This past Sunday, we talked about Matthew 5:13 and the importance of salt. Now let’s take a look at the second part of that verse – where it talks about salt becoming tasteless and being absolutely useless:

But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

What good is salt that has lost all of its flavor? Not very good is it? You might as well be dumping some fine grain sand on your food. In the same way, we as Christians need to make sure that we are not losing our flavor. We need to make sure we are continuing to check our flavor by giving ourselves periodic “spiritual check-ups.” How are we doing in our walk with Christ? Are we moving forward, or are we just kind of coasting along? Do we still have that fire within us burning brightly, or has it been reduced to a tiny flame, barely staying lit? We need to make sure that more important than anything else, we our spending time with Jesus every single day. It is only when we do that, that we keep our fires burning brightly. We may be fooling ourselves, but others around us can definitely see changes in us when we aren’t. They can see when little things start bugging us more than usual. They can see it in our attitude and our reactions. If I am telling somebody about the joy and hope that Christ can bring to their life, while at the same time I’m walking around like everything is hopeless, what kind of message am I really sending?

As Christians, we should be checking on each other as well. If people walking in darkness can see changes in us, shouldn’t we who profess to walk in the light notice even that much more? When we see our brothers and sisters changing, it is our responsibility to be there for them – to help them. After all, we all need a little nudge once in a while, don’t we? A little bit of encouragement? Look around, be there for each other; help each other keep our flavor stoked. When we do that, when we truly act as a unified body, we can reach this world for Jesus in ways we never could have imagined.