Sermon Tone Analysis

Matthew 5:13-16

What Would the World be Without a Church?

You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?

It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.

You are the light of the world.

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.

Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.

In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.[1]

In the American West a town was established which boasted that it had no church.

The man who founded the town hated religion and planned a town without any church.

The town lasted in that condition for less than three years.

After a couple of years, the founder put an ad in several Eastern newspapers.

The ad requested a parson to come start a church in that town.

In part, the ad said, “Though I don’t believe in religion and I want nothing to do with a church, no decent woman will move to our town.

The town is full of drunks and thugs and is utterly lawless.

We can’t get a family willing to move to our town.

Therefore, I have concluded that we need a church to change the character of the town.”

The message for this day addresses the value of a church—not any church, but a vibrant, living church within a given society.

The message is the beginning of Jesus’ great sermon which He preached on the hillside that day so long ago in the Holy Land.

He had just delivered the Beatitudes, which have become so precious to us.

Now, the Master addressed His disciples, picking up the theme of who they are—their essential character and how that character of necessity effects the remainder of mankind.

The Presence of a Church Delays Judgement.

You are the salt of the earth.

What is the role of a church within society?

What value is there in the presence of a religious assembly in a town?

A former provincial government debated that issue without coming to a conclusion.

They did not consult me, or I might have suggested some points which are too frequently overlooked.

They were concerned that churches and religious institutions receive tax breaks which deprive municipalities of money and which deprive the province of income.

Tax consideration—clergy housing allowance and automobile metrage allowance—accorded to individuals engaged in religious endeavours is debated with some regularity at the highest levels of federal government.

A growing view among various governments assert that this is just a loss of revenue which would allow even more parliamentary junkets and which would allow even more patronage positions to be apportioned.

Well, can I justify the presence of a church?

Can I justify the consideration which is now accorded churches?

In an egalitarian society, can tax consideration be justified?

Does a church benefit society in any manner?

If it does provide benefit to society, then perhaps the consideration received is valuable for society and worth the potential loss of tax revenue for governmental coffers.

There are the immediate and obvious benefits which accrue to society as result of the presence of churches.

Churches conduct the overwhelming majority of charitable services in contemporary society, and they do so far more efficiently than does any government.

The first hospitals were church sponsored, growing out of Christian compassion for hurting mankind.

The first orphanages were church run, prompted by the deep concern of the people of God for the fatherless and the motherless.

The first homes for the aged were church sponsored and church run as the people of God put into practise their concern for the widows and the widowers.

Virtually all soup kitchens and rescue missions are church based or have their roots in church ministries.

It has been so throughout the many years of history, even to this day.

Historically, it was churches—especially evangelical churches—which promoted and provided for benevolent service within society.

Governments were unconcerned for caring for the weak and injured or the dispossessed and disadvantaged.

Kings did not accept such responsibility and politicians recognised they had no immediate responsibility within these spheres.

Healing and health are innately related to the view held by the people of God that they are responsible to minister to the whole man—body, soul and spirit.

Free medical services, hospitals, long-term care facilities were all originated by churches.

Orphanages, houses of refuge and advocacy for the poor were all services which originated among the churches.

Halfway houses and prison ministries were among the services which churches originated.

Government neither began such ministries nor were governments particularly concerned to either acknowledge the need for such ministries or exercise oversight over them until well into the twentieth century.

I will make one further contention.

When government attempts to serve the weak, the dispossessed and the disadvantaged, they ensure that there are a sufficient number of cracks to allow the majority to fall through.

Further, government will always conduct these ministries at excessive social cost—both fiscally and through loss of human dignity.

It is not government’s role to attempt to replace the compassion of churches nor is it their role to direct or oversee such charitable activity.

Such service lies under the purview of God’s people, arising from the faith of Christ the Lord.

It is not the role of government to redistribute wealth, to provide charity or to control the ministry of the churches which seek to honour Christ through providing such services.

In a practical sense, we must guard against ever receiving government moneys for conducting the ministries to which God called us, and we must never permit government to direct the manner in which we conduct the ministries which God assigns us.

We must maintain freedom in faith and practise, obeying God in such matters.

The value of a church to society is far greater than the sum of its charitable activity, however.

Jesus speaks of Christians, especially when they are united as a congregation, as being the salt of the earth.

Within those words is a powerful apologia for the presence of churches within a community.

We need to understand the role of salt in that ancient day in order to begin to grasp the vital purpose of a church in the towns and cities of our world today.

Recall Jesus’ words.

You are the salt of the earth…  You are the light of the world…  [Ὑμεῖς ἐστε τὸ ἅλας τῆς γῆς… Ὑμεῖς ἐστε τὸ φῶς τοῦ κόσμου].

In either statement, you is plural and by its situation within the sentence it is emphatic.

Jesus was speaking to those who were His disciples within the crowd gathered to hear Him speak.

In these words, the relationship of His disciples to the world is revealed.

Salt has multiple purposes.

It seasons food which is insipid and it preserves food which is corruptible.

These are the common roles assigned to salt to this day.

Perhaps these are the roles which Jesus had in mind as He addressed His disciples.

Disciples are charged to make righteousness attractive to those living in the world as they observe the deportment of the saints, and Christians are to so live as to delay decay in the world.[2]

There is another role which salt played in that ancient world which may give us additional insight into the meaning of Jesus’ words.

The soil could be treated with salt to destroy weeds and to enrich the soil.

In demonstration of this use of salt in that day, I need but refer you to *Luke 14:34, 35* where the Master used this same parable, but with a twist.

Salt is good, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?

It is of no use either for the soil or for the manure pile.

It is thrown away.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

From this parable, it should be obvious that salt was used for making soil more productive.

Perhaps this will make more sense for you if I inform you that most salt in the region about Galilee, where Jesus ministered throughout His days in the flesh, came from evaporated pools around the Dead Sea.

This salt was contaminated with gypsum and other impurities.

Salt, left exposed to the atmosphere, draws moisture from the air.

Moisture, when it caked the salt, and then evaporated, would leave behind these impurities, which were mixed with it in the soil.

Such salt would no longer be capable of seasoning or preserving, but it could serve to fertilise, even hindering weed growth.

When even this function is gone, the salt became worthless.[3]

Put this together and you will see that it is the church which is responsible to set the moral standard of the community.

We do so through being Christian within the community.

We attract outsiders to the Faith of Christ the Lord and create in them a desire to know Him as they observe our conduct.

In reality, a vibrant church ensures that there are always those who adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour [see *Titus 2:10*].

What has this to do with delaying judgement?

Let me remind you of an incident recorded in the first book of the Bible.

God determined that He would destroy the cities of the plain—Sodom and Gomorrah.

Abraham pleaded with God, obtaining a promise that judgement would be delayed if there were fifty righteous people in the city.

He continued to plead with God until at last God promised that even the presence of ten righteous people would delay judgement [*Genesis 18:22-33*].

It may be that Abraham thought that surely Lot and his family would have influenced at least a similar number of people to embrace righteousness.

However, when the angels of judgement arrived in the city, they found Lot, together with his wife and his two daughters.

Lot’s wife yearned to remain in Sodom.

His daughters proved that they were anything but righteous.

Lot, alone, is described as a righteous man, and that only after thousands of years have passed when Peter writes of him [*2 Peter 2:7, 8*].