One Thing Jesus Didn’t Give Us a Choice About

Salt Doesn’t Work in the Shaker

Salt is one of the only things in your kitchen that will last forever if you let it sit there. It won’t rot. It won’t go stale. A pile of salt will be just as salty in ten years as it is today. But salt that never leaves the shaker? Useless.

Jesus said:

“You are the salt of the earth. But if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored?” (Matthew 5:13)

Salt isn’t meant to be collected. It’s meant to make contact. It only works when it dissolves into something else, enhancing it, preserving it, and drawing out what’s good. That’s exactly how Jesus moved through the world. He didn’t keep his distance. He sat at tables. He walked through dusty streets. He touched the sick. His presence wasn’t just noticed—it changed things.

And ultimately, he took this all the way to the cross. Because what is the cross if not Jesus absorbing all the decay of the world—all the sin, all the brokenness, all the corruption—so that life itself could be preserved? Jesus was the salt of the earth. And if we’re following him, so are we.

But only if we’re actually in the world, doing what salt is meant to do.

---

Light Doesn’t Work If It’s Hidden

Salt works by disappearing—melting into what it touches and changing it from the inside. Light works by being seen. You can’t grab light. You can’t put it in a container for later. Light only exists when it’s doing what it was made to do. The second you cover it up, it stops being what it is.

Which is why Jesus says:

“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden.” (Matthew 5:14)

Jesus didn’t just talk about light—he was light. Everywhere he went, people saw differently. The poor were noticed. The outcasts were welcomed. The powerful weren’t as impressive in his light, and the forgotten weren’t as invisible. Jesus didn’t just reveal the truth—he was the truth.

And the resurrection? That’s where his light shattered the darkness once and for all. The cross looked like the moment the light had been snuffed out. But Easter morning revealed the truth: the light of the world cannot be put out. And if we are in him, then that same light shines in us.

Which brings us back to the question—are we living like it?

---

Some of Us Prefer Salt, Some Prefer Light—But Jesus Says We Are Both

Some people love the idea of being salt. They want to quietly serve, make things better, blend into the background, and never draw attention to themselves. Others? They are light people. They want to stand out, to speak up, to shine so brightly that everything around them is exposed.

But Jesus doesn’t let us choose. We are both.

If we only act like salt—preserving, stabilizing, working quietly—then nothing gets revealed. If we only act like light—shining brightly, exposing what’s wrong—then nothing gets preserved. Salt without light stays hidden. Light without salt loses its grounding. But together? They paint a full picture of what it means to follow Jesus.

---

What Gets in the Way?

If we already are salt and light, then why do we sometimes live like we aren’t? Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s comfort. Maybe it’s the idea that someone else will do it.

Jesus warns us about two things that will ruin our witness:

1. Salt that loses its saltiness.
2. Light that gets hidden.

Can salt actually lose its saltiness? Not really. But in Jesus’ day, what they called “salt” wasn’t pure—it was mixed with other minerals. If exposed to the elements too long, the real salt would leach away, and all that was left was white dust that looked like salt but had no flavor.

That’s the warning. Not that we’ll stop being salt, but that we’ll become so diluted, so compromised, so caught up in other things that we lose our distinctiveness.

And then there’s the light.

What’s the point of a light if you cover it up? That’s like buying a flashlight and then shoving it in a drawer when the power goes out. It defeats its own purpose. But we do it all the time. We hide our light because we don’t want to stand out. We hold back because we don’t want to seem too Christian. We get distracted, entangled, and before we know it, we’re just blending in.

But Jesus is calling us back to who we already are.

---

So… What’s the One Thing We Don’t Get a Choice About?

You caught me. Yes, technically, I’ve talked about two things we don’t get to choose in this post. But both of them flow from one foundational reality:

Jesus has already told us who we are. When he said, “You are salt. You are light,” that wasn’t a suggestion. It wasn’t a goal to work toward. It was a statement of fact. And that’s the one thing we don’t get a choice about.

Now, within that, we do have choices. We can either live as salt and light, or we can ignore what we’ve been given. We can either embrace the full calling, or we can try (and fail) to split it in half. But all of those decisions flow from the indicative—Jesus’ direct statement about who we are.

And this is bigger than just a job description. When Jesus calls us salt and light, he’s giving us his own identity. He was salt—deeply embedded in the world, preserving what was good, restoring what was broken. He was light—revealing truth, exposing injustice, illuminating God’s presence in a way that couldn’t be ignored.

And now, he turns to us and says: This is who you are, too.

So, yes, we do still have choices. But not about whether we are salt and light. That’s already settled.

The only question is: Are we living like it?