Life of Jesus - Week 6

We’ll be splitting up the sermon on the mount into a few parts.

Matthew 5:13–16 NIV

“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 underfoot. “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.

Let’s talk about

Salt

We use salt as flavouring.

Back then, it was a preservative. And in some circumstances, it was even used in fertilizer.

Even now - salt is an essential part of our diet.

God’s priority all through the OT was about rescue and preservation

In Nehemiah, the exiles are starting to return to their land from Persia. They are on the tail end of a judgment from God.

Nehemiah 9:26–28 NIV

“But they were disobedient and rebelled against you; they turned their backs on your law. They killed your prophets, who had warned them in order to turn them back to you; they committed awful blasphemies. So you delivered them into the hands of their enemies, who oppressed them. But when they were oppressed they cried out to you. From heaven you heard them, and in your great compassion you gave them deliverers, who rescued them from the hand of their enemies. “But as soon as they were at rest, they again did what was evil in your sight. Then you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies so that they ruled over them. And when they cried out to you again, you heard from heaven, and in your compassion you delivered them time after time.

You have this loop, over and over again. And when God abandons the people to their enemies, we can ask ourselves - where’s the love of God there?

Jesus isn’t trying to ignore the decay - he’s trying to prevent it by bringing life

STORY - I am very paranoid about spoiled food.

Spoiled food is just the worst. It smells, it’ll make you sick. Eat enough of it and it’ll kill you.

As people - we can spoil easily. But our problem isn’t just bacteria and oxygen. It’s sin.

James 1:14–15 NIV

but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.

So in each one of us, we have this force, acting to drive us towards death.

and this was sin #1. Wanting to know stuff and do stuff God didn’t want us to know and do.

So all through history, God is working in humanity. Not JUST to forget about all the decay. But to remove the decaying agent from our nature.

Sometimes we act like, all Jesus aimed to do was just throw open the doors to heaven and say ok, come on in! Jesus came, with his death to be the antidote to the poison in our nature.

John 3:16 NIV

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

We don’t skip the middle. It doesn’t say - God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son so that anyone has eternal life.

It says, God so loved… so that whoever believes in him shall not perish.

Jesus gave a bit of a morbid illustration on this in John 6

John 6:53–58 NIV

Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Our lives naturally decay and die - Jesus’ life brings eternity

I’ve had people ask me, how can you follow a God that condemns people.

But here’s the thing. We’ve condemned ourselves. We’re the ones who jumped off the bridge.

And God has moved heaven and earth to give us a way out of our conundrum. But we need to choose it.

SIDEBAR - We NEED to choose this. God COULD force us. I could force my kids to obey my every whim. But then will I actually raise children?

Is it really life if we sit back, kick up our feet, and let God do absolutely everything? (Wall-e - people got lazy to the point of uselessness)

If you think about it. If we’re the problem, and we’re asking God to simply get rid of the problem and erase it - that’s bad for us, right?

So Jesus came, died on the cross, and in his sacrifice, He paved the road we could follow down to get back to life. Rather than abandon creation to decay, He brought the only way to preserve humanity.

We just need to walk it.

Next, let’s talk about

Light

Light back then is pretty much the same as now.

We have so much light everywhere. But if you’ve ever been out in the middle of nowhere, no electric lights around - it’s really, really dark.

We need light at all times to be able to see, to navigate, to do anything.

Jesus’ reference to a city on a hill. Think about it sort of like a lighthouse. The POINT is to be visible. It’s a marker. They didn’t have GPS, giant green road signs, etc.

God is the light against the darkness

Through scripture, light is this extra important allegory. It’s not like physical dark spaces are actually bad. But darkness is synonymous with evil.

And God is the ultimate source of light in this ‘darkness’. The light is so great, that nothing else can stand against it.

Psalm 27:1 NIV

The Lord is my light and my salvation— whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life— of whom shall I be afraid?

The bible clearly identifies Jesus as continuing this path of light:

John 1:4–5 NIV

In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Salt is one half of this equation. Salt is about preserving and preventing the process of death in us.

Jesus has come to remove all sources of evil, once and for all

Revelation paints this beautiful picture of Jesus’ end goal:

Revelation 22:3–5 NIV

No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.

God will eliminate all evil, he’ll beat the curse. Things will be so bright that we literally won’t even need the sun.

All through the Bible, this is what God worked towards. Judge a nation - remove their evil. Send his people into exile - burn away the darkness in them.

So we have this two part process - remove death, preserve life. Beat back the darkness, and prevent the decay.

But there’s one more thing that we need to take very seriously:

We are the Salt and Light in this story

I’m gonna read it again.

Jesus says, WE are the salt in the world now.

Not that we are the ones who actually prevent decay, or save someone from death. But it’s our responsibility to get out there.

we are the light of the world. not that it’s our goodness that changes anything. But Jesus shining through us into dark places.

And jesus says -

We need to take our jobs seriously

Jesus says, salt that loses it’s prueservation properties, or a lamp that’s just lit and then placed under a bowl - they’re both useless for their purposes. He says, nobody builds a city on a hill for the sake of hiding it. Nobody grabs salt that isn’t salty.

But here’s the scary part - Without our presence out in the world, bringing God’s preserving spirit and His light into the world around us - the world will slowly perish. God has chosen to work THROUGH us.

And if we shy back from it, not only does it have a consequence on US -

it’ll also have a consequence on people around us.

STORY - I’ve had a number of occasions to speak into someone’s life in a moment of crisis. I’ve also had a bunch of opportunities to bring light and life into dark circumstances. Not because i’m a pastor - but because I take seriously the idea that I’m called to be salt and light.

And you can do it too. Because it’s not YOUR power that preserves people from death - it’s Jesus

And it’s not YOUR light that burns away at the darkness. It’s Jesus.

We’re just the vessel.

So please, be the vessel to the people around you.

The easiest way to do that is this:

Live your faith seriously and openly

Firstly, take it seriously. Faith is about growing in Jesus every single day.

Tear down reasons to miss spiritual disciplines

Challenge yourself to trying and doing more

Secondly - live it openly

This doesn’t mean change every single conversation to be about Jesus and the bible. That can get obnoxious.

But let your faith make a practical decision on your choices and the way you live. and don’t be shy about it.

And if you’re doing it right - people will ask YOU.

But the world needs people who are trying to be Salt and Light for Jesus. Because without it, people we know around us, people we love and care about - are left to decay and darkness.

General Notes

Matthew 5:13–16 ““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 underfoot. “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”

possible uses of salt

primarily used as a preservative. We use it as a flavour additive. But with no refrigeration, it was used to preserve meat or fish

Essential element in the diet of human beings

Used in small quantities as a fertilizer in certain types of soil

We shouldn’t stress too hard any particular application - our conclusions about that application ‘ over-allegorizing the illustration may introduce meanings Jesus never meant to convey

The emphasis is on the disciples ‘being’ the salt and the light. Not ‘having’ the salt.

What does it mean to ‘lose saltiness’?

Jesus was addressing the possibility, not the impossibility. Though the town can’t be hidden, he’s addressing the fact of people treating a town, or a lamp, as a thing to hide.

Jesus may have been quoting a proverb at the time (‘Can salt lose it’s flavour? Does the mule (which is sterile) bear young?’) To suggest an impossible thing.

However, he COULD be illustrating the impossible approach to ‘being a christian’ and ‘not being the salt and light’. A lamp that is not used to light is not a lamp, it’s a useless object. Salt that isn’t salty is useless.

Light is an important theme in scripture - usually emphasizing the removal of darkness through history

Typical lamp at the time was a partially closed reservoir made of clay. Held oil, and had a wick of flax or cotton set into it. It didn’t give a lot of light, so it was held up on a lamp stand in the open to maximize it’s reach

Jesus’ message brought ‘light to the darkness’ (Matt 4:15-16), and his disciples were supposed to be living examples of the arrival of the kingdom which brought that light

This light was not designed to be hidden away. The same as a city placed on a hill wasn’t designed to be hidden, and a lamp wasn’t designed to be placed under a bowl

Salt losing it’s saltiness / hiding a lamp or city away - implications

Jesus states that salt that loses it’s saltiness will simply be thrown away. He likewise states that you don’t

It’s the way of the world to bring our kingdom through power, oppression, might. We expand by killing and taking away, and by bringing darkness.

But Jesus saw his disciples as salt (preservative, flavour, necessary to health) and light (guiding, unable to be hidden, illuminative)

This process can’t be faked. if we’re living our faith correctly - we’re bringing light and preservation. That doesn’t mean we’re always liked and everything is always good.