Sunday, April 13, 2014

Salt - III

I tend to look at salt as a metaphor for the attractive qualities of Jesus and his family. The things that make people want to be with Jesus. The things that make people to chose Jesus as their first allegiance and follow him.

Several of us got together for a birthday celebration this past week. As always, conversations spanned a large spectrum of subjects: sports, politics, family, etc.

A few of us got talking about different "things" involving people who chose to follow Jesus, but have gone onto build big "things" for Jesus. Big churches. Big organizations. Big budgets. Big programs.

Often, when people describe what is bad about Christianity, people like this are mentioned. They are:
  • Judgmental.
  • Intolerant.
  • Only interested in money.
  • Only interested in themselves. 
If it is "salt" that makes us want to be with Jesus, many would consider that these people seem to have lost theirs. They do seem to like large crowds. But the crowds are not like Jesus' crowds. The rejects of society are not sitting in the front row. Moreover, Jesus did not seem to need crowds.

So, have these lost their "salt", because they chose to not follow Jesus? Or have they lost their "salt", because of contaminants? Maybe ideas about success\failure, what is valuable, what is important that are not Jesus' ideas about these things have gotten planted (to do a quick switch in metaphors) and the fruit is an urgent need to maintain their status, and not an urgent need to be truly "salt."

No comments: