Sermon Tone Analysis

Prayer

Prayer

Intro

Please open your Bibles with me to the Gospel of Matthew.

We'll look at a portion of chapter 5 today.

Over the next four weeks, our series will allow us to examine four specific points Jesus made in his Sermon on the Mount.

As we study together, we will unpack Jesus' sayings on salt, sin, sharing, and the storage of treasures.

Today, we will discuss the teaching of Jesus for His disciples to be the Salt of the Earth.

As you're turning there, Matthew relayed Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, and the first 12 verses cover the beatitudes.

In those general statements of blessing, Jesus explained that certain types of people would be blessed.

It's important to note that the kind of blessed people Jesus refers to cannot become those types of people on their own accord but rather need the Lord to develop godly personalities among them.

As he began the Sermon, Jesus was essentially sharing the summary and essence of what the rest of the Sermon would be about.

Speaking to his followers (5:1), Jesus shares the reality of discipleship lived in the presence and power of the kingdom of God but within the everyday world.

As one commentary shares, "these teachings, when rightly understood, form a challenging but practical ethic that Jesus expects his followers to live by in this present age."

(ESV Study Bible).

Today, with God's help, we will seek to understand and apply Jesus' teaching on His followers being the Salt of the Earth.

We'll also include verses on being the light of the world, but our main focus will be on the saltiness we've been called to.

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With that said, let's look to the Scriptures together.

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Matthew 5:13–16; Matt 11:30; John 13:35; Colossians 4:6

Matthew Henry once said, "The Sermon on the Mount is a practical discourse; there is not much of the credenda of Christianity in it—[that is] the things to be believed, but it is wholly taken up with the agenda—the things to be done; these Christ began within his preaching; for if any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God.

The circumstances of the Sermon being accounted for, the Sermon itself follows, the scope of which is, not to fill our heads with notions, but to guide and regulate our practice" (Matthew Henry, Commentary on Matthew 5).

After finishing the beatitudes, Jesus teaches his followers to make an impact on the world in which they live.

The first way He chooses to do this is by using the illustration of salt.

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The Science of Salt

Now before we get into the application, let's take a minute to talk about salt, not in illustrative terms, but in somewhat scientific ones.

I don't know if you will be as I share, but I was fascinated as I studied salt in preparation for today.

Now, when I was in high school, I took Chemistry, as almost everyone does, I assume.

My problem was that my Chemistry class took place on the third floor immediately after lunch.

My high school was a near ancient building with poor air conditioning at that time.

The third floor got very warm, and as I said, it was Chemistry...after lunch.

Do you see where I'm going with this?

We'll, I didn't do an excellent job of paying attention.

I had just been adopted, so my last name was Andrews at that point, and I was sitting in the front row, and my teacher, no joke, lived on my street.

Neither of those things was enough to keep me awake, so if we learned about salt, I didn't retain it.

I say that because I recently learned quite a bit about salt.

For instance, before we talk science, did you know that we owe the word "salary" to salt?

To be 'worth one's salt' is to be worth one's pay.

Our word salary derives from the Latin salarium (sal is the Latin word for salt).

There is some debate over the origin of the word salarium.

Still, most scholars accept that it was the money allotted to Roman soldiers to purchase salt, though Roman soldiers weren't actually paid in salt, as some suggest.

They were obligated to buy their own food, weapons, etc., and had the cost of these deducted from their wages in advance.

So if they weren't doing what they ought to, they weren't worth their "salt money."

Now, for the science.

Salt is a stable compound of sodium chloride.

This is why Jesus' question about salt losing its saltiness is rhetorical.

Apart from an outside process, sodium chloride will cease to be sodium chloride.

By a show of hands, how many people own a pool?

Anyone?

It's not that important; I am just looking to see who I need to become better friends with.

In Georgia, we owned a house with a pool.

Had we stayed there, we would have been interested in converting it into a saltwater pool.

A scientist explains, "Saltwater swimming pools draw on dissolved salt in the water to generate chlorine.

The salt cell or generator utilizes a process called electrolysis to break down or separate the salt also known as sodium chloride or NaCl in the water.

The chemical reaction created by electrolysis produces chlorine in the form of sodium hypochlorite and hypochlorous acid.

These sanitizing / disinfecting / oxidizing agents are the same as chlorine commonly used in swimming pools in solid and powdered form [though in a less odorous and irritating way].

This means a saltwater pool is not actually chlorine free.

It simply utilizes a chlorine generator instead of being dependent on chlorine added in other forms."

(Bluescience.com)

As I said, by itself, salt cannot stop being salt.

Salt is typically found by salt water evaporating, leaving salt deposits behind, or mining it.

From the evaporation process, one could have pure salt.

Other elements and minerals would be mixed in with the salt when being extracted from the ground.

If salt were exposed on the ground when the rain fell, the salt would dissolve, and many other minerals would remain, but it would be essentially useless, and tossed out.

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Uses for Salt

Until the invention of canning and refrigeration, salt was necessary for preserving and curing food.

"Salt is effective as a preservative because it reduces the water activity of foods.

The water activity of a food is the amount of unbound water available for microbial growth and chemical reactions.

Salt's ability to decrease water activity is thought to be due to the ability of sodium and chloride ions to associate with water molecules.

Adding salt to foods can also cause microbial cells to undergo osmotic shock, resulting in the loss of water from the cell and thereby causing cell death or retarded growth" (National Library of Medicine, "Preservation and Physical Property Roles of Sodium in Food," Strategies to Reduce Sodium Intake in the United States, 2010, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK50952/).

In large quantities, when salt was spread over a defeated people's farmland, the land became infertile.

When used correctly, small amounts of salt can serve as a fertilizer.

Scientifically speaking, salt is incredible.

It's necessary for life and serves many purposes.

In interpreting scripture, we must ask, what would the text have meant to the original readers?

Since electrolysis didn't exist yet, Jesus wasn't referring to the loss of salvation by talking about salt losing its saltiness by some outside force breaking up the disciple.

Is it possible, however, that Jesus was referring to life and the world's effect on the disciple having the potential impact of the disciple dissolving or blending into the very things it was mixed with?

Unlike saltwater, which retains its saltiness, the blending we're talking about here is where the salt washes away and makes no impact whatsoever.

Jesus knew exactly what He was doing by using a metaphor that worked on many different levels.

Disciples of Jesus are to be like salt: although ordinary, found everywhere, and involved in pretty much everything, they also have a variety of roles to play while awaiting the Lord's return.

Andrew Wilson, a pastor in London, shared in his book, The God of All Things, several ways that salt was used.

Let's look at some those and how we are to be used as salty disciples.

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Salt Flavors

The first application of this metaphor to be "the salt of the earth" is to enhance or to season the flavor of life in the world.

This is done by enriching the good things around us and standing out from the commonly accepted routines.

In Luke 6:35, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and to do good to them.

Immediately after telling His followers about the persecution they would be blessed by facing, Jesus tells them they are salt.

When others see us and how we respond to the struggles and persecution, they come away with a different taste than what the world offers.

As we behave in ways that reflect God's nature, we emphasize the difference Jesus makes in one's life.

So salt flavors.

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Salt Preserves

Secondly, we see that salt is used to preserve.

As I mentioned, a scientific process happens when salt is applied to food as a preservative.

As followers of Jesus, we maintain the goodness around us and prevent corruption or decay when sent into the world.

For example, have you ever noticed that others tend to think twice before telling a lewd or demeaning joke in the presence of one who lives a noticeably godly life?

Christians ought to have a reputation for high moral integrity.