Matthew 5:13 (NIV): “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.”
When Jesus called His disciples “the salt of the earth,” He was not referring to a flavoring or a spice at all. In those days, salt was valued for one main reason: its ability to preserve things, especially meat. If you packed meat in salt, or soaked it in salt, the meat would be preserved. The Egyptians even packed people in natron, a form of salt, and mummified them, preserving them for thousands of years!
What Jesus was pointing to is the preservative effect that God’s people have on a society, a nation, even the world. If we do our job conscientiously, we will keep society from falling into decay and rot. A good example of how this could have worked, but didn’t, is Sodom. When Abraham pleaded with God to save the city of Sodom for the sake of the righteous people who lived there, God agreed that, for the sake of 10 righteous people, He would spare the whole city. (Genesis 18) Those 10 truly righteous people would exert a preservative effect on the whole city, preventing it from sliding into the abyss of sin and into destruction. But God could not find 10 righteous people in that whole city – He only found ONE; only Lot. God saved Lot out of the city, even saving his wife and two daughters by grace (although his wife turned back and was ultimately destroyed as well).
The important point is not that God’s people SHOULD be the salt of the earth, but that we ARE. We are the ONLY thing that can preserve a society. If we truly follow and obey God, having as our focus the enlarging of the kingdom of God by the consistent and focused making of disciples, tearing down the strongholds that satan has erected, and rescuing those who have been taken captive by sin and depravity, IF we will do those things and never waver, we will preserve our society, our nation. If we don’t focus on doing those things, our society will slide inexorably into the abyss of sin, humanism, secularism, complete godlessness, paganism, and ultimately, complete anarchy and disintegration. And if we, as God’s people, allow that to happen by forsaking His commands, by refusing to be on the front lines of the spiritual battle, by shrinking back, staying silent, and retreating into our church buildings, we become worthless, both to God and to the world. We will lose our preservative quality, and are then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled by the men of this world – and we WILL be trampled by them!
All around us we are seeing the decay of our society. All around the darkness is closing in, and sin and lawlessness are taking over. All around us the secularists are flexing their muscles, gaining in strength and influence. And, at the same time, the Church is falling further into a useless, comatose state, drawing in instead of pushing out against the darkness. We have become useless as a preservative.
The path ahead is clear, if nothing changes. We, the people of the Church in this nation, will be trampled on by the men of the world and ultimately stamped out. America will become a pagan nation to which God will have to send missionaries from other nations to bring people into the kingdom, and raise them up to be disciples, raising the Church anew from the rubble.
But things are not hopeless even now. What is impossible with man is possible with God. Even now God can restore new life to the increasingly dry and lifeless bones of His Church. Even now He can breathe His life-giving Spirit into us, and raise us to our feet as a victorious army. Even now He can restore our saltiness, and give our nation a fresh start.
Father, all that You have shown me, all that You have predicted for us and our nation is self-evidently true. Forgive us for losing our focus. Forgive us for doing a thousand things except for what You have commanded us to do. Forgive us for losing our saltiness, our vital power to change and preserve our society. Forgive us for turning our attention away from Your plan for success, relying instead programs, and advertizing, and on trying to use politics and influence politicians. Forgive us for not believing the promises contained in Your word, showing clearly what You can do to remake and reshape our world, retreating instead into our buildings and our programs, praying for Jesus’ speedy return to pull us out of the rotten and decaying world that we find ourselves in; the world that we have allowed to grow into what it is by not preserving it with all of Your strength working through us. Forgive us, Lord for not being the Church as You have called us to be. We have fallen asleep at the switch. We have buried the one talent that You have entrusted to us, showing no increase to present to You at Your return. Help us. Restore us. Change us, before it’s too late. Amen.