The similes of Salt and Light

Our Sunday gospel today is a very short one … but it is one of the most profound teachings that our Lord Jesus Christ has imparted to his apostles and disciples about what we ought to do when we are given the blessing of faith by God our Father. It is the similes of Salt and Light and you can read it in Matt.5:13-16.

 “[Jesus said to his disciples] 13 “You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. 14 You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket: it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to al the house. 16 Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.”

First, let’s deal with what is salt to us? Salt is the world’s oldest known seasoning. If you didn’t know there are many types of salt, there is rock salt, sea salt, table salt, iodized salt and even kosher salt. Here in the Philippines we only know sea salt, as it is the most common, although you can already get the other types in supermarkets that sell imported goods. But one thing is clear, without salt, food is nothing but a tasteless crud.

There are many other uses for salt, which is to preserve food. In Bantayan Island, they use it to preserve dried fish. Without the salt, the dried fish would be tasteless. The same is true with a pig’s leg or hamon, which is seasoned and preserved by the salt. In the time of our Lord Jesus, salt had other uses … as wood was not plentiful in Palestine, the people used dried-out donkey or camel dung mixed with a slab of salt as fuel for their ovens. The salt apparently has the ability to ignite the dung when mixed with it. But often the salt doesn’t burn … hence our Lord says, “It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”

What the Lord is telling us when he said, “You are the salt of the earth” Actually if you opened your Bibles to Leviticus 2:13 it says “However, every cereal offering that you present to the Lord shall be seasoned with salt. Do not let the salt of the Covenant of your God be lacking from your cereal offering. On every offering you shall offer salt.” Then the Evangelist Mark write in Mark 9:49-50 when our Lord says, “Everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if salt becomes insipid, with what will you restore its flavor? Keep salt in yourselves and you will have peace with one another.”

From our lay viewpoint … when the Spirit of the Lord comes to us, we become the salt of the earth; we give flavor to the faith that has been given to us. When people say about a person “He is a seasoned speaker” it means that he speaks with some kind of authority. Salt is therefore right metaphor for discipleship and it doesn’t matter whether your join the clergy or just a layperson. We are to be the salt of the earth.

Therefore after you have had your “Damascus experience” meeting up with our Lord Jesus Christ perhaps in a different way than what happened (usually through a Life of a Spirit Seminar) to Saul of Tarsus, then we just like St. Paul (with the salt of fire in our belly) we should evangelize first to our friends and family then to those who hunger and thirst for the Good News of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

What good would it do if the Holy Spirit bestows upon you the fire of salt, but you merely keep it to yourself? Hence you have to preach the gospel to anyone who cares to listen. Too often I have seen this in many Charismatic Communities people who have embraced a personal relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ and truly became the salt of the earth. However, the Evil One doesn’t rest and snares these disciples and brings them to their spiritual desert. Hence a lot of them have lost their flavor and as the Lord tells us “It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”

This brings us to our being called the Light of the World by our Lord. In a sea of darkness, even a small light from a lighted match attracts everyone. There is so much darkness in the world, which is why our Lord Jesus said, “I am the way and the light”. To give us a clearer understanding of this teaching, we go to the Prologue of the Evangelist John.

In the Prologue in John 1-5 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God… all things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being… in him was life and the life was the light of all people… The light shines in the darkness and he darkness did not overcome it.” Hence there was only darkness in the beginning and God gave light for all people to see. God through his Holy Spirit shares us this light so that we too can light up the darkness within our communities so peace can reign in our land. I write this because I’m the salt of the earth.

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