I am a Jesus pusher!!! “You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned” (Matthew 5:13)? The present tense verb in the indicative mood indicates permanency. But permanency is also in the genitive clause, “of the earth.” You are salt, yes, but for the earth, not for yourselves. The same is true for light. “You are light, but for the whole world, not for a closed fellowship of disciples.” This statement gives us the sense of permanency. This is not a task we accomplish or a duty we perform. There is a call, a permanency, contained within Jesus’ statement, which points to an eternal view. There is no end in view or termination point to anticipate. This is who we are as Kingdom people and it will never change.
Another indicator of the principle of permanency is in the statement, “but if the salt loses its flavor.” This statement provides a problem in the passage. Sodium chloride (salt) does not lose its taste. In other words, the statement in the passage when applied to salt is chemically impossible. At the end of the first century a rabbi was asked, “How could one make saltless salt salty again?” He replied, “One should salt it with the afterbirth of a mule.” Being sterile, mules have no afterbirth; he was simply saying that a stupid question deserves a stupid answer. My helpless state embraced by God’s sovereign Person creates a new creature called the Kingdom of Heaven. There is a permanency to this resource. I do not need to worry about exhausting His resources. Questions such as these are meaningless: What if He grows weak? What do I do when He is not adequate? How do I regain Kingdom status when He is no longer available? What if He grows tired of my weakness? These are foolish questions. Jesus is adequate forever! I am a Jesus pusher!!!