Question and Answer
What are some of the practical implications of salt imagery for our personal lives today?
Salt imagery has several practical implications for our lives as Christians today. First, we live in a world where sin’s corrupting power is constantly experienced and observed (see Rom. 1:18–32; 2 Tim. 3:1–9; 2 Peter 1:4). The 24/7 news cycle and the pervasive reach of social media heighten our sense of these sinful and corrupting realities. As Christ followers, we should be what Jesus says we are: a penetrating and beneficial influence and gospel force for good, our redeemed presence preserving what is good in this world, keeping it from descent into all-out moral decay and rottenness. It is the presence of the church on earth as salt that has preserved the world from becoming a bag full of morally rotten potatoes!
Second, we are the seasoning of life. It is the presence of Christ-followers living as Christians that gives life its flavor and its zest. We are the seasoning of life and language (see Col. 4:6). Third, we are thirst generators. When we live our lives in the Spirit’s power, we function as salt, generating thirst in others for the things of God and for God Himself.
BY Dr. Winfred O. Neely
Dr. Winfred Neely is Vice President and Dean of Moody Theological Seminary and Graduate School. An ordained minister, Winfred has served churches across the city of Chicago, the near west suburbs, and Senegal, West Africa. He is the author of How to Overcome Worry (Moody Publishers) and a contributor to the Moody Bible Commentary and Moody Handbook of Preaching. Winfred and his wife Stephne have been married for forty years and have four adult children and nine grandchildren.