Our text this morning calls on us to do this very thing.  We had a wonderful time celebrating Jesus’ resurrection last Sunday; but during the 8 weeks before this, we have been chewing on Jesus’ powerful sermon in Matthew 5.  We are picking back up there this morning.  In the Beatitudes, Jesus called upon His followers to live by faith, acknowledging their own poverty and need, embracing the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and then acting as vessels who bring peace to others, even while being persecuted.  Although He is no longer couching His words with the saying “Blessed are...”, Jesus is still speaking to their hearts about who they are as members of His Kingdom, and how they are to live in light of who they are.  When Jesus begins this segment of preaching, He uses images which would have been crystal clear to His followers because of the impact salt and light had in their society.  So let’s jump back into this powerful sermon by Jesus as we look at the theme, Jesus calls on us to live unashamedly, according to who we are in Christ, and leave a blessing in our path.

I. We are to preserve our society by engaging every aspect of it with the gospel and praying for God’s glory to be shown through us.

Jesus moves from “Blessed are..” statements to “You are...” statements.  This means they are identity declarations.  If you have sat under my preaching for any length of time, you have already heard me tell you how important it is to know who you are.  The world says all kinds of things about who we are.  If you believe the statements by the world, it will lead you down a path of destruction.  You will act according to who you believe you really are. 

Over Spring break, we spent some time with a relative who is in college.  She knows Christ.  Her parents are godly.  She is currently enrolled in a Christian college.  But my overwhelming impression after spending several days with her is that she does not know who she is.  She would quickly tell you she is born again.  But, there is little conviction about anything else in her life.  Being born again is not enough.  That will get you into heaven, but Jesus does not stop His teaching with entering the Kingdom of God.  He tells us how we are to live as members of the Kingdom of God.  Then, He goes on to make these powerful identity statements about who we are as followers of Christ, because He knows we will live according to what we believe. 

The first declaration is, “You are the salt of the earth.”  The ancient philosopher, Pliny said, “Without salt human life cannot be sustained.”  It was that important to people in these times.  There was no refrigeration.  Meat had to either be consumed immediately or heavily salted to preserve it from rotting.  Putrid meat is not only rancid, but makes you sick.  Salt flavored food, but its’ most important functions were preserving food, and healing wounds. 

There are many applications to this idea of being salt in the rest of the New Testament.  Let’s look at a few of these.  Mark 9:50 says, “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with each other.”  The gospel writer defines what he means when he calls on readers to have salt in themselves– it means they are to be or live at peace with each other.  They are to have reconciled relationships with each other, period.  When we have these kinds of relationships, it not only influences us, but everyone around us.  If there is no peace in your relationship with another person in this fellowship, that affects you and those around you and those around the other person, so in effect, your broken relationship influences this whole body.  This is why it is so important for you to have forgiven others in the body before coming to offer yourself to the Lord in corporate worship.  We want the manifest presence of God in our midst here, but God is not going to attach His Name, His glory, to our sin and broken relationships.  Being salt means you are at peace with every other member of the body of Christ. 

Paul tells us in Colossians 4:6, “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”   Here , salt means speech which is full of grace.  In other words, when we speak to others or about others, our speech should edify or build others up.  We are to give an answer to those who ask us about our faith or our motives.  When people listen to us speak, they ought to be encouraged and strengthened, at least in their sense of what is right and good.  There is no place for critical or judgemental speech coming out of our mouths.  When people are around us, they should know that Florence is a better place because we live here.  The glory does not go to us, because it does not originate in us, but people should know that they are glad that we are here.  Is this the sense of the people in Florence?  Are they glad the community called Trinity Evangelical Presbyterian Church is here and that the people who identify themselves with Trinity are here because of the way we use our words?  I surely hope so!

As salt, we are to be rubbed into the meat of society.  What does that mean?  We should be on the school board, and a part fo the PTA and active in efforts to beautify our city– way to go Julian Young as chair person of Beautify Florence; and helping the Manna house and East Florence Mission and serving the foreigners in our midst, and engaging the city with efforts to bring justice and hope, which has been our intent in the neighborhood in North Sumter.  Keep it up!  I would pray that others of you would be president of your neighborhood association and members of our county council and those who take a stand for truth in the marketplace through journalism and articles to the editor.  There are a thousand ways to do this, and members of this community of faith should be engaged in all of these ways!

By using the word ‘earth’– we are salt of the earth– Jesus is referring to the influence we are to have on the whole world.  Those who are My disciples and members of My Kingdom, says Jesus, are to preserve and influence the whole world, even if they persecute you in response.  Remember the passage which is immediately before this one– the segue from the Beatitudes to the rest of the sermon on the Mount speaks about His followers being persecuted when they stand up for righteousness.  When the world persecutes you, which will happen, because the world persecuted your Lord and the prophets who went before you, then you should rejoice, because you know that you are really one of Jesus’ disciples.  In other words, when we act like salt, not everyone will applaud.  Many will criticize.  This isn’t a logical response, but is from the spirit of the world and the evil one.  It doesn’t matter if the community responds in a positive way or not, you are still to act according to who you are– those God desires to use to preserve the society, and those God will use to bring healing to others.

II. People in our society are to see the character of our Father expressed through our actions, so that praise goes to Him.

The second identity statement is “You are the light of the world!”  In our culture, which is drowned in light, this doesn’t mean as much to us.  In a culture where there is no electricity, where you live in the daylight hours, and talk or sleep after sundown, but aren’t able to do significant work, light has a whole different value and meaning.  When I went to a tribe in the bush of Uganda, we had only kerosene lamps to journal by and talk around after the sun set.  You could see the whole milky way in the heavens, but you could not read or do any work at all after the sun set.  You could see the headlights of a car from a long distance, because there wasn’t any other light at all.  In fact, you could see a kerosene lamp from a long distance, because of the backdrop which was pitch black.  A light in this kind of setting stands out in stark contrast to the surroundings.  You should be easily seen by the world around you is one of the implications of this statement by Jesus.
Let me ask you, can the world around you easily distinguish you from the rest of the society?  Can the world around us as a body easily distinguish us from the rest of the society?  This is a right question from our text this morning.  A city on a hill could not be hidden, because travelers could see the city while still encamped a long way off.  If there is one kerosene lamp lit in the room, it immediately attracts your attention because you cannot see anything else without its light. 

What are they to see?  People around us are to see our works and glorify our Father in heaven.  Remember, Jesus is talking about His followers who are already a part of His Kingdom, so we are not talking about salvation here.  We are not saved by our good works.  BUT, good works should naturally follow those who belong to Christ.  We should do good works.  This was Jesus’ expectation.  We aren’t to do “good works” in our flesh, which has no value and is impossible, but by the power of the Holy Spirit within us!  How else are people going to see any difference between you and the others in society?  When you spend yourself for the needy, for the orphan or widow, or when you work so another person has a decent place to live, then these people praise the Lord for your uncommon ministry to them.  By and large, people in need are taken advantage of by others who can abuse them for their own gain.  There are many examples of people in this community serving others, and they are to be commended for this.  But more and more, in our society at large, we see the devastation of sin and greed or selfish desires motivate people in what they do.
Let me share one example of the way people have seen our good works and praise our Father in heaven.  I have heard this time and again– Hispanic people love coming to the ministry at Trinity, because they know they will be loved there.  They sense this very verse we are talking about this morning– that they are loved, even when there is a language barrier.  Pastor Gregorio used to say, “Everyone recognizes the language of love!”  It is true!  And when they know you love them, they thank the Lord for you– praise goes to the Father.  Many of these people will come to an authentic faith in Jesus Christ, because they have experienced the love of God through His people.  And that is when all of heaven breaks out in praise!

III. What it looks like to live as salt and light in this society.

I have preached on this passage before.  I felt like the Lord wanted me to remind you again.  We need to know who we are in Christ– I am salt and light in the situations I will live through today; so no matter what happens circumstantially, the Lord desires to use me as salt and light.  In this knowledge, we ask for and receive His fullness.  What I mean is we ask the Holy Spirit who dwells in us to rule and reign in our hearts in that moment, and then we live and speak from the fullness He will give to us, using the words He will give to us.  It isn’t our great words which change people or situations.  It is the power of the Spirit of God who lives in us, and who will speak through us which will make the difference.  As we talked about in the introduction, one of the ways we do this is through what we have called “Prayer Evangelism”.

What we call “Prayer Evangelism” needs to become a mark of all of our lives.  If some of you stepped out and prayed to bless people, and reached out in simple ways to ask people how you could bless them, then you have experienced how God works through available vessels.  Some of you may have slipped back into old patterns of being so busy you don’t have time to bless others.  If this is true of you, then I would urge you to develop this pattern of blessing others again.  Look for ways to pray for people or pray with people who you interact with each day.  As you love people like this, God will use you!

What does this look like?  When you wake up in the morning, ask the Lord to show you what He has in mind for you and how He wants to use you that day.  As you drive to work, ask the Lord to soften your heart to see people as He sees them.  Ask for one opportunity that day to bless another person.  Then keep your eyes open and watch how He works.  Whether it is a waitress at a restaurant or a person at the cash register, or a neighbor carrying in her groceries, or a telephone call from a member of your son’s baseball team, ask the Lord to give you grace to bless them.  If they serve you, then thank them and ask how you can pray for them.  If you have the chance to serve them, watch for the opportunity to tell them why you served them, or simply keep serving them.  If you are waiting for your daughter to finish practice, take the walk across the room to introduce yourself to some other mother or father who is waiting and ask them how their child likes the team.  Bill Hybels, pastor at Willow Creek Community Church has written a book called, Just Walk Across the Room.  In this book, he tells us how easy it is to simply introduce yourself, and what a difference it has made in so many lives.  He trains people to be able to simply share their story, without a lot of religious jargon, so that another person can sense the goodness of God in just a few minutes of interaction with you.  You do not need to be dynamic.  You need to be yourself.  You need to believe who you are though- you are salt!  You are light!

I don’t think Jesus wants to hear, “I could never act like that...”  You can ask Him, but I think Jesus is looking for available vessels, who believe what Jesus says about them is true!  Do you believe you are salt and light?  Then begin to ask for God’s strength to live according to who you are.  Pray this truth daily into your own heart.  Yes, rehearse it several times a day, “Wait a minute, I am the salt of the earth and I am the light of the world!  Lord, help me to live according to who I am now in Christ!  I believe what you have said in your Word, and I believe that this promise is for me!  Help me Lord, to live for you this day!”  Every time you see a salt shaker, and every time you turn on a light switch, remind yourself of who you are.  This is how the Lord will use you to build His Kingdom, so that He gains much glory!!