Wise Walking and Salty Speech
Colossians 4:5-6
Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time. Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.
Paul, having dealt with prayer for the spreading of the gospel in the previous verses, now turns to each believer’s responsibility to labour in his or her own life for this dispersion of the gospel.
The ESV translates the end of verse 5, “making the best use of the time.” God puts on our path opportunities to evangelise and Paul tells us to make the most of these opportunities. He says we are to do so firstly by our ‘walk of wisdom’ (verse 5) and secondly by our seasoned speech (verse 6).
Paul’s not the only one who tells us to be wise. In Matthew 10:16 Jesus tells His disciples to be “wise as serpents”. James, too, tells his readers to exercise wisdom (James 3:13) and gives us a description of how to walk in wisdom: “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy” (James 3:17).
It is hard to act this way. Our sinful nature so often takes over. But God gives us clear directives for growing in wisdom. He gives us His Word, by which we grow in wisdom (Psalm 19:7). He also gives us the gift of prayer, so that we may ask Him for it (James 1:5). He also gives us wise people around us to give us knowledge and instruction (Job 12:12; Psalm 37:30). Finally as we grow in real life experience, we gain knowledge and wisdom (Hebrews 5:14).
We are to evangelise by our actions. As we act in a wise and godly manner we bring glory to our God. We show that we are different, that we have a shining hope inside us. When the unbelievers around us see that, they marvel and ask us about it (1 Peter 3:15). And so in our evangelism we are not only to be godly in our actions, but also know what we are to say when asked about the Gospel. Paul deals with that in verse 6: “Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.”
Without salt, food is bland and unseasoned. It’s tasteless and unappetising. Our speech is not meant to be like that. Paul tells us that our speech about the gospel must be as appealing as possible.
How do we do this? How do we speak about God’s grace and Christ’s death and the Spirit’s power in a way that attracts people to the gospel? In Luke 2:10 the angel calls the gospel ‘good news of great joy.’ The gospel is attractive all by itself. In fact, there’s nothing more beautiful than the gospel! Paul’s not requesting us to “spice it up,” put a bow on it or add anything to it, for there’s no such need. We simply must be more careful not to hide its beauty by our tackiness, foolishness and lack of manners.
In order to do that, we need to value the gospel ourselves. People should see that we trust, obey and thank God in all things. We need to ensure the gospel tastes good in our own mouth and looks good in our own eyes. Spend time meditating on the greatness of God and His grace. We need to be like David, who says, “In Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11).
Once we value the gospel as the life-giving, joy-bestowing gift it really is it will be a lot easier to talk about it in an appealing way. Our heart will overflow with the goodness in it so that we will be able to answer each one in the way that we ought.
So let’s take every opportunity for gospel-spreading with wise conduct and salty speech. And beneath it all let's set our eyes on Christ in the gospel until we taste how appetizing and satisfying he is for our own souls.
“I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).
Part 1: Praying for the Open Door
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