In his book, Led By The Carpenter, D. James Kennedy tells the following story:
A man walked into a little mom-and-pop grocery store and asked, "Do you sell salt?"
"Ha!" said Pop the proprietor. "Do we sell salt! Just look!" And Pop showed the customer one entire wall of shelves stocked with nothing but salt - Morton salt, iodized salt, kosher salt, sea salt, rock salt, garlic salt, seasoning salt, Epsom salts, every kind of salt imaginable.
"Wow!" said the customer.
"You think that's something?" said Pop with a wave of his hand. "That's nothing! Come look." And Pop led the customer to a back room filled with shelves and bins and cartons and barrels and boxes of salt. "Do we sell salt!" he said.
"Unbelievable!" said the customer.
"You think that's something?" said Pop. "Come! I'll show you salt!" And Pop led the customer down some steps into a huge basement, five times as large as the previous room, filled wall, floor, to ceiling, with every imaginable form and size and shape of salt, even huge ten-pound salt licks for the cow pasture.
"Incredible!" said the customer. "You really do sell salt!"
"No!" said Pop. "That's just the problem! We never sell salt! But that salt salesman, Hoo-boy! Does he sell salt!"
Dr. Kennedy goes on to make the point that salt that stays on the shelf doesn't do any good at all. In his famed Sermon on the Mount on the New Testament Gospel of Matthew (chapter 5, verses 13-16), Jesus Christ calls those of us who follow Him to be the salt of the earth:
13You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its savor, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.
14You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. Instead, they set it on a lampstand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
As such, our job is to find a way to get off the shelf and out and into people’s lives! May we be faithful to do so!
STORY SOURCE: D. James Kennedy, Led By The Carpenter (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1999), p. 46.
SCRIPTURE SOURCE: https://biblehub.com/bsb/matthew/5.htm.
A man walked into a little mom-and-pop grocery store and asked, "Do you sell salt?"
"Ha!" said Pop the proprietor. "Do we sell salt! Just look!" And Pop showed the customer one entire wall of shelves stocked with nothing but salt - Morton salt, iodized salt, kosher salt, sea salt, rock salt, garlic salt, seasoning salt, Epsom salts, every kind of salt imaginable.
"Wow!" said the customer.
"You think that's something?" said Pop with a wave of his hand. "That's nothing! Come look." And Pop led the customer to a back room filled with shelves and bins and cartons and barrels and boxes of salt. "Do we sell salt!" he said.
"Unbelievable!" said the customer.
"You think that's something?" said Pop. "Come! I'll show you salt!" And Pop led the customer down some steps into a huge basement, five times as large as the previous room, filled wall, floor, to ceiling, with every imaginable form and size and shape of salt, even huge ten-pound salt licks for the cow pasture.
"Incredible!" said the customer. "You really do sell salt!"
"No!" said Pop. "That's just the problem! We never sell salt! But that salt salesman, Hoo-boy! Does he sell salt!"
Dr. Kennedy goes on to make the point that salt that stays on the shelf doesn't do any good at all. In his famed Sermon on the Mount on the New Testament Gospel of Matthew (chapter 5, verses 13-16), Jesus Christ calls those of us who follow Him to be the salt of the earth:
13You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its savor, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.
14You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. Instead, they set it on a lampstand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
As such, our job is to find a way to get off the shelf and out and into people’s lives! May we be faithful to do so!
STORY SOURCE: D. James Kennedy, Led By The Carpenter (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1999), p. 46.
SCRIPTURE SOURCE: https://biblehub.com/bsb/matthew/5.htm.