A Salty Partner
| "You are the salt of the earth. 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 by men." Matthew 5:13 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. (Colossians4:6) |
Being Partners in Mission in this month of mission, we are reminded to understand and appreciate the fact that we are the Salt of the world. While God's desire is to see the world won to him, we are to make the earth a better and more habitable place through salted conversations.
Salt purifies, preserves and enhances the flavour of food. Therefore being a Salty Partner in the month of missions entails embracing a speech that is loving, caring, gracious and uplifting as opposed to being harsh, bitter and hating. We live in a time where the conversations that are salted with grace are rare. As a Salty partner our conversations need to be seasoned with salt. When we speak we should be uplifting, full of wisdom and challenging.
There are various ways to present the Gospel of Christ to people. However, we must understand the person we are talking to so that we can speak to them in the most helpful way.
We are to season our conversations with salt. Our words should be tasty and delightful to people who hear us. Our words should be used as a preservative to build and to strengthen relationships. Seasoning words with salt means to use speak in a way that is truthful, redemptive, edifying, reflecting God's grace and wisdom. This means speaking with kindness, tact and sensitivity, making our words appealing and useful to others rather than harsh or destructive.
Being a salty partner according to Col 4:6 suggests that our words should have a preservative quality against corruption, a healing quality to sting when necessary to correct and a flavor that makes them more understandable to the hearer.
Remember you are the salt of the earth, Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to communicate well with everyone.
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Sonye Banda, husband to Wiza, father to Kumbutso, Dalitso, Shekinah and Deborah. Enjoys gardening. Serving at St. Peter's Presbyterian Church, Chipata, Zambia.
