Salt and Light - Matthew 5:13-16
John Stott is correct, I think,
when he points out that whereas the Beatitudes teach us about Christian
character, these verses teach us about a Christian’s influence in the world.[1] The lesson is straightforward: those who have
the character described in the Beatitudes become as an inevitable consequence
salt and light in this world. First of
all, he tells us that they are salt. Though today we use salt mainly as a
flavoring agent, in Jesus’ time salt was also used as a preservative against
decay. In an age before refrigeration, if
you wanted meat to last, you salted it.
If meat is properly cured, it can evidently last a long time. In a similar fashion, the disciples are to
act as a moral preservative in a corrupt and godless age. As R. V. G. Tasker put it, they are “called
to be a moral disinfectant in a world where moral standards are low, constantly
changing, or non-existent . . . they can discharge this function only if they
themselves retain their virtue.”[2]
But this is not all Jesus has to
say. It is not only, “You are the salt
of the world,” but he goes on to say, “But if the salt has lost its savor,
wherewith shall it be salted [i.e. how shall it become salty again]? It is thenceforth good for nothing but to be
cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.”
What is he saying? He is saying
that when a Christian ceases to function as salt in the world, they are just
useless. A salt without its savor is
useful neither for flavoring nor is it useful as a preservative. You just cast it out into the streets.
It should be pointed out that
sodium chloride is a stable compound and therefore in the strictest sense salt
cannot lose its saltiness. However, the
salt that Jesus refers to in this Sermon “derived from salt marshes or the
like, rather than by evaporation of salt water, and therefore contained many
impurities. The actual salt, being more
soluble than the impurities, could be leached out, leaving a residue so dilute
it was of little worth.” Both the salt
itself and its residue were called salt, so that Jesus could speak of salt that
had lost its saltiness. In fact, “in
modern Israel savorless salt is still said to be scattered on the soil of flat
roofs. This helps harden the soil and
prevent leaks, and since the roofs serve as playgrounds and places for public
gathering, the salt is still being trodden under foot.”[3]
So this is not just a function of
a Christian, it is the function of a
Christian in this world. Disciples who
don’t live in a such a way to influence their generation against the evils of
the day are useless to the world in which they live, they are useless to the
church in which they profess to belong, and they are useless to the God they
claim to serve.
This role though, is mostly
negative. It is the role of salt to stop
decay; it is the role of a Christian to live in such a way that the corruptions
of the society in which they dwell are minimized. We are to serve as a restraining influence. But we are to be more than that. So Jesus goes on to describe the Christian as
light. “You are the light of the
world. A city that is set on a hill cannot
be hid; neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel but on a
candlestick and it gives light to all that are in the house.”
This is something positive. As salt, the believer is meant to push back
on the evil in the world. As light, the
believer is meant to attract people to the truth. Paul wrote to the Philippian Christians, “Do
all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and
innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted
generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word
of life” (Phil. 2:14-16). The idea is clear
enough: just as there is something attractive about the nature of light, so
there should be something about the life of a Christian, both in words and
works that should attract those who dwell in darkness. If you are a weary traveler on a long road and
darkness is falling, and on a hillside you see a city shining out of the
darkness, you are probably going to feel a certain degree of gladness in your
heart that there is a place you can rest in safety. Even so, the believer is to live the kind of
life that will attract those who, seeing the darkness in which they live, will
come to him/her for direction and guidance.
Our Lord then goes on to explain
exactly what he means by the disciple shining as a light on a hill: “Let your
light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your
Father who is in heaven.” In other
words, we shine through our good works. Or,
another way to put it is that we shine by manifesting day in and day out the
works that come from a character described by the Beatitudes.
The reason for this is that men
would see our good works and then glorify God.
We are to live for the glory of God in all that we do, for only then
will our lives truly point away from ourselves and to the God that all men
need. It is easy to live in such a way
that we do good things but do them so that people look at us instead of to
God. This was the mistake of many of the
religious people of Jesus’ day: “They do their works to be seen of men” (Mt. 23:5). They tithed, prayed, and fasted so that they
would be glorified (Mt. 6:1-18). But
that is such a mistake! For the only
light we have is a reflected light.
It is the mark of a truly
God-centered life that people look past you to God. A religious life that is man-centered has no
problem getting people to praise it for the good deeds that it does. But it is only the person whose life is truly
God-centered that is also really supernatural so that nothing can explain it
except the grace and power of God. What
has caught the eyes of the unbelievers through the ages? Is it not that they saw in believers
something that could only be explained by something outside of them? If the world looks at us and sees something
which they can duplicate, then we are not shining our light. It will not be attracted to us. On other hand, if we are living in such a way
that only God can explain, then we are shining brightly. But that will only happen if we are living
for the glory of God and not for ourselves.
The teaching of Jesus then, is
this. Those who are his disciples are
described by a certain set of character traits.
But these traits are not meant to be hidden. They are meant to be displayed in our lives
by the things that we say and do. As we
live out being poor in spirit, and meekness, and hungering and thirsting for
righteousness, and mercifulness, and purity, and a peacemaking spirit, then we
will be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Men will see our good works and glorify our
Father in heaven.
There are some principles that
emerge from this text. The first is that
the Christian is radically different from
this world. Salt is different from
that which it flavors or preserves.
Light is the opposite of darkness.
We cannot affect any change in this world in which we live if we are
like it. If we are like the world, if we
share its tastes and preferences and values, then we do not belong to
Christ. “Such were some of you” is the eternal description of the believer (1
Cor. 6:11). Peter wrote to the
Christians of his day, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy
nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies
of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are
God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy”
(1 Pet. 2:9-10).
The second principle is that the Christian is part of this world. This may seem strange to say, given what I’ve
just been saying, but it’s true. It’s
the paradox of the Christian life. We
are in this world but we are not of it.
After all, you cannot be an influence in the world if you aren’t in
it. Christ does not call us to separate
from this world completely; he does not call us to withdraw into our Christian
ghettos. We are to be separate in the way we live, but not where we live. To withdraw from the world is to do exactly
what Jesus says we must not do. It would
be to put our light under a bushel. It
would be to become tasteless salt, affecting no change, stopping no decay. It would be therefore to completely deny the
Christian position with regard to the world and our witness to it.
The third principle is that the Christian is to be intentional in living
out a life of witness to the world.
This surely is the force of verse 16: “Let you lights so shine among men
that they may see your good works and
glorify your Father who is in heaven.”
We are not just to shine our light but we are to so shine it that others see it.
That doesn’t mean that we become ostentatious in our presentation. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you stand on
a street corner and preach the gospel – although God certainly does call some
to this work. But it does mean that we
have an eye out for the lost who are around us.
It means that we care about the people we live and work with. It means that life is more than just
ourselves and our problems. It means
that we stop living life selfishly. It
means that we care about God’s global mission to advance his kingdom and exalt
his name among the nations.
The question therefore is: how do
we live this out? In some sense, the
answer is pretty straightforward. You
live like salt and light in this world by living out the Beatitudes in your
life. But if you’re like me, you are
probably tempted to read things into this passage that actually end up undoing
it in your life.
What I mean is that when I read
this passage, and think of being salt and light in this world, being a city on
a hill, I begin to think only of things on the level of the grand and
glorious. And I’m not alone. When John Winthrop preached his famous sermon
“A Model of Christian Charity” in 1630 on his way to found a new settlement in
the New World, he used the words of Christ to express the greatness and breadth
of his vision: “For we must consider,” he said, “that we shall be as a city
upon a hill. The eyes of all people are
upon us.”[4] This political sermon and these words have
been picked up by many politicians since, including Presidents Kennedy and
Reagan. So I ask you: when you read the
words “city upon a hill,” knowing that Christ calls you to this, what comes to
mind for you?
For many of us, what comes to
mind is something like feeding homeless orphans in India, or preaching the
gospel to Muslims in Africa, or doing some kind of obvious missionary or
charitable work.
I’m not even beginning to suggest
that doing these things is wrong. I
thank God that he calls women like Amy Carmichael who gave her life to rescue
young women in India from prostitution.
I sincerely hope that he calls some of these young men and women in this
congregation to give their lives on the mission field. In fact, we ought all of us to be willing to
pack up and go to any mission field that God has called us to.
But that’s just the thing. For most of you, the mission field is right
here, in Texas, in your homes and neighborhoods and workplaces. My point is this: if all you can think about
is some grand mission on a foreign field when you read these words, knowing
that right now that is just not going to happen given where you are in life,
then you are going to miss what God has called you to do today. He may
be calling you to be salt and light in Bangladesh. And if he is: Go! But one thing is for sure: God is calling you to be salt and light in
your own living room surrounded by your children. He is calling
you to be salt and light at the workplace, wherever that is.
We’re living in a day when the
call to be radical has become so commonplace that it is no longer radical. The radicals have become the
conservatives. But one thing I’m worried
about is that the call to be radical is misunderstood to imply that living out the
Christian life anywhere except the inner city or foreign mission field is
somehow wrong. Being a city on a hill
doesn’t just happen in soup kitchens.
Most often it happens in the day to day occurrences as we live out a
life of obedience to Christ among our families, friends, and co-workers.
In his book, Ordinary: Sustainable Faith in a Radical, Restless World, Michael
Horton tells the story of a young woman, Tish Harrison Warren. When she was 22 years old, she went on a
mission trip to Africa, and became known as a “radical” Christian by people in
her church, but almost immediately begin to struggle with what that was supposed
to mean for her life. Horton writes,
“After spending time in various ‘radical’ Christian communities, Warren began
to wonder if ordinary life was even possible.”
Then, about 10 years later, she came to this realization:
Now I’m a thirty-something
with two kids living a more or less ordinary life. And what I’m slowly realizing is that, for
me, being in the house all day with a baby and a two-year-old is a lot more
scary and a lot harder than being in a war-torn African village. What I need
courage for is the ordinary, the daily every-dayness of life. Caring for a
homeless kid is a lot more thrilling to me than listening well to the people in
my home. Giving away clothes and seeking out edgy Christian communities
requires less of me than being kind to my husband on an average Wednesday
morning.[5]
As Horton puts it, “Sometimes,
chasing your dreams can be ‘easier’ than just being who we are, where God has
placed you, with the gifts he has given to you.”[6]
But, as he goes on to point out,
this does not mean being mediocre. We
ought to strive for excellence in what God has called us to do. We ought to be salt and light, to be a city
on a hill in the context in which we’ve been placed. But that’s just the thing. If we can’t think of anything else when it
comes to the call to be a city on a hill except a dream we cannot attain, at
least not at the present, then we are not going to put our energies into being
salt and light to the best of our abilities in the here and now.
What motivates our dreams,
anyway? Is it the praise of man or the
praise of God? It’s not going to win you
a lot of attention by living an ordinary life of obedience to God. But maybe that’s what God has called you to
do. And in the end, that’s all that
matters. It’s his glory, not our own,
that we ought to be aiming for, anyway.
Paul says that the mark of a regenerate man, whose heart has been
changed by the Spirit, is that “his praise is not from man but from God” (Rom.
2:29).
And by the way, you don’t know
what God can do with an ordinary life that is also salt and light. I heard a great story this week of an
ordinary man who just witnessed to people as God gave him opportunity. His witness was simple and often just a few
words, but as people would reflect later on what he had said to him or read the
tract he gave to them, they would become convicted and end up being saved. Many of these people joined a particular
church in town. As the pastor spoke to
them, and asked how they had come to be a part of the church, they all spoke of
this quiet man who witnessed to them. So
the pastor sought him out. It turns out
he came from another nearby town, and when the pastor finally tracked him down,
and told him the stories of the people that had been saved through this man’s
witness, tears began to stream down his face.
He told the pastor, “You’re the first person who’s ever told me that
I’ve done something good for God’s kingdom.” He had been utterly oblivious to
the fruits of his witness. But God had
blessed it, nonetheless.
God isn’t interested in The Next
Big Thing.[7] And if you spend your life moving from one
adrenaline rush to the next eventually you are going to wear yourself out. And the sad thing is, it’s probably not for
God’s glory, but for your own excitement and glory. Instead, God commands you to let your light
shine where you are even in the mundane so that men see your good works and
glorify your Father in heaven.
All of this to say that the main
thing to being this kind of person is to resist the discontentment with the
place where God has placed you. Resist
the restlessness that plagues the world around you. It is restless precisely because it does not
know a sovereign and saving God who knows his people and never leaves
them. Be free to be radical in the eyes
of Jesus while being ordinary in the eyes of the world.
And then the second thing is to
always have God’s glory before your eyes.
If we are not serving him, then we are only going to want to be salt and
light when there are obvious returns on our labor. But faithfulness cannot be sustained only by
results. It takes an eye to the honor of
our Lord. Calvin, when he was banished
from an ungrateful Geneva after his service there, said, “Surely if I had
merely served man, this would have been a poor recompense. But it is my happiness that I have served him
who never fails to reward his servants to the full extent of his promise.” And it was this eye to God’s glory that
enabled Calvin to go back to Geneva
after three years of exile!
But then of course, we must
always remember that being light in our community only happens through
Christ. Our light is a borrowed
light. We are lights to the world
because Jesus is the light of the world (Jn 1:9). We can only reflect his light. We don’t hold out to the world the message
that we are the answer. The believer is
not the answer to this world’s darkness.
The church is not the answer.
Only Christ is the answer, and it is only as men and women come
personally into contact with his saving benefits through faith in him and
repentance from sin that they too share in his light and become light to
others. For the main problem with the
world, what leads to its moral putrefaction, is sin. And sin can ultimately only be dealt by redemption:
redemption from the guilt and grip of sin.
Jesus alone is the redeemer of mankind.
He alone can forgive your sins and give you real freedom from its power,
and it is our privilege as salt and light to point men and women to the Lord
Jesus Christ.
[5]
Horton, Michael S. (2014-10-07).
Ordinary: Sustainable Faith in a Radical, Restless World (p. 15). Zondervan.
Kindle Edition.
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