The context, Jesus addressing his disciples about some of the characteristics that are part of just being a Christian, that these things would be true for those who are Christians, and then he goes on to talk about persecution. And then after that comes the portion that we have for this morning. So keep in mind that it's right after he's been talking about being persecuted and what we saw last week that we're actually to rejoice and to be glad. And then it goes on there to point out the opportunity we have to be salt and light. Let's hear the Word of God. Seeing the crowds, He, Jesus, went up on the mountain, and when He sat down, His disciples came to Him. And He opened His mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you, and persecute you, and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, How shall its saltiness be restored? Is it no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet? You are the light of the world. The 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 your glory to your Father who is in heaven. Near the city of Canyon City, Colorado, there's a road called Skyline Drive. that goes over the top of a high ridge. Now the road is one-way road, and it has to be, because the road is so narrow there would be no way to get two cars to pass. So I thought, why? And on both sides, as you go down this drive are steep falls, either to the left or the right. If you go over the side, you're going to go down for several hundred feet before you hit the bottom. And so you want to stay on that road. And of course, out there, there are no guardrails, there's nothing to hold you back. As you might imagine, the scenery, the view is great. And fantastic, but you don't want to be looking out at the scenery if you're driving. It's much too dangerous. It's a breathtaking view, but you want to be looking out as a passenger, not as the one who's driving. Well, that scenic highway reminds me much of the Christian life. As we think about how to live the Christian life, it's sort of a narrow path. that you dare not stray too far to the right or to the left. And the devil is wanting us to go wrong one way or the other. And it really doesn't matter which way, because it will be equally traumatic which way you go. For example, one of the things that Jesus has commanded his disciples is to be in the world but not of the world. And as we chart that course of being in the world and not of the world, we'll notice there's two ways of going astray. The first is not really to be in the world. It's to cut yourself off from the world. To be separate from it. And the second is to become like the world. To be of the world. to be no different than the world. And both are wrong. In the first case, we're not able to be ambassadors in this world that we're called to be because we're not really interacting with the world. is wrong as well. Our priorities, our habits, our thoughts, our ambitions are just the same as the world. If we have the same materialism, the same divorce rate, the same attitude toward worth as the world does, there's nothing that indicates that we're not of the world. And Jesus As we look at these verses, as he's talking to his disciples, to his followers, it's calling us to be distinctively different. To be in the world, but to be not of the world. To live and to act and to think in such a way that others can see that we're not like them. That we're not going along with the world's standards. We're not backing away from the world, but we're not embracing what the world does. And the first point, as you look at these verses twice, in verse 13 and 14, Jesus begins with, you are. As He's addressing His disciples, He wants them to understand something about their situation. You are. There's a given. And those two words are very significant, that word you. It's plural. And we would take that as pretty natural, he's addressing a crowd, he's addressing his disciples as we're gathered together, that he would be addressing them, you all. But he could. There are instances where he addresses them with the singular. That even as he addresses the crowd, and even as I might address you, I might be looking at one particular person and say, you. and how you think about your situation. So we have at least a hint, and I suspect probably much more, there's a corporateness about being soft and light. There's this word called to do that. We're to do it, yes, individually, but we're also to do it as a body, as a group. That much of the way that we show that we're soft and light is by our interaction. but what we're like together. And so, there's a comfort in this. All of us are to be part of a welcoming community, and not just the individual. All of us are to be showing compassion on the needy. All of us are to be showing integrity in our speech with one another. All of us are to be chaste in our speech and in our conduct. And it's as we interact with one another, show that, not only individually, but corporately, that we're proving to be salt and light. Because you think about it, you can find an isolated individual here and there in the world, as well as in the church, who would be friendly, who would be welcoming, who's naturally outgoing, who welcomes new people. But it's when the group is, when there's a group witness, that as I've been received by Christ and welcomed by Him, I receive and welcome others, that there's a power to that witness. The second thing Jesus says is, you are. And that word are is important. This, Jesus is saying, is your present condition, your present status. This is what you are. Notice that. If you are a follower, you are salt. You are light. It's not that you'll strive to be salt and light. that you will someday be salt and light, that if you act rightly, you'll become salt and light. He's not urging them to become something that they aren't. He's telling them what they are, by the very fact that they're His followers. And so the question isn't whether or not you'll be salt and light. The question is, what kind of salt are you? What kind of light are you? And as you look at what he says, you can either be worthless, its only purpose is to be trodden on by others, or giving glory to God. Which kind of salt are you going to be? Which kind of light are you going to be? Well, looking then at the specific second point Jesus tells us follows, you are the salt of the earth. You're placed within this globe, within all the peoples, within all the nations of the world to be salt. As you look around at the world with its ambitions, with its pursuits, with its goals, you have a distinctive function. And that function is to be salt in this world. Now keep in mind, He's talking about those who just mentioned being persecuted. The world is going to react strongly against them. They'll be persecuted. And what's the response? To keep in mind what you are. You're to be salt in a darkened world. Now, if you think about what salt is, Salt is seemingly a pretty insignificant chemical. It's one of the cheapest things you can go in the grocery store and buy, and it was back in Jesus' day. You can think of how Christians are often seen as insignificant, as powerless in this world. of not having much value. And if you go in and buy some table salt, it won't cost you an arm and a leg. But it had great properties. It had great value beyond what it was worth monetarily. And so it is with Christians, that our value, that our influence, it's much greater than what our appearance would seem to be. Or we could ask, first of all, what are the properties of salt that give it such unusual abilities? There are three things we can think about. First and most obvious is that salt acts as a preservative. It preserves. How did people in the first century and before and after keep meat and fish fresh, keep it from rotting? Well, they put salt on it to preserve it. So it wouldn't decay. It would not become rotten. And Jesus, comparing us to salt, is saying we're the same thing morally. How does society keep from becoming as rotten, decaying as much as it could? Well, it's as Christians are in there giving a saltiness to the world. For example, you think how maybe someone at work refrains from telling a lewd or racist joke. Well, why do they do that? They would know that there's a Christian in the workplace, on the shop floor. or in the doctor's office, and you're trained. Because they know you'll be offended and rightly so. Someone may be tempted to pilfer from the company, but they know there's an employee who acts with integrity, who will turn them in, for their misdeeds. And so they restrain themselves. A student on the campus who is being tempted to immorality, and there's that student that says, I don't live that way. There's no reason to indulge that way and to restrain. As Christians, we can be that moral compass for people around us. This is people who do not know what is right or wrong, what is good and evil. We're the ones that are there, that are saying, abortion, mercy killing is wrong. Homosexuality and all sexual sin is wrong. To cheat on your taxes is wrong. And so we can have a preserving aspect of society. They'll understand right and wrong, truth and error, sin and righteousness. as they see us. Second, salt, and this is what we know, especially in our day, salt gives flavor. It seasons the food that we eat. It brings out the taste. And that word seasons, if you look it up in the Oxford English Dictionary, it says, gives zest. It simply tastes better. It brings out the flavor. And as we're involved in society, we bring out the better aspects of what society is involved in. And I think of the autobiography of John G. Payton, a missionary to the Hebrides. The tribe that had no Christian influence, none of this Christian taste of their culture. What was their society like? where I was continually lying and deceived, of backstabbing, of trying to hurt the other person. There was constant warfare going on. And as one of the missionaries wrote, they were either at war or they were preparing for war. Those were the only two conditions I had. And of course, they were cannibals as they were engaging in that war. They would steal whatever they could. He tried to lock up whatever he had. Because if it was just left out, it would be dying. The neglect of women, of wives, of children was rampant. And the wives were put to death when their husbands died. And often because of the warfare, the husbands would die very young. And so you had a lot of these young widows being put to death. You know, it was a horrible, horrible place to live. You didn't feel secure for your life, even if you were a tribal leader because there was somebody wanting to take your position, wanting to kill you and have your wives and everything else. Take all your possessions. And so you try to grow things, but someone would come along and steal them in the middle of the night. So your life was not safe, your property was not safe, your family was not safe. You lived in constant fear and in constant conflict. How much better is a taste of society that's been influenced by Christian principles where there is some regard, maybe not all the regard we want, but there is some regard for integrity, honesty, and justice, and personal rights, and property rights, and family. We can cause it to taste better, life to be better, because of our influence. And the third use of salt is that which is found in Judges 9, 45. That's Abimelech, as he goes into the city of Shechem and destroys the city. And then we're told he scatters salt over it. Why does he do that? Well, to surrender the ground infertile. They'd often do that. They would often put something on the ground that would make it difficult, at least for some years, for them to grow any crops. And that's what you're doing when you take your stand for Christ in society. Whether it be at school, or your co-workers, or maybe if you're involved in politics, or even if you play some sports. You make that area less fertile for wickedness to grow. You hold it back. And it doesn't mean that society has changed, that they've come born again somehow. But it does make it more difficult for sinful attitudes and habits to grow and to prosper. They don't become the norm. And we can see parts of our country where those things are the norm. And too much in the media. It's the norm. with the suggestion that a husband would be faithful to a wife and a wife would be faithful to her husband. It's unthought of. Well, B, we see that verse 13 ends with a warning. If salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? Of course, the applied answer is it can't. It's no longer good for anything. Now in our day, we don't think about salt losing its saltiness. We can store it in the kitchen for many years, and it remains salty. But in the first century, it was possible for salt to lose its saltiness. Because what they would have as salt wouldn't be pure salt. And if there was a lot of water, what was the true salt, sodium chloride could be drained away, and the impurities would be what was left. So it was no longer salty. It was no longer able to do what it was supposed to do. And so it didn't preserve or flavor. What could you do with it? Well, nothing. Jesus said, you just throw it underfoot. It has no good purpose. And we might say, for a Christian, how do we lose our saltiness? We lose it when we're no different than the world, when we're going along with what the world thinks, with its values, with its ambitions, when we're no longer mourning for our sins, when we're no longer hungering and thirsting for righteousness. We've lost our saltiness. And sadly, I look around and see that's a trend in society among Christians. That we want the world to like us. We want the world to come in and worship with us. And so we want to make them feel comfortable and we'll do everything we can to give the impression that we're no different. That we don't live any different. We don't think any different. We don't have any different values. We want our worship to be attractive, to be entertaining, which may mean we'll have to tone down this thing about sin and repentance, about the claims of Jesus Christ to be King and King and Lord of Lords. The world doesn't like that message. So we get rid of it. But think what it means. If we think, if we act exactly like the world, if the only difference is that most weeks we come to the worship, we put a little bit of money in the offering plate, then that's the only difference. Why in the world would anybody be attracted to that? If you're just going to do everything the same, why not go golfing Sunday morning? And at least enjoy the fresh air. Why not take that money and spend it on yourself? And you'd want what you would like to indulge yourself in. The world often implies, unless you're attractive to me on my terms, then I won't respond to you. I won't respond to the gospel. And so we can get into this feeling, well, I need to make my Christian life more exciting. more like the world, and what the world needs. And what Jesus is telling us is we need to be salt. We need to be different to the world. We need to have a saltiness about us that people can see, that people can taste in our lives. Really, if we're no different, then we've lost our witness. We're powerless. And there's no reason that men and women should be drawn to us. Third point is that Jesus also says that his followers are to be the light of the world. And I suspect in our present age where we have electricity so available to us, we really miss the import of this. how important life is. And perhaps you've experienced that for a short time, the power's gone off for a day or two, and you realize how dependent you are. You know, the TV doesn't work, but you want to read, but you get the candle out, and it's really pretty hard to read by candlelight. There isn't a whole lot you can do. You say, well, maybe that'd be a good time for the family to get together and play a game. Well, it's even hard to do something like that. And you find out, well, maybe going to bed is the best thing that we can do. But when you didn't have electricity, you find that light regulates your life. When the sun rises, you get up, because that's your opportunity to do stuff. That's your opportunity to work, to plow the fields, to cook your meals, to do what you needed to do. And the Jews often didn't even travel. At night, it was so difficult. Darkness has a great limit. And light allows for the pursuing of what is good and proper. And that's really what Jesus is saying when he's saying, you're the light of the world. It allows for the pursuing of that which is good and proper. as you're there shining your light before men. Christians have a positive influence on the world. And specifically, it's the shine in those dark places. And we're given two images to think about by Jesus. The first is a city set on a hill. And they have both a sense of how unthinkable Unthinkable it should be that Christians would not shine their light, would not be different so that people could see the difference in their life compared to their own. So the first is a city set on a hill. And Jerusalem would have been one of the chief ones, but there are others. He'd often set the city up high so he could look out and could see any enemy coming and attacking. And it meant that everybody knew where that city was. that it shone and stood out. It couldn't be disguised. It couldn't be hidden. It was in plain view. I don't know if you've approached a city at night, and even from a distance, you can kind of see the glow of the city. You're aware that it's there. Jesus said, Christians are like that. Your light, that place that men will see. They will know you're there. They will know Christianity is around them. And that your light is shining into the darkness. God has made us into a city that set high. He has made us to be seen to be witnesses that others around us would see us, and not just overlook us. And then the second image that Jesus uses, it takes it a step further. You light a lamp, and what do you do with it? Well, you don't put it under a bushel. You don't put it under something that will cut off its light. No, what you do is you put it on a lampstand so that it could light up the whole house. Look how absurd it is to light a lamp and then to hide it. You're really defeating the purpose of the light if you put it under a bushel basket. It's the same thing Jesus is saying about being a Christian, about your purpose. Your purpose for which God has created, for which God has redeemed you, is to be a light to the world, to let your light shine and be seen by an unbelieving world. To bring God's light to bear on them. And you can't do it if your life is like everybody else's. If your speech is identical to theirs. If you hesitate to identify with Jesus Christ. If your attitudes mimic their attitudes. And thus be called in verse 16 to let your light shine before others. Again, think what a choice you have. Of hiding your light, of being salt without any saltiness, that's trampled underfoot, or being a shining light. And the natural question is, how do we do that? And what's the result? Well, Jesus answered that. How do we do it? That's why our good works. Your good works will be seen by others. Your light will shine forth by what you do. And probably that good works as a very general expression for anything you would do as a Christian, anything you would say, anything you would... behavior, that's Christian behavior. How is it you respond when someone is angry with you? Because there's a way the world does, of getting angry in response, of seeking to retaliate, of seeking to avoid. But there's a way that Christian does. What type of jokes do you tell? And do you listen to? What's your integrity when it comes to paying your bills on time? And I think especially, as we're called here to good works, one of the most fundamental, important good works is sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. That one of the ways that that light of the gospel goes to people is we speak to them about Jesus Christ. And again, I'll think about that next week in the evangelism seminar. I encourage each one, if at all possible, to come. It won't be something that's too difficult for any of you here, but it will help you to think through, what does it mean to be a witness? How can I be a witness? What things do I need to communicate to those around me who are in darkness? What are the things we do? to break the hold of darkness is to share the light of the gospel. Now, that's not all. Good works also implies acts of charity. Helping those who are in need. That we have a heart of compassion, practical deeds of compassion to help. And what's the result when we don't do those things? God is glorified there at the end of verse 16. even unbelievers, give glory to God. Now, it may be in terms of their becoming Christians and their acknowledging God's mercy and grace in their life, but it may just be acknowledging that there's something different. That these Christians are genuine. They're compassionate. They act with integrity. They're faithful. They give their word. And they will see that that difference comes not because we're better people, but because God has been at work in our lives and so the glory ultimately goes to the Father. And they will desire that. People want to be treated with honor and respect, rather than being attacked. When in need, they want to find someone who has an open heart and an open wallet, rather than holding on to what they have. They want people who are honest in their business dealings, who are faithful in their speech. And they may not embrace Christ, but they'll see a difference. And they will see that it's good. And in that way, they'll be glorifying God who is in heaven. But as you think about application, realize you are salt, and you are light in this world. And it really implies you're not to be separate, you're not to be aloof, out there by yourself, not interacting with the world. It also means you're not to be adopting the world and its standards. There's that narrow path that we're called to as we're being sought in light of being not of the world, but not of the world either. What Jesus is calling you here is to live differently. It's to be sought of salty. Life is shining in darkness. And so your life is different. Many times we're pushed to think it's something I've wronged, that my life is different than my neighbors. Jesus is saying, your life should be different if you're a non-Christian neighbor. They should be seeing it. and hopefully be drawn toward it. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we look at your word and see that we are, we are, already solved and light. By your calling us into a relationship with you, you've called us into a different relationship with the world. One of being solved and of being light. to this world that we see around us. Help us to be those who are indeed salty, who preserve, who give flavor, who prevent the corruption, the deterioration of the society around us. And that we would be that light that shines, that shines your light, your truth, Your message to the Gospel, to a world that is in darkness, that by our lives, that by our speech, and especially as we would communicate the goodness of Jesus Christ, that that light would be going to the world around us. Help us to do that better each day. We pray in Christ's name, Amen.