More Than Enough for Taste

        While watching the Packers succumb to a horrible defeat on Saturday, I made the best of a pretty lousy game by eating pizza and nachos and cheese with my wife and her family. And did you know that in 7 tortilla chips you can get 5% of your daily needs for sodium, and in one slice of pizza you get about 30%? So after four slices of pizza, and half a bag of chips, I went way over on my salt intake, and that doesn't even account for the cheese dip... But there just seems to be something truly patriotic about watching football while ingesting insane amounts of sodium. Salt just makes everything taste better, am I right??

      And this was the mindset I read Matthew 5:13 with. Jesus said, "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt of the earth 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." Salt makes things taste good, and it is better in high quantities. Chinese food, pizza, Italian: everything that is good is salty. Including the people of God. Christians provide the flavor to the world. Christians make the world "taste good" to God. That's how I took Jesus' words.

Until I had a conversation with my dad.

     He told me that he didn't think that's the way Jesus meant it. Jesus doesn't want us all to die from high cholesterol and heart attacks. Salt was the main preservative of the ancient world; they didn't have all of these fancy chemicals and canning processes we do nowadays. Jesus was telling his followers that they are supposed to preserve the world. Jesus' disciples help to keep the world fresh.

     Well, needless to say, my father's words gave me a deep insight into the heart of Jesus. Jesus wants his disciples to keep the world from perishing. He wants his followers to take care of people in need, to help out in their communities, to act lovingly toward everyone. This type of saltiness will keep the world moving forward and keep Jesus' Kingdom growing. (This type of saltiness might mean that we advocate for less saltiness in foods and fight against childhood obesity and malnutrition!) We are supposed to keep this place around us fresh.

     Jesus has rescued you. Through his resurrection from the dead, he has secured life for you! He has delivered you from the things that once enslaved you. And now, Jesus has put you somewhere to preserve life in your community. There might be elderly people in need of someone to talk to. There might be children in need of some tutoring. There might be abused people, poor people, smart people, uneducated people who need someone to help preserve their lives. People around you need rescuing! A famous theologian once said that if there is nothing more to the Christian life than believing in Jesus and trusting in his promises, then Christians should just be taken immediately to heaven once they believe. But that is not the case; we have been given time and a task. How can and will you do something to be the "salt of the earth" Jesus asks you to be?