Matthew 5:13-20
13 You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
14 “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
You Are Salt and Light
I’ve gotten into the habit of making eggs for breakfast recently. What kinds of things do you put in your eggs? For me, it largely depends on what we have on hand. If we have bell peppers or onions I might dice them up. If it’s after Christmas and we have some leftover ham, you better believe there will be a pork product in there. Whatever cheese we have on hand – that just goes without saying. Then, to top it off, no matter what time of year it is, no matter what else I put in those eggs, I’ll reach into the cupboard and grab some salt.
Salt just makes everything taste better. And the best thing about salt is that you don’t have to check the expiration date, because salt doesn’t expire. You don’t have to squeeze it, sniff it, sample it to see if it is still good. Salt is salt is salt. It is reliable. You always know what you’re getting. So at any time of day, no matter how long it’s been in the cupboard, no matter what I’m making, I can grab some salt and count on it to do what salt does. I don’t have to give salt a pep talk before I use it, “Now go and be salty!” It just is, by its very nature.
You are salt. That’s what Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount. We started studying this sermon last week. We’ll keep talking about it next week too. It’s the most famous sermon ever preached. It goes on for three chapters of Matthew’s Gospel and tells us so many things. Most of all, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is highly practical. Over and over again in this sermon Jesus tells us what a Christian is supposed to do.
Today’s portion of Jesus’ sermon is different, though, isn’t it? Jesus isn’t telling you what to do. He is telling you what you are. Jesus didn’t tell his disciples, “Now listen up. Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to go and be your saltiest self.” No, he said,
“You are the salt of the earth.”[1]
Over the centuries, Christians have debated what that means exactly. Since salt acts as a preservative, are we supposed to help preserve the world from the potential evils that could take place here? Since salt makes things taste better, are we supposed to spice up life with our own unique Christian flavour? I think that there is an element of both. But the way that Jesus himself explains this seven-word sentence leads me to believe that he isn’t talking about preservatives or spiciness. He’s talking about distinctiveness and consistency.
You can tell when there is salt in your eggs at breakfast. The world can tell when a Christian walks into the room.
Have you ever heard the expression that you are the only Bible that some people will ever read? It’s so true, especially where we live. I mentioned it a couple weeks ago – only 13% of Canadians go to church regularly. That means that 87% do not. That leaves a huge segment of your world that either doesn’t know Jesus at all – has never cracked open a Bible – or, at the very least, doesn’t know Jesus very well. You are the only Bible that many people in your life will ever read.
When you go to work, your coworkers are watching you. When you go to school, your classmates are listening. When you have a playdate or a birthday party with your family or friends, they’re paying attention. They are listening to the kinds of things you say and the way you say them. They notice if you’re nice or nasty to other people. They see you when you open the door for someone else or when you close your mouth instead of joining them in gossip or gutter talk.
They’re watching and they’re listening, but more importantly they are forming their impressions about Jesus and Christianity based on what they see and hear from you.
So what happens when you don’t bring a distinctive Christian flavour to your workplace or school? What happens when you slap a fish decal on the back bumper of your car and then drive like a self-obsessed maniac? What happens when you pick and choose the moments that you want to act or talk like a Christian, as if it’s OK for you to be good and prim and proper here, but as soon as you get to your friend’s house or to the restaurant or arena you “let your hair down” and let profanities spew out of the same mouth that sang God’s praises here?
Jesus tells us:
“But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to thrown out and be trampled underfoot.”[2]
A Christian who doesn’t act like a Christian is of no use to anyone. If you are inconsistent, insincere, or indifferent in your faith you’re not helping anybody else. In fact, you’re hurting other people because you’re giving them a false impression about Jesus. You are making it seem as if God doesn’t care about what people do. Or you are casting Jesus and his name in such a negative light that no one would want anything to do with him.
A Christian who doesn’t act like a Christian is of no use to anyone. If you are inconsistent, insincere, or indifferent in your faith, you’re not helping yourself either. Jesus says that you are not good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. Your faith is dead and so is your hope of a future in heaven with him. That was the last verse of our text for today:
“For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.”[3]
Is that intimidating to you – to know that you are the best, or maybe even the only, chance that some of the people you know and love will ever have to go to heaven? To know that you have to be “on” all the time because the world is watching you? It’s not just pastors who live in glass houses. Christian, the world is watching you. And so is your God, and heaven hangs in the balance, both for you and the people who are reading you.
Goodness, when you put it that way, I don’t know that I want to be salt or light to the world. Can I just retreat, withdraw, hole up in my house with my family and mind our own business? Can we just create a little Christian colony somewhere where we don’t have to worry about what other people see or hear or say? Well, no. That wouldn’t work either, because even there our righteousness would not surpass that of the Pharisees and teachers of the law. Heaven would still be barred to us.
But even more than that, Christian isolation is not possible, because that’s not God’s purpose for you. God didn’t tell you to be salty. He said, “You are salt.” God didn’t say, “Let your light shine before others so that they can see how great you are and how far your righteousness surpasses anyone else’s.” He said,
“You are the light of the world… Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”[4]
Sometimes when we hear sermons like this one, we bristle, we resist, we reject what we hear. We don’t want it to be true. I don’t want to be the only Bible that the people in my life will ever read. I know I can never live up to that. When I hear the to-do list of God’s holy law and the perfect standard that he sets for my obedience, I have no love in my heart for the commands of God. And yet, that law is still good.
Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets” – but Jesus, wouldn’t that make my life so much easier?!? – “I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”[5] Now that actually does make my life so much easier.
Sometimes God’s commands and his perfect standard for our unrighteous seem so unattainable that it feels unfair and downright cruel for God to hold them over us. But God’s law is good. It was given for our good. When he tells us not to murder, cheat, or steal, he is protecting life and marriages and property. When he tells us not to lie or covet or show disrespect, he is protecting the truth and your satisfaction and your relationships. The fact that we cannot keep the law doesn’t make the law bad; it makes us bad.
In fact, the law is so good that if someone were able to keep it perfectly, he would get to go to heaven purely on the merits of his own goodness. Keeping the law is and has always has been a legitimate way to get to heaven. It’s just that no one has ever been able to live up to it – no one, of course, except Jesus.
Jesus did not come to abolish the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them. Talk about being the only Bible some people will ever read; he was the Word of God in the flesh. When people looked at him, they saw what God expects of you. When people listened to him, they did not hear hypocrisy or hatred or one more guy up on his high horse; they heard the truth and the love of God – that God hates sin and punishes it, but has forgiven you through his Son, i.e. his perfect, sinless, spotless Son who sacrificed himself in your place on a cross, who paid for your sin with his life, who opened heaven to you and countless others whose righteousness does not surpass that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, but whose hope is in him and his righteousness. He is the one who made you into the salt of the earth and the light of the world.
It can be scary to think that God wants your Christian faith and life to be as distinctive and consistent as salt is in scrambled eggs. It can be scary to think that God wants your Christian faith and life to be as obvious and visible as a city on a hill. But that is the grace and mercy of our God, that he took the weak things of this world, the small things, the unimportant things to shine a light on the most important thing. It is nothing but pure grace that Jesus calls you the light of the world, not because you are so bright and brilliant, but because like a mirror or the moon, even imperfectly you can nevertheless reflect the light of Christ to this sin-darkened world. Even though you fail and fumble in your faith, you can still embody the forgiveness of Jesus to you and then also through you to the world.
I thank God that Jesus’ command to you is not, “Be salty,” or “Be bright and brilliant.” It is his promise and a miracle of his grace that says, “You are salt; you are light.” That is what God has made you. The goal is not to be saltier or brighter. It is to be what God has made you distinctively and consistently and visibly. The goal is not to hide our light under a bushel or let our flavour taste like the world around us. It is not even to let other people see our good deeds so that they know how good we are, but so that they can know how good Jesus is.
You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. May God work in you and through you to know God’s love and to show God’s love to the world in Christ Jesus our Lord. To him be all glory and honor and praise forever and ever. Amen.
[1] Matthew 5:13
[2] Matthew 5:13
[3] Matthew 5:20
[4] Matthew 5:14,16
[5] Matthew 5:17