was told they could not leave a church and look for a new church home because they were not being released from authority. If you ever hear this, think of II Corinthians 3:17: “Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” That liberty includes the freedom to make personal choices.
Other causes of falling away are more insidious. I love praise music, and sometimes you find yourself in a service that you wish would never end. You feel so safe and secure within the church walls listening to awesome, uplifting music that nothing else matters (including people who don’t know the Lord.) But God wants us to be involved in the world, though not caught up in its culture. The Church is not a private club.
The Church is the Bride of Christ in the next world, but in this world it’s subject to judgment. As Peter says in his first epistle (4:17): “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?” Because in this universe things tend to run down (that’s the Second Law), people tend to slip over time in their walk. Because of this, we need revival.
Header photo credit: Shulevskyy Volodymrr (Shutterstock)
