5th January 2025

Called to Be Salt

Passage: Matthew 5:13-16, Luke 14:34-35
Service Type:

Being salt of the earth is not about doing good works or creating Christian institutions – it is about who we are in Christ. When believers embrace their God-given distinctiveness rather than trying to blend in with the world, even a small percentage can transform their community. The Lord calls His people to promote what is good and resist what is evil, not by starting programmes, but by living openly as those who belong to Him. Just as salt in Jesus’ time both fertilised good growth and prevented corruption, Christians are meant to stand out and influence society through their different way of thinking and living.

Automatically Generated Transcript

[00:00:00] I want to this morning talk to you about a theme called salt and so if you’ve got your Bible with you to open your Bible turn to the gospel of Matthew in chapter 5 and verse 13, 14 we’re going to be reading. There it is up on the screen for you through to 16 where it says blessed of sorry 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 under foot. You are the light of the world, a town built on a hill cannot be hidden, neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on a stand and it gives light to everyone in the house in the same way let your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father

[00:01:15] in heaven. I’ve heard a lot over the years about being salt and light. I’m going to focus this morning on what it means to be the salt of the earth and maybe tonight we might look at light we’ll see as the evening comes. Now does anybody come back for the evening service? You know that most churches I’ve been to that no one comes back for the evening service but I’ll be here tonight at five o’clock to bring God’s Word to you again. What is Jesus concept of salt? When we talk about salt and light today it’s been my experience that people immediately think about doing things in the community and so churches in their desire to be relevant today and under a tremendous pressure from society to be relevant and have a place in the community have linked on to and latched

[00:02:34] on to rather this whole idea of being salt and light and so as I’ve watched over the last 20 years particularly more and more churches are setting up things like childcare centres and so if we have a childcare centre that is a Christian childcare centre we are being salt and light in the community other places have gone for aged care centres, other places have built schools, Christian schools and they’re saying this is being salt and light in the community. Well I want to say that if you believe that you have a different concept to the biblical concept of salt and light. Can we go back up to that those verses. Oh sorry, there we go. Verse 13 right at the very beginning says what? You are the salt you of the earth. You what? The salt? You are the salt. Not you become salt by doing

[00:03:55] things. In fact doing things for God, they’re good things to do but they don’t make you salt. Salt is who you are according to Jesus. It’s not what you become, it’s who you are. It’s not about doing, it’s about being. You get that? Salt is about being, it’s not about doing. We do good when we’re able and that’s expected of us but that is not what makes us salt and is not what makes us light, at least in the biblical concept of salt and light. Now Jesus took his disciples up on the mountain. Just before this passage we have the passage where Jesus goes up to onto the mountain and he preaches the sermon on the mount and teaches his disciples the Beatitudes. What makes you the soul of the earth? Is who you are not what you’re going to be doing? Now Matthew’s gospel was primarily

[00:05:36] written to believers. Mark’s gospel was written to non-believers but Matthew’s gospel was primarily written to believers and Jesus takes his disciples up who are believers and he begins to teach them. What’s he beginning to teach them? They are different to their environment. You see, when you are salt that is what makes you different to the rest of the world who don’t know Christ. A lot of us, we work very hard at being the same as the rest of the world but Jesus taught us that we are in fact different and then when he taught the Beatitudes what he was saying to the disciples is you are different. You no longer think like the world thinks. You no longer act as a result of that like the world acts. You see, the world thinks in a certain way and acts in a certain

[00:07:03] way as a result but now as a believer, as a follower of Jesus, you think differently and because you think differently you act differently and because you are in Christ as we would say today in Christo, we when we give our lives to God, God comes and lives within us and he calls that us being in Christ and because you are in Christ you are different, very very different. You are in fact at that moment the salt of the earth. Over the years I’ve had the privilege of leading some people to Christ. In fact I love moving amongst non-believers. I love going to non-believers wild parties and not telling them that I’m a pastor of course and just moving around and engaging with non-believers and over the years I’ve had people come to me in quiet moments who have seen me out in

[00:08:30] the community at different events but they’ve come to me in the quietness sometimes of my office, sometimes at a coffee shop, sometimes in their own home at their request and here’s what they’ve said to me, there’s something different about you. Oh yes there might be. I want to know what it is that makes you different and I’d often say to them why do you want to know what it is that makes me different and here’s the reply because I want whatever it is you’ve got and so I would begin of course to tell them about the Christ who has made me different. You go to the scriptures and you read in the scriptures the life of Christ and what do you discover? You discover people are attracted to Him. They flock to Him and I’m not talking about believers, I’m talking about

[00:09:49] unbelievers. Unbelievers continually turned up to hear the words of Jesus. Do you know why? Because there was something different about Him and when you are in Christ, when you have submitted your heart and life to Him and He has taken up residence in you and He is now beginning to make you like Him and as He is making you like Him, others see that change taking place in your life and they see the result of a Christ who lives in you and they’re drawn to you. They may even hate you but they’re still drawn to you. Do you think that the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the lawmakers and so on, they hated Jesus but guess what? They were still drawn to listen to Him. Why? Because there was something very different about Him. Let me tell you something, there’s something

[00:11:09] very different about anybody who receives Christ into their life and what the difference is is that you are now the salt of the earth, the light. You are both salt and light. Now I want to talk about the concept of salt in Jesus’ day. What was the purpose of salt in Jesus’ day? Take your Bible, turn with me across to Luke’s Gospel and chapter 14. Let’s have a look and see what the purpose of salt was in Jesus’ day. Let’s look at verses 34 and 35 of Luke 14 where it says salt is good but if it loses its saltiness, that is its savour, how can it be made salty again? It is fit neither for the soil nor the manure pile that is thrown out. If you had the original language it would say the dung heap. You know what that is don’t you? We all know what that is. Where in Jesus’ day and during

[00:12:40] His ministry days on earth did they get their salt from? Anybody know? Primarily where did they get their salt from? Who knows? Surely someone knows. The dead sea. Well done ma’am. What’s your name? Margaret. Good on you. So they would get their salt from the Dead Sea. How did they get their salt from the Dead Sea? We got any salt miners here? How did they get their salt from the Dead Sea? Say it again. dried out in the Sun exactly and then they would go and scrape it up, go and scrape it up and as they scraped it up it would be mixed with other salts and other substances and then it says in the scriptures that it was to be put where? It would be no more good if it was, if it had lost its saltiness, no more good whereabouts. No, before the dung hill. What’s the one before the dung hill? On the

[00:13:56] soil and so salts was very much a part of a fertilizer mixed with other salts and mixed with other ingredients that was scraped up from around the Dead Sea and if you had the right amounts it would make great fertilizer but if you had the wrong amounts it would make terrible fertilizer and so salt was used to promote the growth of good things. So here is a biblical concept of growth of salt is to grow good things and so you are different, you have Christ in you, you are the salt of the earth and so God wants to use you to promote good things, the things that are of good report, the things that are wholesome, the things that will bring glory to him. But if the salt loses its saltiness, now what’s the technical name for salt? Sodium chloride. Does it ever break down? That’s

[00:15:31] a good question. Does it ever break down on its own? It always remains sodium chloride, that right? Well how on earth does it lose its saltiness? Come on. How on earth does it lose its saltiness if sodium chloride never breaks down on its own? It becomes diluted, how does it become diluted? Has excess water or it is mixed with all the other things that it’s scraped up with and the mixture is contaminated, exactly, it’s contaminated by all these other ingredients and so what happens is that the salt amount that’s required for fertilizer is devalued and it loses its savour. Now Jesus says when salt loses its saltiness it’s no good as a fertilizer, it can’t promote good, can’t promote the good things of life. Then he says neither is it good for the dung hill. Of course

[00:16:53] that’s actually about human waste. In fact the Bible tells us how they dealt with their sewage back in that day. If you’ve got your Bible turn, don’t do it now but go home and I wrote down the reference here and I can’t see it right now but it’s here. Deuteronomy 23 and verse 13 tells you that they dug holes and then they had two boxes. Can you tell me what were in the two boxes that were beside the holes? Any clues? I mean haven’t you been to one of these earth things up here where there’s no sewage and all the greenies gather and they dig a big hole in the ground and they have a couple of boxes there? What’s in one of those boxes? Come on. Sorry? Sawdust, yes. In Jesus’ day it was just dirt so they had dirt in one of the boxes. What do you think was in the other box?

[00:18:07] Salt, exactly. So what was the purpose of the salt? It was being used as a disinfectant and what’s the purpose of a disinfectant? To disinfect? Well done, well done. 101 uni. First year? Third year, very good. To disinfect? To disinfect what? Infections, oh another smart man. To disinfect the bad things and so you are the soul of the earth. What is the biblical concept that Jesus has of the soul of the earth? You and I being the soul of the earth one is to promote that which is good and wholesome and grow the good and wholesome things that will bring glory to God and secondly to stop growing the bad things, the bad things. And so, us here, who are filled with Christ, that is who are in Christo,

[00:19:28] in Christ, who have Christ living in us. You are the soul of the earth and your purpose as part of the soul of the earth or as the soul of the earth is to promote the things that are good and stop the things that are bad. So now I have a question, a simple question. How much salt is needed in our society to impact our society that good things would grow and bad things would be put to death? How much salt is needed? Sorry? Truckloads? Is that what I heard? Truckloads. That’s what I would think too. Truckloads. How many of you have ever heard of a place called Nagaland? No one’s heard of Nagaland? N-A-G-A-L-A-N-D? Nagaland? No one at all. You’ve heard of Nagaland? You know what’s special about Nagaland? No, it’s not in Africa. It’s a tiny state that has been given sovereignty of itself by India, has its own governor, has its own parliament,

[00:21:08] runs its own affairs, has a population of about 1.9 million people, and is situated between Pakistan and India. Nagaland, never heard of it. The missionaries came to Nagaland’s early last century, and there was a movement of God’s Spirit, and today around 85 to 90% of Nagaland are active believers in church, the highest in the world of Christians in church, Nagaland. Look it up. I bet you some of these students over here got their phones out looking it up on Google already. It’s there. Nagaland. And so as a result, in Nagaland, they have great policies. Their culture has been changed, and they’re promoting the good things that bring glory to God and stamping out the bad things as they raise their ugly head because they are being sold to the earth. So do you think we need 85 to 90% Christian in our country for that to happen? In our state for that to happen?

[00:22:40] The truth of the matter is nothing like that is needed. In fact, Hugh Welchill, who died just last year, did a lot of research in this area. And he was involved primarily in business, and so his studies that he did were studies of what the impact might be of Christians in the workplace in working for a corporation. And so he looked at how many Christians are necessary, alive, vibrant, salt of the earth Christians were necessary to impact a workforce in one place. Any clues? 1%? Big voice. One person? No. No, that’s not what he discovered. He discovered that about 5 to 7% when a workforce had 5 to 7% of spirit-filled salt of the earth believers, it changed the entire workforce of a company, impacted the workforce of the company.

[00:24:31] I look back to the 1950s and 60s in this country and we had a significant amount of salty Christians. But I look today and I’m dependent on others telling me as to the number of salty Christians born again, Bible-believing, active Christians willing to raise the flag for Jesus. How many do you think there are in Australia like that? What percentage? 1%? Just a little more. 2%. Just 2%. And as I look back across these 50 years, 70 years, 80 years, I discover a spiral that’s taking place in our state and in our nation, morally and even culturally. What really hit me was recently discovering what our state did in relation to abortion. That a child born alive will be left to die unaided if that’s the desire of the one who renders birth. Wow. How far have we fallen? How far have we spiralled? And I look at that and

[00:26:36] realise that Christians have spiralled exactly the same rate. What’s that tell me? Well, I’m told that there’s up to 15% of Australians who attend church on a regular basis. What’s happened? That there’s only 2% or less who are willing to fly their flag for Jesus, who are the salt of the earth. I’ll tell you what I think has happened. I think just like the salt brokers in the day of Jesus would often scrape up the mud and the sand and the other elements to extend how much money they get for their salt. You see, that salt has been mixed with bad things. And I believe that we as believers have embraced the mix of bad substances, the things of this world, and we’ve embraced the things of this world. We don’t want to stand out any longer

[00:28:08] because we’re afraid. We’re afraid that people may persecute us. But you know what Jesus said? Blessed are the persecuted. And so we hide our light under a bushel. We allow our saltiness to be devalued. And what do we do as a result? We embrace the things of the world. And we try to hide in the world. Sure, there’s no pressure on coming to church, but when you’re in that discussion around the drink, stand at work tomorrow and the talk is about abortion. What are you going to do? I’ll tell you what most of us do. We shrink back to our office very quickly. All we say is too difficult to say what should be done.

[00:29:30] Listen, if you are in Christ, you are the salt of the earth and you are different. Don’t try and hide from your difference. You see, the world, while they don’t like your views and you are different to them, and they hate the fact that you are different to them, when you integrate with the world, let me tell you, the world will despise you. They’ll at least respect you for your difference. But if you hide your difference, they’ll despise you for it. The truth of the matter is the world wants what you’ve got. And what you’ve got is the gospel of Jesus. And how will they hear unless there’s someone to tell them?

[00:30:50] And they won’t know what they’re looking for until they see the difference in you. Sadly, we have thought as a church that the difference has to be in certain areas. For instance, back in the 60s when all of a sudden we started to grow, men started to grow hair nice and long like yours. The church was up in arms, get a haircut, get a haircut. And then men decided that they could wear a moo moo. Most of you probably don’t even know what a moo moo is. You do. Yes, you’re my age. Cafftan or whatever. And so we said, you’ve got to dress properly, you’ve got to comb your hair,

[00:31:44] and you’ve got to get a job. And we honed in on those things in the 50s and 60s and 70s like you wouldn’t believe when all those people were crying out for was, tell me about the Christ. Tell me about the Christ. Give me the gospel. And what did we give them? We told them, this is the law and this is how you should live, and you need to do it our way. And I’ve run out of time. It’s 10 to 11 and your roast is going to burn if you don’t get home by 12. Is that right?

[00:32:27] Listen, I want to give you a challenge for a New Year’s resolution for 2025. Start being the salt of the earth because that’s who you are in Christ. Stop hiding. And I’m going to tell you, when you stop hiding, you will be persecuted, but Jesus will bless you. He’ll protect you. He won’t protect you from the persecution, but he’ll protect you. I had a pastor friend who passed away last year. He told me a story about when he was a pastor. He got a phone call one day from a nurse at the local hospital.

[00:33:40] And she said, I would like you to come and see me. And he said, oh, I wonder what’s gone wrong. So he went to see her. And she said to him, I just want to say thank you. I’m actually leaving my role here as the head of nursing in this hospital. She said, and I just want to thank you. He said, well, what would you want to thank me for? I mean, I seldom come to this hospital. She said, I have never had such a wonderful experience of a nursing staff like I’ve had here. And he sort of looked at her still a little bit puzzled.

[00:34:26] And she said, I can see the puzzled look on your face. Let me tell you, I just decided to do some research to find out why I had such a good staff and how they got on together and how they carried out their work. And she said, I discovered 10 percent of my staff are from your church and they are bold believers. And as a result, the whole of the nursing staff got on so well and worked so well together and carried out their functions so, so well. Will you be one of those staff that will fly your flag? This year, next year and every other year, because Jesus is in you and he’s called you and made you the salt of the earth.

[00:35:38] It’s a challenge, isn’t it? It really is a challenge in the environment we live in. But do you want to change your community, you want to change your city, you want to change your state? It begins with you being who God has made you, the salt of the earth. Let me pray. Father, we thank you for the Christ who took our place on that cross, who has cleansed us. We thank you that you hold us in the palm of your hand and you won’t let us fall from there. We thank you that you bless us even when we don’t deserve your blessing. Father, would you help us to be courageous and to be salt in our family, to be salt in our community, to be salt in our city.

[00:36:59] That people might see Christ in us and that they might be drawn to you. And Father, that they would hear the gospel message of the Christ who laid down his life for us and of the Father who raised him from the dead and who has put his spirit in us and made us salt of the earth for his glory. Lord, remind us that we belong to you, not this world. And I pray this in Jesus’ holy name. Amen.

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