041023 Sermon on the Mount – Salt and Light
Skydiving illustration: You’re telling me something that’s true, but that doesn’t help me.
Sermon on the Mount M4 BI We are the salt of the earth--we act as a preservative in the world. We are the light of the world--we help people see the way. Be in the world, but not of the world. We are to become the change we envision--Ghandi
------------------------
After I finished my undergraduate studies, I ended up working with the Sony group in Tokyo.
As many of you know, Japanese businessmen work long hours and then after work many of them like to go drinking. I am not talking about just having a glass of wine with dinner or a beer while watching a baseball game, I am talking about drinking to get drunk. If you’re riding the subway at night in Tokyo, it’s not that uncommon to see two Japanese businessmen putting their right and left arm around a drunk colleague, grabbing him by his belt to help him onto the train.
From time to time while in Japan, I was invited to go drinking with Japanese businessmen.
As a person socialized primarily in Canada and as someone who believes that getting drunk is not a responsible way to decompress, this represented a dilemma for me.
I didn’t always negotiate this dilemma well. I can remember one time in particular when I a great time with a group of business leaders, but I clearly had a few too many.
Peter Berger the sociologist at Boston University says that when we are in a culture where the set of values held by the culture are different from our personal values—we have one of two tendencies. Either we will blend in and conform to the values around us like a chameleon who changes colors with its environment or we’ll tend to gather in a tribe with people who think and act just like us and isolate ourselves from the rest of the culture.
Throughout the history of Christian church we see that followers of Christ have faced the twin pressures of being “sucked up” into the world around them so that they become just like the world around us or Christians tend to form protective, “holy” huddles, isolated from the world.
What should our posture be? Are we to accommodate ourselves to the values and practices of the world or are we to separate ourselves from it? Neither. Jesus said we are to live “in” the world, but not be “of” the world. We are to live in the tension point of being “in” but somehow unique in the world. Yes, “IN” the world, but we are to are to have distinct flavor in the world.
How do we truly live “in” but not be “of” the world?
Jesus shows us by giving us a new identity point:
If you have your Bibles please turn to Matthew 5:13-16
Jesus in his famous Sermon on the Mount says to those how those who are beginning to follow him: 13"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 by men. 14"You 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 bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, 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 praise your Father in heaven.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth.
Salt of course in the ancient world had many different functions: to flavor things, it was used as payment, it was a symbol of purity, and it was used as preservative for foods.
When Jesus says, “You are salt of the earth” he probably has in mind the quality of salt as an agent to be able to preserve food.
Jesus would have seen his mother Mary rub salt into fish or meat or soak fish or meat into salty water. In the first century world, without refrigerators or deep freezers, salt was absolutely necessary to create “shelf-life” for fish or meat.
So, when Jesus says we are salt of the earth he is saying that those who really know God preserve the good things of this earth.
When he says we are this preservative force in the earth, he is assuming that the world in some sense is decaying and putrefying.
The 2nd law of thermodynamics tells us that nature tends toward chaos and disorder. When things are left to themselves they have a tendency to fall apart. What happens if you never give attention to your apartment or house? What happens if you never give attention to your body? What happens if you never tend to your relationships? They fall apart. What’s true on a physical level and a relational level is also true on a moral and spiritual level. Left to itself the earth tends to unravel morally and spiritually. When Jesus says you are salt of the earth he is assuming that the world is decaying.
Second, when Jesus says you are the salt of the earth he is assuming that we will play a key role in keeping the earth from decaying spiritually and morally through the saltiness of our lives.
Sometimes the effect of our lives may not be dramatic, but quiet.
How many raked leaves in the past few weeks?
Did you hear the story of the elderly, of the quiet forest dweller who lived high above an Austrian village along the eastern slope of the Alps. Many years ago, the town council had hired this old gentleman as Keeper of the Spring to maintain the purity of the pools of water in the mountain crevices. These pools ran down the mountainside and fed the lovely spring which flowed through the town. With faithful regularity, the Keeper of the Spring patrol removed the leaves and branches from the pools, and wiped away the silt that would otherwise contaminate the fresh water.
The crystal clear spring flowed through the town drew tourists and created a fresh water supply for the people. The spring also created a natural irrigation system for the farmlands.
Years passed. One evening the town council met for its semiannual meeting. As the council members reviewed the budget, one man's eye caught the salary paid the obscure Keeper of the Springs. "Who is this old man?" he asked. "Why do we keep paying him year after year? No one ever sees him. For all we know, this man does us no good." By a unanimous vote, the council dispensed with the old man's services.
For several weeks, nothing changed. But by early autumn, the trees began to shed their leaves. Small branches snapped off and fell into the pools, hindering the rushing flow of sparkling water. One afternoon, someone noticed a slight yellowish-brown tint in the spring. A few days later, the water had darkened even more. Within a week, a slimy film covered sections of the water along the banks, and a foul odor emanated from the spring. Tourists no longer visited the town. Businesses located near the water closed. The drinking water turned a brownish color. The town reconvened and re-hired the keeper of the spring and in time, the spring returned to its former pristine state.
As the salt of the earth, like the keeper of the spring, we can play a vital role in preserving the goodness of the earth.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German Pastor and who was imprisoned and martyred under Hitler, has said when the society throws out the Christian it throws out it’s very life.
Darrell Johnson has said the health of the city depends on the health of the church.
Jesus said if we are to act as a preserving agent on the earth we have to retain our saltiness, i.e., is we have to retain the distinct flavor that God has gives us as we are drawn into a life-giving relationship with him (which is described in Matthew 5-7). Rev. John Stott says that those who enter a transforming relationship with Christ become as different from the larger culture as cheese is from chalk.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness, it is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men and women. In the ancient world, when salt had it “saltiness” washed out by heavy rain, it only use was as a kind covering for a walking path.
If we want to retain our saltiness we must pray that God would draw us deeply into a relationship with him so that would be become the kind of people described in Matthew 5-7.
If we become the kind of people described in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) even we are small in percent of the population in Vancouver we can change this city.
Robert Bellah, the well known sociologist from the University of California at Berkeley has said, "We should not underestimate the significance of a small group of people who have a new vision of a just and gentle world. The quality of a culture may be changed when 2 percent of its people have a new vision."
If we a vision of a just and gentle world, and in the words of Ghandi, if we become the change we envision, we can change the culture.
Through our relationship with God, we can become like Jesus, we can be the the salt of the earth.
Sometimes we act as the salt of the earth in away that is very dramatic and public like Sherron Watkins the Christian woman who blew the whistle blower at the Enron corporation, but most of the time, like the keeper of the spring, we act as the salt of the earth, in ways that are quiet, and for the most part unseen.
One of my professors in seminary named Haddon Robinson describes how he came from a family with very little money in Harlem, New York. He remembers how he and his dad would ride the subways in New York City together. And from to time to time they would come to a turnstile that was unmanned and it would have been easy for Haddon’s dad and him to have walk through the turnstile without paying and riding the subway for free. But Haddon’s dad always paid their fare. It had a lasting impression on Haddon. Haddon’s dad was being the salt of the earth.
This I was in the deep South with a man named Chris Woodhull from Knoxville, Tennessee. Chris and his family moved into the “hood,” i.e. the inner city of Knoxville with his wife and two daughters. His mother in law refused to speak to him for a month when he decided to move where he did 10-11 years ago, a dangerous area, area infested by gangs, drugs, and crime. Over the years Chris and his family have gotten to know their inner city neighbors and Chris hires young, African American gang members in his business to help get them off the street. He and Laurence and his children Tessie and Paris are acting as the salt of the earth.
How is God calling us to act as the salt of the earth, how is God calling us to be a unique presence in the word?
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth and he says you are light of the world.
Remarkable statement. Jesus says I am light of the world in the Gospel of John and here he says you are light of the world.
As many commentators have pointed out, we human beings don’t have any extraordinary luminosity in and of ourselves, but as we allow the light of Jesus to shine on us like the moon reflects the sun, we reflect something of light of God.
Darrell Johnson, shares the story of young girl who was in a Catherdral, she pointed up to some figures featured in the stained glass window and asked her parents who are they? Her parents said, those are the saints, she said, oh, Saints are people who let the light shine through them. We become the light of the world as we allow the light of Jesus Christ to shine through us.
It’s important to note that when Jesus is delivering the sermon on the Mount he is not talking to the so called “cultural elite.” He not talking at the graduation of a Ivy League school, or a group of Nobel Prize winners, or group of documentary filmmakers.
He’s talking to people who are considered the losers of society… He says you’re light of the world…
And if Jesus can say of these people you are the light of the world because of the fact that they are being drawn into a relationship with God, he can say this of us.
Jesus says you are the light of the world; a city on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do people light a lamp and put 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 so shine before men and women that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.
Many people will say that “faith is a very personal thing.” Faith is a very personal, but it’s not private. Faith is meant to affect every area of our lives. This does not mean that we are talking ALL the time about our faith in God, or seeking to convert people ALL the time, it does mean that the effects of our faith can be seen not only Sunday, but from Monday to Saturday… If our relationship with is God is real it all that we are and all that we do…
Jesus says let your light so shine before people that they may see your good works (and good in the Greek means beautiful) and glorify your father who is in heaven.
I’ve had the privilege over the last few years of becoming acquainted with the former “hatchet man” of president Richard Nixon’s administration, Chuck Colson. Colson ended up going to prison for his role in Watergate. Colson has was so ruthless, he once said, I’d kill my own grandmother, if that’s what took to get Nixon elected as president.
In prison, Jesus Christ got a hold of Chuck and has changed and in an ex-convict through whom Jesus Christ is shining his light.
Some years ago Chuck Colson was standing in a long line in the airport in Jakarta, Indonesia. He and some Prison Fellowship (Prison Fellowship is a ministry to prisoners) colleagues had been traveling all night. It was now early morning. The terminal was hot and steamy, and they were tired. "Passport in my sticky hand (Chuck said) I was exhausted and exasperated at the long, inefficient line snaking ahead of us. I was worried we would miss our next flight and the ministry friends who were waiting for us." But, Chuck adds, "I was also determined not to let my frustration get the better of me. I talked with my friends; we laughed and made the best of the situation."
Two years later, he received a letter from a businessman who lived in Singapore. The man had been a follower of Confucius, but he sent his children to Sunday school at a Presbyterian church for moral training. One Sunday, as he picked up his kids, he heard the end of the sermon. A visiting missionary held up a copy of Chuck's first book, Born Again. On the cover was a picture of Chuck.
A few months later, this businessman was stuck in a long line in the steaming Jakarta airport. Glancing over into the next line, he spotted the same face he'd seen on the cover of Born Again. He was so impressed by Chuck Colson's calm demeanor and cheerfulness that when he got back to Singapore, he got the book, read it, and committed his life to Christ.
If an ex-convict, who known as the hatchet man, willing to kill his own grandmother to get his man elected, could let the light of Jesus shine through him, so can you and I.
If we are “in” the world, but not “of” the world, if we truly “in” in the world, but distinct from it because of our relationship with God, we can be part of redeeming the world. Do you believe that?
If we let the light shine through as students, if we the light shine through as people in business, if we let the light shine through us if we let the light shine as homemakers, if we let the light shine though us as people in medicine, if we let the light shine through as people in plumbing, as we let the light shine through as people in the arts, if we let the light shine through as volunteers…
If we let the light shine through us in whatever our calling, we can be part of redeeming the world.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Regardless of what our specific call is, let us go learn what this means.
Franciscan blessing:
May God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.
Sermon on the Mount M4 BI We are the salt of the earth--we act as a preservative in the world. We are the light of the world--we help people see the way. Be in the world, but not of the world. We are to become the change we envision--Ghandi
------------------------
After I finished my undergraduate studies, I ended up working with the Sony group in Tokyo.
As many of you know, Japanese businessmen work long hours and then after work many of them like to go drinking. I am not talking about just having a glass of wine with dinner or a beer while watching a baseball game, I am talking about drinking to get drunk. If you’re riding the subway at night in Tokyo, it’s not that uncommon to see two Japanese businessmen putting their right and left arm around a drunk colleague, grabbing him by his belt to help him onto the train.
From time to time while in Japan, I was invited to go drinking with Japanese businessmen.
As a person socialized primarily in Canada and as someone who believes that getting drunk is not a responsible way to decompress, this represented a dilemma for me.
I didn’t always negotiate this dilemma well. I can remember one time in particular when I a great time with a group of business leaders, but I clearly had a few too many.
Peter Berger the sociologist at Boston University says that when we are in a culture where the set of values held by the culture are different from our personal values—we have one of two tendencies. Either we will blend in and conform to the values around us like a chameleon who changes colors with its environment or we’ll tend to gather in a tribe with people who think and act just like us and isolate ourselves from the rest of the culture.
Throughout the history of Christian church we see that followers of Christ have faced the twin pressures of being “sucked up” into the world around them so that they become just like the world around us or Christians tend to form protective, “holy” huddles, isolated from the world.
What should our posture be? Are we to accommodate ourselves to the values and practices of the world or are we to separate ourselves from it? Neither. Jesus said we are to live “in” the world, but not be “of” the world. We are to live in the tension point of being “in” but somehow unique in the world. Yes, “IN” the world, but we are to are to have distinct flavor in the world.
How do we truly live “in” but not be “of” the world?
Jesus shows us by giving us a new identity point:
If you have your Bibles please turn to Matthew 5:13-16
Jesus in his famous Sermon on the Mount says to those how those who are beginning to follow him: 13"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 by men. 14"You 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 bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, 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 praise your Father in heaven.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth.
Salt of course in the ancient world had many different functions: to flavor things, it was used as payment, it was a symbol of purity, and it was used as preservative for foods.
When Jesus says, “You are salt of the earth” he probably has in mind the quality of salt as an agent to be able to preserve food.
Jesus would have seen his mother Mary rub salt into fish or meat or soak fish or meat into salty water. In the first century world, without refrigerators or deep freezers, salt was absolutely necessary to create “shelf-life” for fish or meat.
So, when Jesus says we are salt of the earth he is saying that those who really know God preserve the good things of this earth.
When he says we are this preservative force in the earth, he is assuming that the world in some sense is decaying and putrefying.
The 2nd law of thermodynamics tells us that nature tends toward chaos and disorder. When things are left to themselves they have a tendency to fall apart. What happens if you never give attention to your apartment or house? What happens if you never give attention to your body? What happens if you never tend to your relationships? They fall apart. What’s true on a physical level and a relational level is also true on a moral and spiritual level. Left to itself the earth tends to unravel morally and spiritually. When Jesus says you are salt of the earth he is assuming that the world is decaying.
Second, when Jesus says you are the salt of the earth he is assuming that we will play a key role in keeping the earth from decaying spiritually and morally through the saltiness of our lives.
Sometimes the effect of our lives may not be dramatic, but quiet.
How many raked leaves in the past few weeks?
Did you hear the story of the elderly, of the quiet forest dweller who lived high above an Austrian village along the eastern slope of the Alps. Many years ago, the town council had hired this old gentleman as Keeper of the Spring to maintain the purity of the pools of water in the mountain crevices. These pools ran down the mountainside and fed the lovely spring which flowed through the town. With faithful regularity, the Keeper of the Spring patrol removed the leaves and branches from the pools, and wiped away the silt that would otherwise contaminate the fresh water.
The crystal clear spring flowed through the town drew tourists and created a fresh water supply for the people. The spring also created a natural irrigation system for the farmlands.
Years passed. One evening the town council met for its semiannual meeting. As the council members reviewed the budget, one man's eye caught the salary paid the obscure Keeper of the Springs. "Who is this old man?" he asked. "Why do we keep paying him year after year? No one ever sees him. For all we know, this man does us no good." By a unanimous vote, the council dispensed with the old man's services.
For several weeks, nothing changed. But by early autumn, the trees began to shed their leaves. Small branches snapped off and fell into the pools, hindering the rushing flow of sparkling water. One afternoon, someone noticed a slight yellowish-brown tint in the spring. A few days later, the water had darkened even more. Within a week, a slimy film covered sections of the water along the banks, and a foul odor emanated from the spring. Tourists no longer visited the town. Businesses located near the water closed. The drinking water turned a brownish color. The town reconvened and re-hired the keeper of the spring and in time, the spring returned to its former pristine state.
As the salt of the earth, like the keeper of the spring, we can play a vital role in preserving the goodness of the earth.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German Pastor and who was imprisoned and martyred under Hitler, has said when the society throws out the Christian it throws out it’s very life.
Darrell Johnson has said the health of the city depends on the health of the church.
Jesus said if we are to act as a preserving agent on the earth we have to retain our saltiness, i.e., is we have to retain the distinct flavor that God has gives us as we are drawn into a life-giving relationship with him (which is described in Matthew 5-7). Rev. John Stott says that those who enter a transforming relationship with Christ become as different from the larger culture as cheese is from chalk.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness, it is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men and women. In the ancient world, when salt had it “saltiness” washed out by heavy rain, it only use was as a kind covering for a walking path.
If we want to retain our saltiness we must pray that God would draw us deeply into a relationship with him so that would be become the kind of people described in Matthew 5-7.
If we become the kind of people described in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) even we are small in percent of the population in Vancouver we can change this city.
Robert Bellah, the well known sociologist from the University of California at Berkeley has said, "We should not underestimate the significance of a small group of people who have a new vision of a just and gentle world. The quality of a culture may be changed when 2 percent of its people have a new vision."
If we a vision of a just and gentle world, and in the words of Ghandi, if we become the change we envision, we can change the culture.
Through our relationship with God, we can become like Jesus, we can be the the salt of the earth.
Sometimes we act as the salt of the earth in away that is very dramatic and public like Sherron Watkins the Christian woman who blew the whistle blower at the Enron corporation, but most of the time, like the keeper of the spring, we act as the salt of the earth, in ways that are quiet, and for the most part unseen.
One of my professors in seminary named Haddon Robinson describes how he came from a family with very little money in Harlem, New York. He remembers how he and his dad would ride the subways in New York City together. And from to time to time they would come to a turnstile that was unmanned and it would have been easy for Haddon’s dad and him to have walk through the turnstile without paying and riding the subway for free. But Haddon’s dad always paid their fare. It had a lasting impression on Haddon. Haddon’s dad was being the salt of the earth.
This I was in the deep South with a man named Chris Woodhull from Knoxville, Tennessee. Chris and his family moved into the “hood,” i.e. the inner city of Knoxville with his wife and two daughters. His mother in law refused to speak to him for a month when he decided to move where he did 10-11 years ago, a dangerous area, area infested by gangs, drugs, and crime. Over the years Chris and his family have gotten to know their inner city neighbors and Chris hires young, African American gang members in his business to help get them off the street. He and Laurence and his children Tessie and Paris are acting as the salt of the earth.
How is God calling us to act as the salt of the earth, how is God calling us to be a unique presence in the word?
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth and he says you are light of the world.
Remarkable statement. Jesus says I am light of the world in the Gospel of John and here he says you are light of the world.
As many commentators have pointed out, we human beings don’t have any extraordinary luminosity in and of ourselves, but as we allow the light of Jesus to shine on us like the moon reflects the sun, we reflect something of light of God.
Darrell Johnson, shares the story of young girl who was in a Catherdral, she pointed up to some figures featured in the stained glass window and asked her parents who are they? Her parents said, those are the saints, she said, oh, Saints are people who let the light shine through them. We become the light of the world as we allow the light of Jesus Christ to shine through us.
It’s important to note that when Jesus is delivering the sermon on the Mount he is not talking to the so called “cultural elite.” He not talking at the graduation of a Ivy League school, or a group of Nobel Prize winners, or group of documentary filmmakers.
He’s talking to people who are considered the losers of society… He says you’re light of the world…
And if Jesus can say of these people you are the light of the world because of the fact that they are being drawn into a relationship with God, he can say this of us.
Jesus says you are the light of the world; a city on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do people light a lamp and put 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 so shine before men and women that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.
Many people will say that “faith is a very personal thing.” Faith is a very personal, but it’s not private. Faith is meant to affect every area of our lives. This does not mean that we are talking ALL the time about our faith in God, or seeking to convert people ALL the time, it does mean that the effects of our faith can be seen not only Sunday, but from Monday to Saturday… If our relationship with is God is real it all that we are and all that we do…
Jesus says let your light so shine before people that they may see your good works (and good in the Greek means beautiful) and glorify your father who is in heaven.
I’ve had the privilege over the last few years of becoming acquainted with the former “hatchet man” of president Richard Nixon’s administration, Chuck Colson. Colson ended up going to prison for his role in Watergate. Colson has was so ruthless, he once said, I’d kill my own grandmother, if that’s what took to get Nixon elected as president.
In prison, Jesus Christ got a hold of Chuck and has changed and in an ex-convict through whom Jesus Christ is shining his light.
Some years ago Chuck Colson was standing in a long line in the airport in Jakarta, Indonesia. He and some Prison Fellowship (Prison Fellowship is a ministry to prisoners) colleagues had been traveling all night. It was now early morning. The terminal was hot and steamy, and they were tired. "Passport in my sticky hand (Chuck said) I was exhausted and exasperated at the long, inefficient line snaking ahead of us. I was worried we would miss our next flight and the ministry friends who were waiting for us." But, Chuck adds, "I was also determined not to let my frustration get the better of me. I talked with my friends; we laughed and made the best of the situation."
Two years later, he received a letter from a businessman who lived in Singapore. The man had been a follower of Confucius, but he sent his children to Sunday school at a Presbyterian church for moral training. One Sunday, as he picked up his kids, he heard the end of the sermon. A visiting missionary held up a copy of Chuck's first book, Born Again. On the cover was a picture of Chuck.
A few months later, this businessman was stuck in a long line in the steaming Jakarta airport. Glancing over into the next line, he spotted the same face he'd seen on the cover of Born Again. He was so impressed by Chuck Colson's calm demeanor and cheerfulness that when he got back to Singapore, he got the book, read it, and committed his life to Christ.
If an ex-convict, who known as the hatchet man, willing to kill his own grandmother to get his man elected, could let the light of Jesus shine through him, so can you and I.
If we are “in” the world, but not “of” the world, if we truly “in” in the world, but distinct from it because of our relationship with God, we can be part of redeeming the world. Do you believe that?
If we let the light shine through as students, if we the light shine through as people in business, if we let the light shine through us if we let the light shine as homemakers, if we let the light shine though us as people in medicine, if we let the light shine through as people in plumbing, as we let the light shine through as people in the arts, if we let the light shine through as volunteers…
If we let the light shine through us in whatever our calling, we can be part of redeeming the world.
Jesus says you are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Regardless of what our specific call is, let us go learn what this means.
Franciscan blessing:
May God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.
posted by Shigematsu at 9:10 PM
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