The Teachings of Jesus: Salt and Light - Matthew 5:13-20

Jesus has gone off a little ways from the crowds. He gathered his disciples and he began to teach them. Jesus has recently begun teaching what has come to be known by Christians, down through the ages as the sermon on the mount by saying, “Blessed are those.” Jesus begins teaching his disciples, speaking blessing upon those who are hurting, who are struggling, calling out those who were seen as the least, as other, as ones who are surely at the bottom of an calculation and left out of most things. Jesus extends the embrace of the promise of God to those who were most overlooked, most stepped over and upon; to those whose struggle may have seemed worthless, undesirable, and without merit. Jesus is informing those who follow him that these who are the least are the ones who are blessed. They are the ones who will inherit the kingdom of God.

Jesus then begins talking directly to his disciples about what it means to be a disciple, what the life of one who follows him will look like. Now that they understand who Jesus values and who Jesus sees as worthy of blessing and promise, what then is one who wishes to follow him, to be one of his disciples to do?

Jesus’ answer to this is a simple metaphor. A follower of Jesus is to be salt and light. Jesus in casting a vision about what it means to be counted among his disciples, and does so begins speaking about salt, light and being more righteous than the strictest adherents to the Law. Phrases like “Salt of the earth,” and “Light of the world,” are not unfamiliar to the seasoned church goer.

Most of us have had heard Sunday school lessons, sermons, Bible study talks, and may even remember a cute little Children’s song or two on one or both of these metaphors (humming “This Little Light of Mine”).  The hardest passages  to learn from, to hear the voice of Jesus continuing to speak to us today, are passages just like this one, which we know so well, and have come to believe that we already know what Jesus is telling us, what God has to teach us. We have already learned this lesson. We can hear it again, affirm its truth, but it has perhaps lost its flavor. Our understanding of what it means to be salt and light has become bland, so we need to taste it anew; we need to shed some light on this and perhaps see it in a new light which has been released from the confines of the darkening basket of overexposure.

Salt is an amazing thing. We cannot live without salt, our bodies need salt to survive, but too much salt will kill you. (I am sure more than one of have hear that from our doctors)  Salt is a fairly simple compound. NACL, Sodium Chloride. It is made up of two elements, which on their own can kill you. Chlorine is a poisonous gas which if combined with water is explosive, and considering we are comprised of, something in the neighborhood of, 65% water, that is not a good thing. Chlorine on its own, it is not something I would advise ingesting. Sodium is a metal, it is not particularly good for you and is somewhat toxic. But salt, the perfect combination of poisonous, explosive gas and toxic metal, is something not one of us can live without, and to make this little miracle compound even better, in the just the right amount, it makes almost everything taste better.

Salt; salt is . . . well salty. It is used to bring out the flavor of food; to make food taste good. Salt is one of the three main ingredients that make bread. Bread was one of the main stays of the ancient diet. It is also used to keep meat and fish from spoiling. As well as being a pretty decent disinfectant. It was one of the single most useful things used by ancient societies.

It was valuable. Everyone used it and everyone needed it. It was even a form of currency. It was used to pay Roman soldiers. The “salary package” of every Roman soldiers included a certain measure of salt. In fact the English word we use, when we are talking about how much we pay a person, Salary, is rooted in the word Salt.  Ever heard someone who is a hard worker referred to as being “worth their salt?” This references that idea that a person who works that hard is worth the salt given to them in pay. Salt was an important and valuable commodity in the ancient world.

The thing about salt is that if it is misused it becomes worthless. If you use too much salt, it ruins the taste of the food (and we all know, too much salt is just plain bad for you), if you don’t use enough salt, it doesn’t do its job, it is as if you have not used it at all.  Too much, too little, either will render it useless, might as well have not used it at all. Might as well have just thrown the salt out on the street to be trampled by all those who passed by. Which I know is something we do, around here, throughout the winter, on purpose, but people would not have done that in the ancient near east.

Salt’s limited ability to de-ice a road was not one its’ many properties which ancient people had discovered. Throwing salt down on the road would have been unheard of and a horrible waste of something valuable. Using too much, or too little, thus robbing salt of its intended purpose, to make food taste good, was robbing if its saltiness, and to do so, was as bad as throwing it in the street. If salt was not salty then it might as well be nothing more than dirt beneath your feet, trampled on, ignored, useless.

The thing about salt being not salty would have been a completely incomprehensible idea. I mean it is a completely incomprehensible statement. If salt is not “salty”. . . then. . . it is not salt. Because being salty is one of the indelible properties of salt. If salt is not salty it is in fact NOT salt, it cannot be.

Light was also just as important but in a very different way. Light as such was not a commodity, able to be bought or sold. The oil needed to make light was very valuable. In fact the miracle, which the Jews celebrate at Hanukah is a miracle of the continued replenishment of the oil needed to keep the Temple lamps lit, at a time when they were unable to purchase the needed to oil needed to keep the lamps lit.

Light in and of itself was important and as such had a certain value.  In a world without electricity and the undying light which it provides, darkness was nearly a tangible force, which consumed and oppressed everyone. Dark permeated and surrounded everything at night. The night with its darkness was dangerous. In the dark of night was when predators hunted. Those who wished to do you ill could hide in the dark and much more easily surprise you, over take you, beat you, rob you, do all sorts of harm to you, and then run off into the night, without ever truly being seen. In order to see at night when the moon is hidden behind clouds, or when you are surrounded by trees where the light of the moon does not easily penetrate, or during the time of the month when it is gone from the sky completely, or at the dimmer points of its cycle, it could be impossible to see your way at night. Light is needed to see in the dark. This is why we have headlights on our cars, and street lights lining our streets. This is why electric lights were invented, because the dark is dangerous.

Dark is, well, DARK. But even at night a city can always be seen from a long way off. At the time Jesus spoke these words, much like today, but to a lesser degree, the cumulative effect of a city worth light, created a glow that could be seen in the distance. A City worth of light can be seen, even on the darkest night. A city, on a hill, at night, could not be hidden from the surrounding countryside.

Light allows you to see what cannot otherwise be seen. In the dark very little can be seen, vague outlines nothing more. Light a candle and once your eyes adjust, you would be amazed at how much you can see with even just one small light. The more light you have, the more that is able to be seen. So Jesus is speaking very logically when he says that no one lights a lamp and then covers it up. (hides it under a bushel – No!) It makes no sense. It is a waste of light, it is a waste of oil and wick. It is a waste. You simply do not do it.

Jesus tells us we are the salt and light of the world. We make things taste good. We preserve that which would otherwise spoil and rot. We allow things to be seen clearly. We illuminate what was otherwise engulfed in the frightening, oppressive force of darkness. In short, Jesus says that his followers are two of the most useful and most valuable things used in the ancient world. If we as Christ’s disciples do not enhance flavor, if we do not glow brightly in the dark, if we are salty-less salt or covered lights, we are useless, we are ridiculous non-sense, dark light, unsalty salt.

And then Jesus ends this section of teaching by telling us we must be more righteous than the Pharisees. The Pharisees were a group which was formed after the exile. Their intentions were good, at first. They saw what had happened when the people of God had not lived by the statutes and ordinances laid out by God. They saw that the consequences of disobeying God’s law were bad, very bad indeed. They wanted to rectify this situation in their own lives and the lives of all those around them.

They wanted to be sure that nothing like the Exile would ever happen again. So they sat upon a quest to follow the law in all things. They even worked to bring clarity to the unclear places of the law, but defining every detail, accounting for every possible scenario and explaining how to understand the law and what to do in every circumstance. And they worked to follow every detail laid out, to never deviate from the strictest applications of the law. So they would know they were righteous before. And they worked to hold all of their fellow Jews to these standards as well. They did not want their people to be sent into exile by God again. They wanted God to be pleased with them at every turn.

I think it comes as no surprise that people who were so focused  on the minute details of following God’s commands in at all times, in all things, that they lost their way as some point. They became so obsessed with this strict adherence to the law, they somehow forgot the God who had given the law; the God who really just wanted to be their God and for them to be God’s people.

They had forgotten the heart of the covenant, even as they recited it morning, noon and night, (literally what the law told them to do), they had forgotten that the core teaching of the law: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your might.” The law was a description of what it meant to be a community of people who lived this all-encompassing love for their God and for the world around them.  They literally tore out the heart of the law, loving God and neighbor, and in doing so tore God out of the law.

Even as they were working to be the people God wanted them to be, by living out all the minute details of the law, they were failing at being the people the God of the law was calling them to be. They were un-salty salt, they were light-less lights. Jesus told those who were listening, you must be more righteous than this. Your righteousness must be salt that is actually making food taste good. You must be salt that keeps things from rotting and spoiling, you must be light that can be seen throughout the house. You must be a city on a hill that cannot help but be seen by all those around you. You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all you might, and your neighbor as yourself (as Jesus himself explains elsewhere).

We are salt and light and to be such, is to be righteous. To be righteous is to be salt, making a world which tastes, bitter, and bland, taste good. We are that which makes the lives of those around us good. We take away the bitterness, as well as the blandness. We are goodness, we are kindness, we are grace and peace to those who lives and work within our spheres of influence.

The thing about salt is when it is doing its’ job, you don’t necessarily know it is there. Things are just good. They taste right. But when it is not boy do you notice. Be salt. Make things good, set things right. Be kind, be gracious, be helpful and just. To be righteous is to be salt in a bland and bitter world. But also do not be overly salty. Do not be too much salt in the stew ruining everything with your intensity, over doing it with your strict adherence to Christian principles while at the same time losing sight of what it means to truly be people who exemplify the nature of God and live out the heart of God in our communities.

To be righteous salt is to be an influence working to counteract the natural decay in the world; inhibiting the rot is going on all around, a disinfectant in a contaminated world. We are to bring God’s justice, grace, love and mercy to all places of our communities, our country, our world; as well as in the lives of the individuals around us. As salt we are to help the hurting, to lift up the weak, to break down the barriers, which trap some within and hold others out. Work to create a world where all are valued equally and all know they are loved, and cared for, not only by us, but by a loving God who is the driving force behind people who are working to bring God’s preservative love to every part of our world.

To be righteous is to be preservative salt, to keep things from decaying, preserve the world, keep it from spoiling, from going bad. To be righteous, is to work to keep work against the forces which rot our society, decay the livelihoods and spoil the lives of people in our world. We are to work to bring kindness, mercy, justice to systems, to people, to keep it all from going bad. To be righteous, is to work to keep the world around us from decaying, from rotting from going foul, being spoiled. We are righteous preservative salt.

To be righteous is to be light; to allow things to be seen clearly. Good light allows all in the house to see; to take away the fear, the danger found in the dark. We are to be a city on a hill, something a weary traveler can see from far away, and head toward; knowing that with us there is safety and security. The light we shine illuminates all that we are doing to bring goodness, graciousness, mercy and justice to this world. Our light shows the world the love of God, in our actions and in our lives, as we work to love God and others in all things, just at the “law” calls us to.

To be righteous is to be salt and light in a world which so desperately needs both. To be righteous is to live a life of radical love in all things in the face of blandness, bitterness and all-consuming darkness.

“This little light of mine. . .”