Living as Kingdom People
Kingdom Living March 30, 2025 Matthew 5:13-16 Notes
Last week, we studied the Beatitudes, the blessings of Kingdom living in Matthew 5:1-12.
Today, we’ll be looking at Mathew 5:13-16, which as Dr. Danny Akin says, “flows naturally out of the Beatitudes.” For as he says it is “taking on and exhibiting the character of the Beatitudes that makes it possible for us to be salt and light on the earth”
While the Beatitudes describe the inner character and blessed state of those who follow Jesus as King, these next verses describe how we are to live as Kingdom people outwardly in this world.
How are we to live as Kingdom people? What does Jesus have to say about this? In the gospel of Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus used the two powerful metaphors of salt and light to call His disciples to faithfully bear witness of His transforming power by living as Kingdom people.
Audio
Good morning, church. It’s good to see all of you here. This morning, we're continuing our series entitled, “Kingdom Living.” We're going through the three chapters that we find in Matthew, chapter five through seven, in a sermon series based on the Sermon on the Mount. Many have described the Sermon on the Mount as the greatest sermon ever preached by the greatest preacher Who ever lived.
Certainly, I agree with this. You might consider these three little chapters as the concise summary of what it looks like for Kingdom citizens to live as Christians in this world. It's an important message that we're studying together.
It was first called the Sermon on the Mount by Augustine of Hippo, who noted the description in Matthew 1:1, which reads like this, Matthew 5:1 (ESV) “Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him and he opened his mouth to teach.” You'll notice that He was on a mountain.The traditional location of the Sermon on the Mount is just on the Northern shore of the Sea of Galilee.
This is the location, the traditional location of the Sermon on the Mount. You'll notice the kind of natural amphitheater shape of this area where the people would be able to be seated and they would be able to see Jesus; the Mount is right up here. They would be all along this area; it was like a natural amphitheater where they could hear and see Jesus.
The Mother of Constantine was building churches on every site and if you visit Israel, you'll see a church built on every site that you find in the Bible. She had a church built there. If you go today, it's been rebuilt because I think the original one was destroyed by fire. It's the Church of the Beatitudes, a beautiful church, and it's built on the traditional location where Jesus preached.
It's important that we ask these kinds of questions when we're studying God's Word, questions like, ‘Where did this happen? How did this happen? What are the details?’ I think it's always important. The Bible is about real people that took place in real history and in real places.
That's the reason we refer to these things now. Living as God's people today, as we're looking at our message today, it reminds me of what Scottish theologian Sinclair Ferguson writes. He says, “The sermon is a description of the lifestyle of those who belong to the Kingdom.” This sermon is not how to become a Christian, because we can't, by living this way, somehow earn it. Because it's impossible to live it out by earning it.
Jesus is the only one Who has lived it perfectly. So, it's instead a description of those who have humbly come to Jesus as their Lord and Savior. They've counted Him king of their life, they've submitted their life to Him. And this is what it looks like to live as those who have Christ living in them. And so that's really what this sermon is about.
That's why we call it “Kingdom Living.” We've been giving out books to those of you who came in today. I hope you picked up a copy as you were coming in. We printed this little booklet so you could save all your notes during this sixteen-week series. We did write an introduction at the beginning to help you go deeper in your study.
I hope you'll take advantage of that. Now, last week we studied the first twelve verses of Matthew 5 and we studied what traditionally has been called the Beatitudes, the eight blessings that Jesus opens up with. My friend, Dr. Danny Akin, rightly says that today's message flows naturally out of the Beatitudes. Those of us that are Kingdom citizens live under the blessing of God, under a state of joyful contentment and favor from God. Those of us like that now are to follow this instruction of what He says today.
If you think about the Beatitudes as inward character traits: meekness, peacemaker, hungry for and thirsting for righteousness… These are inner Christian character traits. He says, “You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world,” which is more outward. This is living for Christ out loud in the public sphere. I wonder today, do you struggle with that?
Do you struggle with how to live your faith in front of others publicly? Do you struggle with that? Indeed, today we'll often hear someone say, ‘You know, I just think that religion's a personal matter. We should keep that to ourselves. That's not for polite conversation with other people.’
We are encouraged by people of that way of thinking, to keep it to ourselves. Indeed, many have tried to remove all vestiges of Christianity from the public sphere, somehow thinking that we don't need to be talking about our faith there. This has caused Christians, more and more I think, to be silent and to live a dual lifestyle. See if this sounds familiar: So, you live one way at church.
Oh, yeah, glory hallelujah. We're singing, we're happy, we're studying God's Word. Then, you go to work tomorrow and you live a different way, you speak a different way. You have one version of yourself that goes to church and believes in God and another version of yourself that goes to school as a student, a teacher, at work or with your neighbors.
There's a version of yourself that goes to your small group during the week and studies and prays together. There’s another version that you take shopping to Walmart. There's kind of a schism between your two selves. But Jesus has something to say about that. I think He really wants us to live one life the same on the inside as we are on the outside, living for Him.
Wouldn't that be great? Wouldn't you like to live like that? That's what we're talking about today. I wonder what Jesus has to say about this, because He has something to say. Are you ready to hear it?
Today, as we look at Matthew, chapter three, Jesus used two powerful metaphors, the metaphor of salt and of light, to describe and to call His disciples to faithfully witness His transforming power as kingdom people. I believe we can live as kingdom people in such a way that our lives become an outward witness to the world. How can we do this? Well, the text gives us two ways that we can faithfully live as Christ's kingdom people. So let's dig in.
Matthew 5:13-16 (ESV) 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. 14 “You are the light of the world.
A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, 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 who is in heaven.” This is God's word.
Amen. We're looking for two ways to live faithfully as kingdom citizens, as Christ's kingdom people. Here's the first way:
1. Be salt. Portray the gospel to a world in decay.
Portray the gospel to a world in decay. Be salt. Jesus described His disciples, those that He had declared this blessing over, with two rich and powerful metaphors, “salt and light.” I'm thankful to Danny Akin's commentary as I was developing this message for some thoughts about how to develop it. Here's what he writes about this sermon.
He says, “Those who love and follow King Jesus are the only real salt this world will ever taste and the only authentic light it will ever see! Jesus’s words in these verses take it as an undeniable truth that we live in a decadent, decaying, dark world. Where there is decay, we need salt. Where there is darkness, we need light. We, the citizens of the kingdom of heaven, are God’s plan to stop death and stamp out darkness.
This plan finds its crescendo in the last words of the last chapter in this Gospel with what we call the Great Commission. To the nations we go as salt and light. That's what I was thinking about when I was writing this message. I was thinking, you know, most weeks, and some of y'all know my habit, I tend to find three points. It's about the amount of information I could share in a 40-minute interval.
But as I was looking at this, it had to be two because you have to let the text speak for itself and Jesus makes two points, doesn't He? It's very clear. Then, while thinking about it, well, I have to decode these metaphors. What does it mean to be “salt?”
Do you need to get inside of a salt shaker? No. What does it mean? We have to think this out a little bit. We have to “unpack” what Jesus means here. First, I would point out to you the kind of intensity and emphasis that Jesus puts here in the Sermon on the Mount.
He says, ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are… Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.’ But then, as He was getting towards the end of those 12 verses, He says, “Blessed are you when you are persecuted.” Remember when He switched and started pointing at people and saying, “you.”
He's continuing it right here, except now, He does what in the Greek they call the emphatic use of the word, “you.” You might be wondering, What do you mean by that, Gary? In other words, if we could literally see what the Greek says under here, it would sound like this, ‘You, you are the salt of the earth.’
It would emphasize “you.” He doesn't say that you will be the salt of the earth when you get to heaven or after you grow up more. He says, “you are.” He doesn't say that you should be the salt of the earth,
like it's something to work on. No. He says, “You are the salt of the earth.” This is familiar language for those of us who have studied the Gospel of John because Jesus described Himself this way. There are seven “I am” statements in the book of John. He says things like this,
”I, I am.” It's the emphatic use of “I” in that case. “I am the bread of life.” “I, I am the light of the world.” “I, I am the resurrection and the life.”
These are the statements. He has seven of them in the book of John. But now, He does something that surprises us. He says, “You, you are salt of the earth,” as if it is a present condition already true in you, because Christ lives in you. So, let's think about this for a second.
”Salt of the earth.” We use that phrase today. We learned it from Jesus. That's the origin of the phrase, except today, when we say it, we say something like, ‘My grandparents;they're the salt of the earth.’
What we mean by that is that they probably work on a farm; they're hard working, they're humble, blue collar and probably honest. Those are the kind of things that we say when we say that somebody's the salt of the earth. But Jesus means so much more than that. To understand what “salt” means, we have to really see how salt is used in the scripture. In ancient days, they had no refrigeration in order to keep meat from decaying, from going bad.
Salt is a very needed and essential ingredient for preserving food. After all, who doesn't like country ham, right? You have to have salt. I don't like it. It's too salty,
somebody said. Okay, but most people like it, you know? This idea of salt is a preservative to keep things from decaying. That's one use you'll see in scripture during ancient times. Another use you'll see is that it had healing properties. Healing properties.
In fact, when a baby was born, a newborn baby, they would rub its body with salt; it had a healing property. If you ever go to the beach and maybe you have some cuticles that are not looking so good, you can spend a couple of days at the beach in the salt water and wow, your fingers look a lot better. There's something about salt water that is healing. By the way, things just tend to taste better when you put a little salt on it, right?
It enhances flavor. I could go on, by the way. Some of you should go ahead and say, ‘Pray for the pastor; he's going to talk about salt for the whole sermon if we don't watch out,’ because I've become somewhat of an expert on this topic.
I have read too much about salt. I have studied this too much. There are over 14,000 uses for salt. It's amazing how many things.
Salt is an essential to life. In fact, one of you, and I won't name her name, heard me talking about salt a couple of years ago and she thought, I need to add to the problem. She gave me a book; it's the history of salt. So, I read that book on the history of salt.
Did you know the source of the word, salary, is salt? They paid the Roman soldiers, instead of in coin, they often paid them in salt.That's where we get the word, salary. I could go on.
I could just wear you out with how much I've studied on salt. This is a rich word. Jesus says, ‘you're the salt.’ It's expensive. Have you ever seen or heard someone say, That fellas
is not worth his salt.’ That means he's worthless. He's not working hard to earn his salt. I could go on. I need to stop, don't I?
What does He mean by, “you are the salt of the earth?” Well, there's places in the Bible where we see that salt was added to the sacrifice. So, it has something to do with the sacrificial system. We see the word of God describe salt as connected to an everlasting covenant. When God speaks to Israel, He says, ‘I have a covenant of salt with you, Israel.
’I will not go back on my word.’ He says to David, ‘I have a covenant of salt with David and your sons, that you'll always have a son that sits on my throne.’ So, it has to do with an everlasting covenant. I mean, I could just keep going. I need to stop.
One more thing I was thinking of about salt: did you know that on the Sabbath (which begins at 6pm on Friday and ends at 6pm on Saturday) in Jewish homes, they take bread and they dip it in salt as a reminder of the everlasting covenant they have with the Torah. That means salt's a pretty important metaphor. We probably need to stop talking about it now, though. Preservative, flavor, essential.
Okay, let's “unpack” that. He says, “...but if salt has lost its taste…” He seems to be really leaning into the flavor aspect there, wouldn't you agree? Verse 13 “...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.”
You're the salt of the world, of the earth. You're supposed to taste, add flavor and a preserving aspect of righteousness in this world, which the world doesn't have because the world's dying. You're supposed to be the lifestyle, but if you're not living it out, then your witness is useless. You're not being Kingdom citizens. You're not living out who you are. It's almost like He describes it in an absurd way, “...but if salt loses its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?” Now I need to say something else about salt.
Salt is a stable mineral. It tastes salty, it won't break down and it won't stop tasting salty. Now, it is water soluble. If you add water to it, it goes into the water. But then, if you put sunlight on it or heat, the water dissipates and the salt is back
and if you taste it, it's salty again. So what is He talking about? Here's one possibility. Go ahead and put this photo up. I've got this big hunk of salt from the Dead Sea in my office.
I tell the kids when they come in there, “Would you like to see part of Lot's wife?” They'll say, “Oh, no!” I got this from the Dead Sea. It's a big old hunk of salt. The primary location that the Israelites got salt was from the Dead Sea. It's one of the greatest deposits of salt anywhere in the world.
But the thing is, it has a lot of impurities in it; they didn't have refineries in those days. If it got wet, the real sodium chloride, (NaCl for you students that are studying chemistry)
leeches out and goes into the water. Then, all that's left is this tasteless group of minerals that are not salt and they don't taste salty. So, that's one possibility that Jesus was talking about. When the saltiness leeches out, you can't make it salty again. The other possibility, though, is true salt will always taste salty and to even imagine it not being salty is absurd.
I could take it either way. I think when we look at the next one, we'll see another kind of unbelievable absurdity. That light could somehow be hidden. Why would it do that?
But, let's stay on salt a little longer. Here's something that Paul says to the church at Colossae about being salty. He says, Colossians 4:5-6 (ESV) 5 “Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. 6 Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.”Let your speech, especially with outsiders who are outsiders outside the faith,
have the flavor of salt. So what's that? The flavor of Jesus? It’s the flavor of being a kingdom citizen, so that your lifestyle “leaks” Jesus, with
just the character traits of how you live and the decisions you make. Jesus, in the book of Mark, is talking about the same topic here. He says, Mark 9:50 (ESV) “Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.” He seems to be connecting one of the character traits from the Beatitudes, saying peacemakers and being reconciled to one another.
Another is connected to salty living, to living in such a way that people get a taste of the kingdom by observing your life, that your life is portrayed by your character, the way you respond to life's storms and difficulties so that people look at you and say. ‘You seem to always have a smile on your face. You seem to always be hopeful. I really admire the way you're raising your children. The way you talk about your spouse is so loving.’
At first, maybe, because of your “salty” way of life, they're offended by your righteousness. But, as soon as one of them gets in a little bit of trouble, instead of going to their own friends, they'll come to you and they'll ask, ‘Why are you like that? Can you tell me what you know?’ Jesus says that you already are “salty” if you have Me in you,
so let Me be the mark of your life. The character traits of Jesus. Now I want to talk about salt like this - salt is not sweet, but it is good. Okay?
Salt is not sweet. Now you can live without sugar. You think you can't, but you can live without sugar. It's not essential to life. In fact, I did some research on this topic and you don't have to have sugar in your diet.
In order to have sugar, your body will make its own sugar. Guess where it gets it? It makes glucose by burning fat cells. This seems like a win win to me. So sugar as a dietary supplement is not a necessity.
However, salt is a necessity for life. Your body has to have it. It can't make its own. It's necessary. Salt is an essential nutrient.
A complete lack of salt could cause you to die. You need salt. It's essential. You have to have it. As the church is salty in a city it is essential to the health of a city.
Do you know that? Think about this story back in the book of Genesis where the Lord came and talked to Abram. He said to Abram, ‘I'm about to go down into Sodom and Gomorrah and judge Sodom and Gomorrah.’ Do you remember the story in the book of Genesis? Abram says, ‘Hey, wait a minute.
My nephew, Lot and his wife and daughters live down there. Lord, You're a righteous judge. If there were fifty righteous people down there, would you still judge Sodom and Gomorrah?’ God tells him, ‘No, not for fifty’s sake.
For fifty’s sake, I would preserve Sodom and Gomorrah. I wouldn't judge.’ Abram then asks, “Lord, what about for forty’s sake?” “For forty’s sake, I'll not judge it.” “Lord,
I'm sorry to keep interrupting You, but for thirty’s sake?’ ‘For thirty’s sake, I will not judge it.’ He gets him all the way down to ten. ‘Lord, please forgive me. I just have to ask, if you find ten righteous people in Sodom and Gomorrah,
would You hold back Your judgment? He goes, ‘For ten’s sake, I'll not judge it.’ He couldn't find ten. But here's a principle I want to draw out from that: If He could have found ten, they would have had a preserving saltiness.
They would have had a witness in that place where God would still be waiting to see how many people would come to Him. I think that's what our church is supposed to be in this city and not just our church, but all the churches in this city that are preaching the gospel of Jesus. We're to have a preserving, portraying love of Jesus, the salt of Jesus to this city, and to be real with people about what that means. Martin Luther emphasized that when we witness that denunciation and proclamation go hand in hand.
He says this about salt. He says, “salt has a bite.”
It's not sweet, it's salty. And so to live salty, your righteousness itself, by your very righteousness, will offend people because they will call you “Goody two shoes.” They'll call you. They'll look down on you. I've mentioned this last week when I was witnessing in my dormitory when I was in college.
Some of the guys started calling me “Billy Graham” and making fun of me. Well, I like Billy Graham and that's not really persecution so much as that you won't get invited to all the cool parties. You might not get that promotion at work.
You actually might not make an A. Instead you'll make a B in some class in school because your teacher doesn't like the way you live. It might cost you something to be salty, but salt has a bite. I think the way I'm talking about this maybe is best described by Ephesians 4:15, where it says, “Speak the truth in love.” It's the right mixture.
To live in a salty way means to live in a truthful way with people, but not forgetting to be loving. You are the salt of the earth.
Ask yourself, are you being salt in your relationships? Are you being salty in the situations around you at work, at school or in your neighborhood? Are you standing firm for truth in places that others are compromising? When we embrace our identity as salt, we stop passively watching the world go by. We stop passively watching the world decay and run down.
We start caring about being part of God's redemptive work. Our lives are to portray the life giving gospel to a world in decay. Here's the second word that Jesus gives to us today:
2. Be light. Proclaim the gospel to a world in darkness.
Be salt. You are the salt. Then He says, “You are the light of the world. ” Be light. Now,
how is light different from salt? We said salt preserves. Salt adds flavor. Salt has healing properties. We didn't go into all 14,000, but we touched on a few.
What about light? Well, light reveals. Salt preserves and adds flavor, but light reveals and shows forth truth. Light causes people in darkness to be able to see.
It causes blind people to be able to open their eyes. That's light. We see the word, “light,” four times in our final verses here, 14 through 16. It's in each of the verses 14, 15 and 16. The word in the Greek is phōs,
if you are taking notes, it's where we get the word phosphorus, photosynthesis and a lot of other English words. phōs is really a great Greek word. Maybe you'll recognize it. It's in verse
15, “Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.” Nor do people light a “lampos.” That one's pretty easy to access. “Nor do people light a lamp and then put it under a basket…” So, we see here that He says, “You are the light of the world.”
Remember what I talked about earlier from the book of John, that in the book of John, he used the emphatic use of “I am, He says, the light of the world.” In John 8:12 (ESV), Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” How remarkable, how stunning is the declaration that the one who says, I am the light of the world would then turn to you and I and say, you, you are the light of the world. How's this possible?
It's only possible if the light of the world, by His Spirit, lives inside of you. Then you become one who reflects His light into a darkened world. That's how it's possible. Jesus has ascended back to the right hand of the Father. His plan for those that are walking in darkness today is that you and I, as witnesses, would bear this light.
So, if being salty has to do with portraying and putting on display the character traits of a kingdom citizen, then being light has to do with proclaiming what it means to be a kingdom citizen, to bring people into the light. He says this, talking about this in verse 14, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.” Perhaps, He was thinking of the city of Jerusalem, which is up on the Temple Mount. From any direction that you're coming to Jerusalem, you have to go uphill to get there, especially, if you're coming from Jericho, it's uphill all the way up to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
If you look at the Temple Mount during those days, everything was made with this white stone, this white marble. No matter the time of day, there was kind of a glow to it. Perhaps, this is what He had in mind when He was saying, “A city on a hill cannot be hidden.” We're to be like that. The church is to be like that.
Verse 15, “Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.” The word, “basket,” has to do with a measuring basket. Some call it a “bushel basket.” In the King James, I think, it is actually translated as a “bushel.”
So, it's dark in your house and you take the time to put some oil in your lamp and you light it. Then, you go and put a bushel basket over it. That's absurd. Why would you do that? What use would light be? It would be useless.
Why would you do that? That's what He says. It's supposed to be something that you actually, instead of covering it up, supposed to put it on a stand. Put it up high so that it lights up the whole house; so that it gives light to all the house. How much light do you need before darkness begins to disappear?
Just one light. Just one candle. Just one little light. One little lamp. Let's see if any of y'all went to Sunday school growing up.
(Singing) “This little light of mine…”
All right, kids, “...hide it under a bushel, no! I'm gonna let it shine.” Yeah. It's not just a kid's song.
We're supposed to let our light shine. He says it's ridiculous that you would put it under a basket. No, put it on a stand. And then He says in verse 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 who is in heaven.” When He says, “others,” He means those outside of the kingdom of God,
because the only salt in this world, the only light in this world for people outside the kingdom, is you. God doesn't have a plan B. The church is plan A. It's the only plan He has. He says that the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.
The church is us. The church is you and I, with Christ in us and He says that you're the salt. You're the light and in this dark world, we are to be the source of light,
of revelation about the Gospel. What happens when we do that? It says in verse 16, “In the same way, your light will shine before others, so that (that's a purpose clause;
it's telling you the purpose) they may see your good works…” Instead of giving you credit for it, because it's so otherworldly, they'll give glory to God. Then, you become what He meant for you to be from creation, the “imago dei,” the image of God, reflecting the glory of God to a dark world, because the light you shine doesn't come from you. You're a reflection of His light to a dark world, and it causes people to glorify God.
Jesus says in Mark 16:15 (ESV) And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.” Go and be a light to the world. In the book of Philippians, Paul describes it like this. He says, Philippians 2:14-16 (ESV) 14 “Do all things without grumbling or disputing, 15 that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, ” So in this dark world, this twisted world, this decaying world, instead of going around grumbling and complaining with the rest of the world,
“among whom you shine as lights in the world, 16 holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.” Now, in the field of physics, the science of physics, we recognize and we learn that darkness is not a force. Darkness, in fact, is the absence of a force. It's the absence of light. Light, on the other hand, has measurable properties.
For instance, you can measure its speed. The speed of light is 186,000 miles per second. You can measure it. When you turn on a light, you don't have to watch your clock to see how long it's going to take for the room to brighten. No,
it seems instantaneous. You don't have to watch it move; you turn on the light and it's instantaneous. Darkness is the absence of light. Light has its own properties.
The minute a light is turned on, darkness vanishes instantly because darkness cannot resist light. And Jesus says,
“You're the light of the world.” May I say it another way, ‘the world has no other light but you.’ Jesus has chosen you, His church, to be the light of the world. The world will remain in darkness without you being the light, so why would you possibly even consider hiding the light of Jesus which lives in you?
It's important because this world is spiritually in darkness, but we are the light of the world. Are you letting the light of Jesus shine from you? Are you the same everywhere you go? The same person you take to church?
Is that the person you take to work, the person you take to school, so that you've got this wholeness? I mean, that with a “wh.” There's holiness which is set apart, but a “wholeness” to you. You're the same person, willing to talk about Jesus anywhere you are. In fact, it's on the tip of your tongue. Does your life match up with your story?
In other words, ‘does your walk and your talk line up, the walk being the salt and the talk being the light?’ because your walk and your talk are to look like Jesus in this world. He is the head and we are the body. In this world, the hands of Jesus are ours. We have His hands.
The feet of Jesus, that carries the gospel to the nations, are our feet. The voice of Christ is our voice. We're to say to ourselves, ‘You are the salt. You are the light.’ Our lives are to be a living proclamation of the Gospel to a world in darkness.
Jesus calls us to live as kingdom people by being salt and light in this world. We are to portray the gospel of salt in a decaying world of light in a dark world. We are to reflect his glory so that God gets all the glory for how we live. Let's pray.
Lord, I first of all want to pray for that person who's never come into the kingdom. They've never come into the kingdom of God. There is an entry point that's a narrow door. Jesus says, “I am the way, I am the truth. I am the life.
No one comes to the Father except by me.” Jesus tells us He's the door. He says, “I am the door.”
Have you ever come through the door? Have you ever said “yes” to Jesus? If that's you, my friend, you're seated here in this room or in the next room or maybe you're watching online. The Lord is listening.
You can ask Him to come into your life. You can profess His name right now by praying to Him. Pray like this. Pray with me right where you are, “Dear Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner.
I've been living in darkness,
but I repent of my sin and I turn my life over to You. I believe You died on the cross for my sins, that You were raised from the grave and that You live today. Come and live in me. I invite You to be my king. I want You to be my King, my Lord and my Savior.
I pray that You would adopt me into your family. I want to be a citizen of the kingdom, a child of God.” If you're praying that prayer of faith, believing, He will save you. Others are here and you're a believer. You're a follower of Jesus, but have you lost your saltiness?
Have you been hiding your light?
Oh, Lord, we repent of that right now. Help us to be the same everywhere we go so that we live as salt and light in this decaying and dark world. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Audio
Good morning, church. Good to see all of you this morning. I'm so thankful you're here. Thankful to be in the second part of this wonderful series, going through the Sermon on the Mount together. I pray that this is an impactful series for our church, that it moves us, it stirs us, it causes us to be more like Jesus.
That's our ultimate purpose as individuals and certainly as a church. This series we've entitled Kingdom Living. It's about us learning to live as Kingdom citizens, God's creation both here and forevermore. And so Kingdom Living, what a great series that we found ourselves in. If you missed last week, you can check it out online at Eastgate Church.
Hopefully on the way in, you grab one of these. If you did not, please raise your hand. We'll get you one. This is a series that we really want you to be able to take notes and keep with you. We're going to be in here for several weeks together and so this is an opportunity for you to really share and maybe have something that you can look back on.
If God kind of speaks, and I pray he speaks to you throughout the weeks we're together in Matthew 5, 7. This whole thing is called the Sermon on the Mount, specifically because of where Jesus preached, but also because of some of the Saints of old. St. Augustine is the one they believe first called it the Sermon on the Mount. And this comes from Matthew, chapter five, verse one, which we read last week, where it says, seeing the crowds, he, Jesus, went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.
So it's been aptly titled the Sermon on the Mount. The traditional location for this is on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. You can pop up this image kind of shows you sort of the terrain of that area, kind of a sloping terrain which would create sort of an amphitheater kind of setting so that Jesus could not only be seen, but also be heard. And so the backdrop gave him sort of a natural amplification. And this whole series, this whole conversation that Christ is having with the people of that day and now across generations.
Now, to us, this conversation is about what it looks like to live as Kingdom citizens, to live as God's people. Scottish theologian Sinclair Ferguson once wrote, the sermon is a description of a lifestyle of those who belong to the kingdom. And so that's where we're spending our time today and where we're really focusing over the next many weeks together. This kingdom that Jesus describes, however, is radically different than anything you've experienced in this life apart from Christ. It is a counterculture in so many ways.
We saw that last week. We're going to see it all the more this week. Jesus is essentially turning worldly wisdom upside down. In fact, it's caused some people, when writing on this, John Stott included, to call this a counterculture sermon. This is why we've called it kingdom living.
You can live for a lot of things and we're naturally going to live for something that's just the state, the nature of man. But Christ has called us to live differently for his kingdom. So that's where we're going to be today. Last week we studied the Beatitudes, and that was a wonderful list that Christ has called us to be and to be blessed in those things. Now today he's going to challenge us further as to what to do with those blessings.
Dr. Akin, when writing on this, he says that Matthew 5, 13, 16, where we will be today from, flows naturally out of the Beatitudes. He goes on to say, taking on and exhibiting the character of the Beatitudes that makes it possible for us to be salt and light on the earth. And that's where we're going to spend time today. The Beatitudes describe this inner character.
And now today we're going to see this external how to outwardly live in a culture that's very far from God. Now I wonder this, and I imagine I know the answers to this question. Do you sometimes struggle with how to live outwardly, live your faith outwardly with others? It can be a very complex thing to try to understand how to live openly with your faith, but also to be smart about that and to know when is the right opportunity to. To share, when is the right opportunity to stand firm.
It can be confusing at times to know how to live publicly as a man or a woman of faith. This can be a difficult thing. Some of us have believed in old adage, you may have even heard this growing up, that religion is a private matter. This is definitely a common thing, I hear. I just want to say this.
This might sound strong. I think that's probably something the Evil One would definitely want you to say, that religion, that faith is a private matter. He would be very happy to hear you do that and say that. Keep it to yourself. That seems a little foreign to what Christ has called us to in the Great Commission, to go and make disciples and baptize.
That seems counterintuitive to what Jesus has said. But a lot of people think this way. A lot of maybe your parents, your grandparents thought this way. They had faith. They had strong faith even, but they thought that religion was something private.
Indeed, many have tried to remove all vestige of Christian faith in the public square. Our nation has been just systematically doing this over time, removing everything that looks Christian for what once was. And this is true in your private life too, that slowly but surely everything, every nuance of Christ is being removed. Others might be open about their faith, yet their lives don't always match the message. And that's equally troubling when you talk a big game, but you don't do the things you talk about.
This leads to an accusation that a lot of non churchgoers, a lot of non Christians, will say that the church is full of hypocrites. And that's technically true. We almost don't even really need to fight that. We just need to say, you know, we're a big mess, every single one of us. We're all sinners, saved by grace.
But the difference between a faithful believer and a non faithful one is repentance and a desire to live as Christ. And that's where he's called us today. How do we live as kingdom people? What does Jesus have to say about this? How should our faith look publicly?
What should it look like? So in the Gospel of Matthew chapter five, just a few verses together, we're going to see Jesus used two powerful metaphors to call his disciples to faithfully live as kingdom people. By his transforming power. We can do this too. We can live out Christ's call.
This is a timeless message for the believers in Christ to live as kingdom people. We're going to see two clear ways to faithfully live as Christ's kingdom citizens. Matthew chapter 5. Let's read these handful of verses together. It says in verse 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. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand.
And it gives light to all in the house in the same way. Let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. This is God's word. Amen. What a wonderful, a wonderful calling.
This is a promise. It's more than a promise. He has named you Christian in the room. Church, hear this. Christ has just said two things that he believes about you.
He has named you not just Trey, not just Rich, not just fill in your name there. He's named you salt and light. And there's an encouraging promise in this. And so how do we live as Christ's kingdom? People number one, be salt.
Be salt. And what does that mean? All right, let's get out of the metaphor. He's talking about the idea of portraying the Gospel to a world in decay, preserving it, portraying it to a world in decay. He described his followers, and now us, the church, as salt and light.
I really loved. This is a longer excerpt from Dr. Akin's book Exalting Jesus on Sermon on the Mount. But this is a really well put quotation, so I wanted to share it with you. He writes about this be salt.
He says, those who love and follow King Jesus are the only real salt this world will ever taste and the only authentic light it will ever see. Jesus words in these verses take it as an undeniable truth that we live in a decadent, decaying and dark world. Where there is decay, we need salt. Where there is darkness, we need light. We, the citizens of the kingdom of heaven, are God's plan to stop death and stamp out darkness.
This plan finds its crescendo in the last words of the last chapter in this Gospel with what we call the Great Commission. To the nations we go as salt and light. Isn't that powerful? Did you know you are not God's plan B? You are God's plan A.
Now that's baffling. I have to admit that's kind of a frustrating thing for me to even think about Jesus. I get it. You had to be crucified for my sake. You had to resurrect so that you could conquer death.
But when you came back from the grave, why didn't you just go ahead and stick around? You're a better preacher than me. You're a much better disciple maker than me. You're better at judging situations and discerning things. You're perfect.
You're the Son of God. And yet he says, behold, when my spirit comes upon you, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and to the ends of the earth. And then he ascends and sends the promised Holy Spirit. You ever think about this God? Why didn't you just stick around?
Why did you give me this job? Well, I don't know exactly God's reasoning and his purposes, but I do know this. There's a certain pleasure, a certain joy that I get as a father when I include my children in things, when I Get the opportunity to say to my sons and daughters, these are good things in life. These are cool things we get to do. When I get the opportunity to share in ministry with my children, that is a certain kind of joy I can't express in any other way.
And there's something else going on here. It's not just that God gets great joy and pleasure when his kids do what they're called to do, and it must give him such joy. But it's not just that. Think about how much it lifts your spirit and how much you get to be a part of the kingdom of God. Because Christ made you his plan A.
He made you his plan A. That's incredible. That's incredible. Some of you will argue with me until you're blue in the face. Well, Jonathan, I'm really, I'm kind of a blue collar guy.
Sometimes the word is confusing to me. I don't know what kind of salt and light I'm going to be. God told you. You're salt and light. You're his plan A.
And he doesn't have a plan B. He doesn't have one because he believes and he knows that the church will rise and sustain and preserve and portray the message throughout all eternity. And certainly while we're on this earth, isn't this incredible news? You are the salt of the earth. Now he comes out of the gate saying, you are.
You are. This is interesting. Some of you have heard this before. There are these statements that Jesus shares in the book of John where he says, I am the light of the world. I am the bread of life.
If you look at that in the Greek, it's actually Jesus saying, I, I am. It's an emphatic use of I am. He says, I, I am the bread of life. Guess what he's doing here? He's saying, you, you are the salt of the earth.
You, you are the light of the world. He's giving you access to something here. He's in fact saying, because I'm the salt of the earth, you will be the salt of the earth. Because I am the light of the world, you will be the light of the world. What is the light that we portray Him?
It's not something we've created. It's the gospel. It's the truth. So we are the salt of the earth. This is simple here, the word salt.
In fact, I did some research this week to try to figure out who coined the phrase. As far as I can tell, Jesus coined this phrase, you're the salt of the earth. We still Use this. Now, we use it a little differently now. Normally describes somebody who's like maybe a farmer, more of a blue collar, like, salt of the earth kind of people.
We'll say that that guy's a salt of the earth. That means he'll give you the shirt off his back. He lives a simple life. My grandparents were the salt of the earth. We still say that kind of phrase.
Jesus meant far more than that. With that, those things could be included. But salt preserves, salt enhances. Now, I haven't read this book. You can pop up this image.
This is a book my dad has read and was telling me about this week as we were studying a large book on salt. And my dad knows a lot about salt, apparently, if y'all see him asking questions about salt. But one of the things that this book talks about is the idea of how salt preserves. I'll just read you a small excerpt. It says, until modern times, it was the primary, the principal way that people use to preserve stuff.
This ability to preserve, to protect against decay, to sustain life, has given salt a broad metaphorical importance about longevity and about permanence. You know, the Bible uses salt a lot as this very idea. Salt, for the ancient Hebrews as well as the modern Jews, is a symbol of the eternal nature of God's covenant with Israel. You can look at the Book of Numbers, for instance. It's written.
It's a covenant of salt forever in the Book of Numbers. Later in the Book of Chronicles, we see the Lord God of Israel gave the kingdom of Israel to David forever, even. Even to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt. This is interesting. On Friday nights, Jews dip the Sabbath bread in salt.
Salt is a powerful thing and has been a powerful imagery throughout mankind's history. Jesus uses it specifically, or not just about preserving, though. He uses it about how we portray the gospel. I know you don't want to walk out of here today just going, man, I learned some stuff about salt. It's not my goal at all today.
That'd be nice. You know, I want you to learn that's cool and all, but I want you to feel like God is moving and changing and stirring in your life. And he's called you the salt of the earth. And he warns us about something. He warns us about something.
He says, if you lose your taste, you can't be restored. You can't come back. Now, that sounds not only terrifying, but kind of strange. If salt loses its salty flavor, doesn't it cease to be salt? Just think about this logically.
For A minute. In fact, many, many people I was reading on this were like, we think Jesus is using something of hyperbole here. In fact, one writer says, common salt, as well, as we know, will melt if you expose it to moisture, but it doesn't lose its saltiness. You can put salt in water. You do it all the time, probably for various things.
Have you ever noticed that it makes water taste salty? Yes, it disappears, but it doesn't lose its saltiness. So what is Jesus saying? He's using this very strange illustration to say, if you, because of Christ in you, because you've been blessed as peacemakers, as poor in spirit as being merciful, all the character traits of Christ Jesus, if you have these things, you are salt. But if you decide to simply not be salty, you're some kind of weird thing that doesn't even exist in nature at that point.
Can you really even identify yourself as salt? Because the key attribute of salt, I don't know if you've ever noticed, is that it's salty.
So Jesus says, salt of the earth. If you lose your taste, you're no good. You're no good. Why? Because you're not even salt.
You're going to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You're trampled underfoot because you're useless. There's nothing to you. In fact, he says in verse 13, how can you make salty? How can you restore it?
The word restore there in verse 13 is simply to salt. Salt.
I was expecting to see something else in my word studies. Jesus is literally saying, how do you make salt salty? The word ESV changes it to restored because that sounds weird. He's basically saying, how do you re. Salt.
Salt? I don't know of any way. We have desalination processes, but I don't know how you re. Salt. Salt.
There might be a way somebody knows. Jesus isn't working on that specifically. He's saying, if you're not salty, you're really not even salt. You just need to be honest about that and you're as good as thrown out. Look, salt is to be the flavor of your speech.
The Bible loves this word, salt. Colossians 4, it says, walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Some of you are really good about this. You're making a lot of use of your time.
You're letting your speech go out, but you probably, if anyone was watching, you would say, I wouldn't Say that was seasoned well. Some of you are doing very good about talking about your faith, but it lacks seasoning. And you wonder why people reject not only the gospel, but you. It's because sometimes we come at this whole conversation with almost loftiness or rudeness. Rather than seasoned well.
He says gracious, being salty is good. It displays in the fruit of peace. Mark 9, it says, Salt is good. But if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will it be made salty again? Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another.
I don't know how else to ask this question. In Christ Jesus, he's already told you, you are salt of the earth. The question is, are you living salty? What does that mean? Let's take it across the metaphor.
Are you portraying the gospel in such a way that people would go, yeah, that tastes pretty good. Are you portraying the gospel in such a way that they would say, I'm interested in what you got going on? There's another place where the Bible says, you should always be ready to show or to speak on behalf of the hope that you have in Christ Jesus. Well, you can't possibly have anyone come up to you. If you're not one who has hope in Christ Jesus, people won't come asking, saying, what is going on with you?
How is it that you're peaceful in this moment? How do you have joy? How do you bring flavor to conversation? How is it that when the rest of us are cutting our boss down, you don't? How is it that when everyone dogpiles that one goober co worker and you know who he is, you know who she is.
There's the goober co worker. We all have one, right? I don't. I work alone. I'm the goober co worker.
I'm the solo pastor here. I'm both. I have to rebuke myself sometimes. Like, man, you're a mess, but we all know that guy. And what causes you then to not dogpile?
What causes you at school to not be on the gossip train with everyone else? What happens there? And guess what? When you're that kind of salty, when you're that kind of portraying the gospel and preserving the gospel, some people are going to turn on you too and say, hey, you don't want a dog pile. Include you and who were dogpiling Cool.
Don't care. I'm the salt of the earth. Eventually that thing will come full circle to where people come and say, there's something tasty about your life. They're not going to phrase it that way. Because that's wacky.
But that's what they're saying. You bring a certain flavor to life that I wish I had.
But you've got to bring flavor to life that people wish they had. Christ says, you've already got it. You already have it. The fruit of the spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, kindness, self control.
The fruit of the spirit is yours. Do you know how many people would like any one of those nine lists? Anyone. And you have them all in Christ Jesus that they could know peace and real contentment, real joy. Are you tasty?
Do you bring flavor to life? Ask some of your friends today, let that be a lunch conversation today with your spouse, with your kids, and say, hey, am I bringing life or am I bringing death? Am I just adding to your confusion? Am I making life miserable for you and spouse? Give them a gracious, seasoned well with salt truth.
Yes, honey, you make life fairly tough sometimes. I worry about you in this. I worry about you because you don't seem to be enjoying your life. You don't seem to be at peace. Now, this isn't a fake thing.
This isn't where we just joke our way through this process and just say, well, I'm going to put on my best. I'm going to do my best. No, that's not how this works. Christ says, you're the salt of the earth. Why?
Because you're blessed. When you do the things to which you've been called, you're blessed. As he begins this. When you follow Christ, when you follow in a long line of the prophets, he just has concluded saying, it's going to be blessed for you to. To be persecuted.
Why? Because you're in the company of the saints. You're in the long line of the prophets. And guess who you're following most closely? Me.
Jesus. All of the things he's described, he will do and is doing. He says, follow me. You're the salt of the earth. How do you continue to be salty?
Well, I don't know how you re. Salt. Salt, but I know how you keep your salt levels high. Keep going back to the source. God has an endless supply in this department.
His well never runs dry. Jonathan, I don't know how to bring salt and light to this life. I've gone through so much. I'm in such pain physically, emotionally, spiritually. My bank account is busted.
I lost my job. My spouse seems to hate me. My kids are a mess. Some of you are facing some of these things. There's so much anxiety in my Life, start with the source, my friend.
If you have faith in Christ Jesus today, he has said to you, you are salt. And he desires to fill you to the brim. Bring all of that stuff that you just said in your mind that for some reason you're only keeping there. Bring it in prayer to him. Say, lord, this is not who I want to be.
It can't possibly be what you designed me to be. You said, I'm salt. I'm supposed to bring flavor and I don't have it fill me. Look, salt, let's be honest. It's not sweet, but it is good.
You can live without sugar, but you really can't live without salt. The body needs just a little bit of glucose. It doesn't require it, though, in your diet. Salt, however, is an essential nutrient. The water throughout your body is salty.
A complete lack of salt can lead to serious health problems and even death. That's just physically. I would argue for you, believer, the saddest place you can find yourself is to be an unsalty salt of the earth.
Yes, eternity is in store for you. There's one day glory, but you will spend this life in misery. I don't want to paint you a lie. I don't want to paint you a picture that isn't true. In this life.
You would have more pleasure if you didn't know Christ. If you're going to live without salt now, you'll have eternity. And that's to your benefit. But if you want to know what it means to live with joy, peace, patience, kindness, the fruit of the Spirit. Be filled with the Spirit, spend time with the Lord.
Animals come from afar. They get this right. There's these salt licks. There's some in North Carolina, these places, they call them salt licks for that very reason. Because animals come, they're not as dumb, they're not as dumb as we are.
Do you know, people for a long time were like, you know, we gotta stop having so much salt, salt in our diet. What in the world's wrong with us? Maybe we have too much sometimes. But when it comes to spiritual things, we're like, I don't know why I feel off a little bit, because you got no salt in your spiritual life. You're trying to live life without the spirit of God.
What are you doing? The animals even know they got to come to the salt lick.
Jesus has named you this, my friends. Be salty in your relationships and the situations around you. Stand firm for truth in places where others might compromise. Embrace your identity. Stop passively watching the world decline and decay around you and be a part of God's plan, a his redemptive plan for the earth.
This blending game is over. No more blending in. Go ahead, you start looking salty and people are going to go, you're glowing. And I don't know how I feel about it. Do it portray this life giving gospel because the world is crumbling and it's going to continue to do so.
Here's the second, and I only have two today. Boy, I get to have fun.
Be salt, be light. Rocket science. How I came up with this one, y'all. This was tough. Proclaim the world.
Proclaim the gospel to a world in darkness. Jesus says, you're salt. Jesus says, you are you. You are the light of the world. Now this is a little different.
He's not just saying the same thing twice. He's not trying to help us dig deeper on the metaphor. He's given us two different aspects about what it means to live as kingdom citizens in a broken and dying dark world. He's saying, first, you need to portray it, you need to bring flavor, but also you bring light to darkness. This word light here has to do with living under his blessing in such a way that people might see you and want what you've got.
In fact, he says this of himself first and then says it of you. John 8:12. It says, Jesus spoke to them, saying, I, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. Now those who were listening intently would go, huh, you said that about us too.
Isn't that weird? No, it's not weird at all. Because in Christ Jesus, his light is our light. He has so inhabited us so a part of what we're doing in life, that now we shine the light of Christ to the world. We don't produce this ourselves.
We're almost like the moon in this. We're a reflection of God's glory. We're a reflection of the sun for a broken world.
One writer says on this. Now, in a remarkable and stunning declaration, he looks at his disciples and applies the same image to them to us. He says, we who follow King Jesus reflect the greater light who is Christ. And in doing so, point to him, point others to him. He goes on to further illustrate this.
He does something similar as what he does with salt, because unsalty salt is just ridiculous. He goes on to say, you know, you're a city on a hill. You can't hide, you can try, but if you're really following Christ, you're the light of the world. And guess what's hard to miss, especially in the first century? A city on a hill.
I'll give you a really, really key city on a hill. In Israel, it was Jerusalem. A city on a great hill. If there's any light in the city, you will see it for miles. You'll see it at nighttime, especially in the darkness.
You'll go, all right, I know where I'm heading. I gotta get out of this dark wilderness. I know where I'm going. He says of the believers. He says, you ought to be easy to spot.
You ought to be obvious.
Is your life obvious?
That would be a secondary question you could ask your friends and family today over lunch. Is it obvious to you that I know and love Jesus? Is it obvious to you? Does my life look like worship? These are challenging questions.
Be ready for challenging answers. He says you cannot be hidden. A city on a hill can't be hidden. It'd be like putting a lamp under a basket. Now, this one sparked a song in me and some of you know what song that may have sparked.
I'm going to start a phrase for you and we're all going to find out who grew up in the church. Don't feel bad if you didn't. This is just. The rest of us are weird, right? And so this little light of mine.
That's right. That's right. This little light of mine. Yeah. Don't let the devil it out.
I'm gonna let it shine. Alright. Christians have always been weird, but we're the salt and the light of the earth. All right? For a long time, as a pk, I grew up as a pastor's kid, grew up in the church, grew up around this stuff.
For a long time I was thinking, man, I gotta stop being so, so weird. Alright? I'm a quirky person and some of it's because of my church past. But you know where I'm at now. You know those little ditties.
Father Abraham had many sons, you know, that stuff is like etched in my brain to the core. Thankful for it. Now, did you know I was singing Matthew chapter five as a child? I didn't realize that. I'm not mad about this now.
Let that light shine. Don't put it under a bushel basket. No, I'm going to let it shine. That's what Jesus says here in verse 15. This is quoting scripture.
We were singing it when we were children and it's foolish to do this in real life. No one would do this.
And he says, but in fact, when I call you what you are, when I name you the true thing, you are the light of the world because of my light in you. Some of you will attempt to hide the city on a hill. Some of you will attempt to hide your light under a basket. But that's not the way. Verse 16.
No. Let your light shine. So this word here, the Greek word for let your light shine is fantastic. You will not forget this. Light.
Shine. Shine. Here is the Greek word. Lampo. Lampo.
Hallelujah. I know Greek because I know the word lamp. Let your light shine. This means to radiate brilliantly, to shine brightly. And he defines what that looks like, not only in the things you say, but then he goes on to say, in good works.
And guess what happens? These are the results that are in God's hands. Verse 16 gives us a reward. It gives us a result clause that I long for. What happens?
Read it again. Church. It says, they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. Guess what happens, my friends, when you're salt and light? You lift up the name of Jesus, and then other people, not everyone, but some people, will look and give glory too.
Jesus says, when I am lifted up, I will bring the nations to myself. When I am lifted up, people will come to faith. What are we to do as Christians then? It's not as complex as we make it. Sometimes our primary purpose in life is to know and to glorify God.
So I lift him up in my speech, in the way in which I work, in the way I spend my money, in the way in which I order my schedule, I lift up the name of Jesus. And then he does this surprising thing. Where others give glory, they magnify. They live in such a way that they too glorify God. We're commanded to proclaim the gospel to the world.
This is why our faith, this religion, if you will, this relationship is not a private matter. It can't be. It just can't be. Everywhere. Salt bumps into stuff.
It makes it salty. Guess what light does every time it bumps into darkness? It wins. It just wins.
Mark, chapter 16 is a repetition of the Great Commission. Here is written that Jesus said to them, go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.
Paul writes to the Philippian Church to shine brightly. He says in chapter 2, verse 14, do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish. In the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, you may have observed this right church among whom you will shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. When Christ comes again, I can say, I shone your light as bright as I could possibly fathom. I didn't get it right all the time.
Understand that the expectation on this verse today is not perfection. There are some people, and I probably should have led with this, There are some people who get to the aspects of the Sermon on the Mount and they say, this is so utopian, this is so ideal, that Christ can't possibly mean that we're to achieve these things. Some people look at this text and say, this much must be a picture of heaven, that this will be what we experience there. Well, I don't think we're experiencing persecution there, so I'm a little confused about all of the details that they're leaning on. But we should at least give them this credit.
This is beyond us, apart from Christ. That's right. That we would be merciful and peacemakers. We'd be salt and light even when things are hard. That we would have mercy for those who don't deserve it.
That we would. We'd be joyful when we're persecuted. But it's not utopian, my friends. God has not called us to something that he hasn't always and consistently given us the ability to do in his name and empowered us to do. When we come back to the salt lick, when we come back to the well of life, he fills us afresh so that we can shine brightly.
This is one of these places in scripture that I don't think we should look at and say, we can't do this, so let's not try. That makes no sense to me. In fact, that's not really the testimony of most of the saints of old. Instead, what we should do is look at this and go, I can't do this apart from you, Lord, so you better show up and I walk with you. And guess what he'll do?
He's down. He is down to walk with you when you walk in your calling, in the place in which he's called you. That's right where he is in physics. Darkness doesn't even have a force of its own. If you're trying to figure out what it means to be light, just know that most of the world is in darkness.
Darkness. The only thing that really makes darkness, darkness. Do you know what it is? Do you know what its Main attribute is the absence of light. You can't even define darkness without light.
How do we even know that the world is dark? That spiritually the world is dark? We know it because there is an absence of light. There is an absence of God. There's an absence of the worship of Christ.
Now we can measure the properties of light. This is a fascinating thing. These are the kind of weird things I like. It travels at a speed of approximately 186,000 miles per second. Light's incredible.
We can measure it. And the moment that light is turned on, darkness can't resist it. It's fascinating. The thing that makes darkness darkness is simply that light isn't there. But when light shows up, light wins.
Just the small presence of Christ's light in us has the power to push back darkness. Guess what? It started in you, believer. Some of you had a very difficult past, a very dark past, if you will. And the light of Christ in your life has begun and continues to push back sin, darkness in your own personal life.
Now Christ says, now that light don't hide it. I know some of you have been through a lot. I know right now some of this stuff you're like, man, I want to shine bright, but I'm discouraged. I'm feeling this. Christ says, just let it just shine brokenness at all.
He didn't say, hey, you've got to be the perfect city on the hill. You better have all your walls cleaned. You better have all your. You've got to have the perfect wax on this candle, right? I don't see that in the text.
He just says, you're a light of the world, so shine. You don't have it all figured out. That's not the point. Are you proclaiming him in word and in deed? Do your friends and family, do they know?
Do the people closest to you even know that you're the light of the world? Do they know? Are you hiding this? Jesus says, I'm the light of the world. And if you follow him, it's going to be bright.
It's just going to be bright. It's going to be weird. Sometimes you're going to sing little ditties you used to know as a child. Just let it go.
Jesus calls us to live as kingdom people being salt and light in this world, portraying the gospel, I would charge you, encourage you as Christ did. You are already these things. This isn't something you have to earn. You've already received it by faith in Christ. You are already salt and light.
Live it and come back to the well, come back to the salt lick and be restored so that you can continue to live it. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you so much that first of all, you are the salt. You are the light of the world, that you haven't called us to be or do something that you haven't first done yourself and empowered us to do. We thank you, God, for the message of the cross.
We thank you, God, that in this darkness, in this place where we as men and women are far from you, that we think most often about what we want to do and what we. What we desire. And we tend as people, as humankind, to just live apart from you. And yet, God, in spite of that, you shone as a bright light in a dark place. You took on the cross for us and that you continue to empower us to this day.
Thank you for who you are. God. We don't deserve any of the many, many blessings that you've given. We certainly don't deserve the eternity that you've promised for us as believers. God, thank you for who you are.
I ask that in your people today you would encourage us. There are some people in this room today that haven't come to the bearer of salt, the well of life, the light of the world. There's some people in this room that, though they are believers, though they're Christians, they haven't come back to the source in a while. And they're feeling that they're feeling depressed, anxious, worried, discouraged.
They're salt God, but they are not feeling salty. They're light, but it's dim. God, I pray for those people today that your presence would be obvious to them in this very moment, that they would feel a strong sense of relationship to you and a calling back to being in a community with you that they've been disengaged from for a while. God, would you encourage us in this way? Call us home.
Dear sons and daughters, come see me. I'm here to speak. I'm here to encourage God. I pray that over your people today, I pray for that one that's come in today. They're not the ones you're speaking of here, salt and light.
They're on the outside looking in at the moment. Maybe they've heard some of the good news before. I pray today that they're hearing for the first time clearly that Christ Jesus, you died for them. You saved them, and you have set them free. If they would believe it and have faith that they too would be the salt and the light.
If that's you, my friend, You've come today and you're understanding this message and God is calling you into relationship with him. Pray simply with me as Paul writes to the Roman Church. Romans 10 if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. Would you pray simply with me? Lord Jesus, I believe.
I believe today that you saved me. That you paid for my sin, my brokenness, my guilt and shame. You paid for it on the cross. And Jesus, you are Lord, you are in charge. You are king of my life.
God, I believe that you raised Jesus Christ from the dead because of the crucifixion and the resurrection. God, I believe that I am saved and that eternity is in store for me. Dear friend, if you prayed that prayer with me. Welcome to the kingdom of God, the family of God. And we pray as one that God you would so call us to be salt and light that we wouldn't run from this anymore.
We wouldn't try to blend in or hide our light. That God you would show us every single day how to represent you in a powerful way to a decaying and dark world. We pray all of these things in Jesus name, Amen.