“You are the salt of the earth. Yet, if the salt has become tasteless, in what way shall it be made salty? It is no good except to be thrown out and trampled by man.”

(Matthew 5:13)

Idiomatically, the phrase “salt of the earth” has come to mean someone who is reliable, dependable, trustworthy, and not a fraud. When this phrase is used, we typically think of those who are not pompous or full of themselves and who do not approach you with ulterior motives. They say what they mean, and they mean what they say, and you can rely on them to fulfill the promises that they make. Typically, folks who fall into this category are not flashy and self-aggrandizing. They exhibit a genuine care and interest in their neighbors’ welfare and consider the needs of others ahead of their own. Nevertheless, given that our focus has not been on individuals but on the church as a whole, the question that we ought to ask is whether such adjectives describe the church as a whole. Sadly, it often does not.

Today, many churches have embraced more of a business model in terms of how they behave toward the community. They advertise, they put on events to promote themselves. They seek to attract followers of themselves rather than followers of Jesus Christ. Early on in my ministry, I served two small congregations, neither of which could support a pastoral call on their own. While there, I visited one of the area churches that had well over a thousand members and asked the pastor to consider sending ten families to these two churches. They were of the same denomination and were less than ten miles down the road from one another. I suggested that these families could see themselves in a missional sense with the aim of helping to breathe life into these struggling churches. The answer I received was a resounding, “No!” In the end, the message was clear, for the larger church, its membership was essentially its customer base and people were quick to build their own “church brand” rather than to build the church. When a church becomes more interested in its kingdom than in The Kingdom, the church ceases to be salt of the earth. 

Much has been written about the nature of salt and its importance in the ancient world. It was used as a method of seasoning and preserving, much as we still use it today, but it was also part of the sacrificial system (Leviticus 2:13) and in other parts of the ancient world, it was even used as a form of currency. Like gold and silver, salt never truly degrades and it is a natural resource that is essential to the functioning of a community. How true that should be for the life of the church. Communities wherein a vibrant and Biblical church resides should be places of health and not of moral decay. Its sacrifices of praise (Hebrews 13:15) ought to be joined by the covenant of salt that God has made with us as His people (Leviticus 2:13; Numbers 18:19, 2 Chronicles 13:5). Covenant of salt? It is symbolic of the irrevocable nature of God’s promise to His elect. It’s a reminder that no matter how the True Church is surrounded by and mixed into the sin-contaminated world, it is never “watered down” or compromised. Salt remains salt.

But wait a minute. What about when the “salt loses its saltiness” (Mark 9:50)? As Matthew records, when salt is no longer “salty,” it is good for nothing but to be trodden underfoot. Yet, didn’t I say that “salt remains salt”? How do these two ideas harmonize? To answer this question, we must distinguish between the nature of salt itself as a mineral and salt’s effect on the world around it; the difference between the individual life of a Christian and the effect of the Christian church on the world around it. For, while NaCl remains salt and can always be reconstituted, no matter how greatly it is watered down, just as one of God’s elect remains elect no matter how inundated by the world he may be, “saltiness” is the measure by which salt can be seen affecting the environment it is in, just as the true church should be clearly separate and distinguishable from the community around it. 

Salt can be diluted. It remains salt, but the more diluted it becomes, the less distinguishable it is. Similarly, churches often become diluted with the world and when that happens, the church ceases to be truly distinguishable from the world. Remember what Jesus said, the world will hate the church because the world hated Christ and the church belongs to Christ. When the church looks more and more like the culture around it, we must ask whether the church has truly lost its saltiness. Just as salt can always be reconstituted as the water is evaporated away, so too can the church be renewed as it puts to death those things of the world it has embraced. What is sad is when (as is often the case) churches cease to be true and faithful representatives of the salt they are meant to be. 

Or, perhaps we might speak more plainly. When the church ceases to submit to Christ as her King and Bridegroom, then it ceases to be a true church. It ceases to be salty and it’s only value is to be trampled underfoot on the path. Many things present themselves as the church in today’s world, but many such things are little more than country clubs built on the remembrance of a past rooted in the Word of God. Their sacraments become traditions, their preaching becomes self-help, and their discipline disappears entirely. Sometimes there is no true salt left within it; sometimes the true salt is so watered down that it cannot be seen and its effects cannot be felt. God calls such believers to “go out from their midst and be separate” (2 Corinthians 6:17). That calls for the stepping out of the comfortable and worldly, a fearful thing for many.