Power in the Pulpit | Matthew 5:13–16

Intro: How many of you remember the first time you realized you had friends going down a bad road. When I was a sophomore in high school we were at lunch one day going towards the end of the school year. Where I went to high school we ate lunch outside, and it was kind of away from where people were at lunch. Well, on this particular day, several of the people I ate lunch with decided they were going to smoke pot behind a greenhouse thing that was out there. My first priority was getting the heck out of there. I went to the library and worked on homework. I was not going to be anywhere near there if a teacher or administrator walked up. Then later that day, several different people I was friends with walked next door to a friend’s house to smoke. Now, I knew that there were people in my grade that did these things. I was not naive to that. But it was the first time I had friends that were doing that. And I remember feeling so helpless knowing that I had friends that were starting to go down a bad path.

I’m sure some of you are experiencing that now. I’m sure some of you are watching your friends start to go down a bad path. And you probable wonder is there anything that can be done? Jesus thought so. In fact he says that you have the answer. You. I propose to you tonight, that the world is in need of our faithfulness to show them who God is. We will see that we are needed to preserve our culture and impede the darkness in our culture. If you would, would you please stand as we honor the reading of God’s Word.

Matthew 5:13.

Exposition: So the first thing we read is verse 13 where Jesus says, Matthew 5:13 ““You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.” Now earlier we had the unsalted ketchup. I regret to inform you, this is not what this verse actually means. So that was something I did for my sake and not really for yours.

Explanation: In this time period there was no refrigeration. You know now, you can go to the supermarket and pick something up and throw it in the fridge and leave it for a few days and it’s good. If they were going to preserve meat, they had to load it down with salt. The amount of salt it would take to be able to leave meat out with no climate control I think is unfathomable to us. I think we are talking about more than McDonald’s french fries on their saltiest day. That’s how salty we are talking. It would have been covered in salt. So when Jesus tells his disciples that they are the salt of the earth, he is saying that they are the one’s who are responsible for preserving the world. He is telling them that the culture is dependent on them to be saved. And this should make sense to us. God created the world to function in a certain way, but when that way is not followed, things get worse. In fact, we do not have to go far to see exactly how the world gets worse when people do not do not live in the way God intended us to live. In fact how many people do we see that we live contrary to God’s Word that end up making destructive decision after destructive decision. And who is going to stop that. Are people that are doing the exact same things going to be the ones that share the truth with them and cause them to stop. Probably not. It is Jesus’ disciples that are expected to be the ones that speak truth into people’s lives and help them see the wisdom that in found in following Christ and living faithfully to God’s Word.

Exposition: But Jesus finishes up verse 13 by saying, “but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.” When we buy salt in the grocery store, it is purified salt. There is nothing found in that container other than salt. It is physically and chemically impossible for salt to lose its salty taste. That’s just what salt is. But that’s not how salt really worked in this time period.

Explanation: I’m sure just about all of us have heard of the dead sea at some point. The Dead Sea is extremely salty. I know you think ocean water is salty, but its even more salty than that. It is so salty that nothing can even live in it. Well this is where the salt that people in Israel would have used to preserve their food came from. But there was something that was a risk to the people of Israel. Often times they could think that when they filtered the water and and used the particles that were left to preserve their food, mixed in the salt could be something other than salt. And when this happened, it could be extremely dangerous for the people. Because that which was not salt did not have the ability to preserve the meat. And then t

What Salt did

What is meant by salt losing its saltiness

How Jesus is applying this to his followers

To be thrown out- to lose purpose

Transition:So we see God telling us that our job as Christians is to preserve the culture. That is a big task. How do we even go about doing that? Jesus tells us how in verses 14-16.

Matthew 5:14-16.

Verse 14

Explain how they are the light of the world.

Explain what a city on a hill would look like compared to a city in a valley

Verse 15

What a lamp and lampstand were like in Biblical times. What were their purposes.

What are ways in which we hide our light?

Verse 16

What are ways we let our light shine

The ultimate purpose is for people to see the glory of God.

Conclusion: One thing we must understand about this is that it does come with responsibility. In the book I’ve already referenced several times, John Stott says, “We must accept the responsibility which this distinction puts upon us. Each affirmation begins in the Greek sentence with the emphatic pronoun ‘you’ as much as to say ‘you and you only you’ are the earth’s salt and the world’s light.” This obviously asks a lot of us. Stott goes on to write, “Salt and light have one thing in common; they give and expend themselves- and this are the opposite of any and every kind of self-centered religiosity.” To be the salt and light Jesus is calling us to be, is going to cost us something. It’s going to take boldness on our parts. But you’re not doing it for you. You’re doing it for the sake of those who are at risk of going down a bad road. You are doing it because the world is in need of a Godly influence. The world is in need of somebody to show them there is a better way, and if we are not the ones that do that, then nobody else will. What role will you play in helping others find out there is a better way? Can you commit tonight to praying for that person?