Untitled Sermon

“Being” the Salt & Light that We Are in Christ, rather than “Doing” them

The New Revised Standard Version Salt and Light

13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

The New Revised Standard Version Salt and Light

Salt and Light

(Mk 9:50; Lk 14:34–35)

13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

The Law and the Prophets

17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter,c not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore, whoever breaksd one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

I remember when I was first asked to help out with running a Christian youth group at St. Thomas’, in Thunder Bay. I had attended there for a couple of years as a university student, and while I had met many of the high school youth in the parish I didn’t really consider myself to be the ‘ready-to-lead-others’ kind of guy that I hoped to one day become. I was still, I thought, half-baked as a church leader potential. Leave me in the oven a little longer, I thought.

Salt and Light

But the parish had hired a Church Army student intern for the year, and she had spent a good chunk of the summer at the Anglican Church camp that the deanery ran, and had begun to form some solid relationships with the young people. She insisted that she needed a male leader to come alongside and support the work she would be doing - if for nothing more than for the purposes of legal liability. I suppose that was what made it seem within reach for me - I could be a male young adult presence. That, I could handle. Being a role model, or teaching a bible study - well, leave me in the oven a little longer.

(; )

Stepping into that role, building that new kind of relationship with the youth of the parish, was not always an easy thing. These were real people whose real lives mattered, whose real little hearts were wrestling through real teenage angst. I discovered, though, that it was in leading that I became a leader. It was in teaching the Bible that I really started to be familiar with the Bible. It was in interacting with young people that looked up to me that I started to become someone who was worth looking up to. If I had kept baking in the oven I would never have been ready - it was only through owning the identity that I had with those kids that I became the person who could carry out what was needed. It even became good preparation for seminary a couple of years later.

I wonder, have you ever felt mismatched to the task at hand? Or, like you have a million reasons to not do something that’s pressing - perhaps you consider yourself a serial procrastinator? Perhaps you don’t admit it, or consciously consider yourself to be one, but know deep down that you are. What about something you’ve always wanted to do, but have been afraid to step out and try - too far from your comfort zone? Do you find it hard to be yourself, sometimes?

13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

When is it hard to be yourself?

I want to talk to you, today, about embracing who you are. Not because unbridled self-embrace and self-expression and -indulgence are good for you. There’s a strong sense in which the only safe place for self-assertion is centered in the conviction of personal depravity - conviction of being poor in spirit, of being weak; a general meekness, and humility that come from knowing Christ. Without these, self-promotion is rooted in the old self, continually being corrupted in sin; with them, however, self-promotion is rooted in the new creation that, by God’s grace, is breaking in upon the world.

The Law and the Prophets

Every one of us is a jumble of loyalties: of commitments, of motivations, of fears, of considerations. Some of our behaviours are defense mechanisms - habits that we’ve formed to protect ourselves, to guard us from rejection, or persecution, or a conversation we’ve had - or explanation we’ve given - a million times before. Some of our behaviours grow out of social conventions. Some are grounded in our worldview. Some are developed intentionally over time, to counter an undesirable tendency that we’ve discovered in ourselves. These are just a few examples, highlighting that we are driven by many factors - perhaps you can think of some others, specific examples, that drive you.

What are the things that motivate you?

Now, here’s the thing. Jesus had been talking to the crowd that had assembled on the hillside in rather general terms, and then He had started to address them, to speak to them, directly. He wasn’t talking, anymore, about some ideal states that people might find themselves in (being a mourner who would find comfort, and so on). Rather, He was addressing them - and our passage today picks up after He has started to speak to them in this way. Let’s hear it again from the beginning:

The New Revised Standard Version The Beatitudes

11 “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

The identity that Jesus gives to His followers is tied to their loyalty when receiving threats - their commitment under fire. The misunderstanding of the world around us, to the faith that we hold, is the backdrop to us being salt and light. If the pressure of persecution causes us to lose our saltiness; if persecution causes us to hide, or shine our light under a bowl, then we are absurdly denying our purpose. When we talk about self-denial, it isn’t denial of our God-given purpose: rather, it is denial of sinful tendencies.

17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

There are a number of uses for salt, and teaching on Jesus’ identification of His followers with salt and light has traditionally considered these different uses, or maybe zeroed in on one specifically. Whatever functions we might come up with for salt, and whatever analogies we might draw between those and faithful Christian living, Jesus’ point is that salt’s identity and purpose - as salt - is found in its saltiness. So too, following and obeying Jesus - even under hardship - is what gives Jesus’ disciples identity and purpose. A Christ follower who hides, who stops obeying Jesus, when opportunities to bear witness to Jesus arise, has forsaken their God-given identity and thus misplaced their God-given purpose. What is the point of light that doesn’t light the darkness? What is the point of salt that isn’t actually salty?

Jesus doesn’t say, “Be salt and light.” He says that you are - the only thing that can change that is if you refuse the work of salt and light. Whether salt is preserving food, flavouring food, or melting ice - it all depends on it being salty. Light can only do its job if it isn’t hidden, or ashamedly shielded. But here’s the really incredible thing about them both: if you salt properly, you don’t taste salt - you taste the flavours of your food enhanced. By salt we taste the rest. In a slightly different way, this is why it melts the ice on the sidewalk - because it is a catalyst: it isn’t the heat of the sun, but it enables and enhances what the sun does. And the same with light - it isn’t all of the things that I see around me, but without it I wouldn’t see them. By it, what is visible is.

This is your identity in Jesus, if you will follow. If you will obey Jesus, then your life is a beacon in the darkness - you are the light of the world; if you will follow Him, then your presence draws out the flavours in life - you are the salt of the earth. If we will own Jesus’ identifications of us, then we must also own their purposes: if we will own that we are the salt of the earth, then we must be salty; if we will own that we are the light of the world, then we must shine in the darkness.

Now, the devil doesn’t want us to succeed in personal ownership of what Jesus has made us. He will do all he can to distract us with inadequacies and ineptitude, with ideas of being half-baked, poor role models. He will tell us that we don’t know the faith well enough, that we don’t possess the necessary theological vocabulary, that we haven’t read and comprehended the Bible enough. The temptation to be timid will rear its head at every one of us. But we will be salt and light, because that is what we are.

The fact is, when I was first asked to put myself out there, and to be a witness of Jesus’ transformative presence in my life to those young people a couple of decades ago, the proposal was that I would be salt to those kids, and light in their lives. If the theatre of the whole earth seems too big, too intimidating a place, then consider instead just those people who are a part of your daily interactions - intentional and unintentional: friends, family, familiar faces who are patrons at the same establishments as you, employees at the businesses you frequent. Can you be salt to this part of the earth? Can you be light in this part of the world? How will ownership of your identity and purpose in Jesus transform your interactions with these people? What will it look like, to trust and obey Jesus? Amen.