There is one thing you are not. You are not the religious encyclopedia of the world. Right? You do not just memorize the words of Jesus and sit comfortably closed on the shelf for the rest of your life. No!
“You are the salt of the earth.” You take Jesus’ words that offer blessings to the poor in spirit and seek justice for the meek and sprinkle them on a bland world that does not care. The world may not care, but you do. And, you do something about it!
There is one thing you are not. You are not the dust bunny of the world. You do not collect Jesus’ words of love for your neighbor and allow them to become a hairy ball, hidden away in dark corners behind shoes and totes of summer clothes.
You say to me, “Pastor, how is it that you know so much about dust bunnies?” And, I say to you, “I don’t really have a vacuum that can reach…Forget it; you are getting me distracted.” As I was saying, you are not the dust bunny of the world that hides in the dark! No!
“You are the light of the world.” A city built on a hill cannot help but shine light into the dark valleys below. Neighbors who find themselves in the darkness are going to be touched by your light, because light does not hide, it shines.
God created you to be someone who shines God’s love onto others.
No one decides to light up the room and then hides the candle under a basket. That is just absurd.
In the same way, God does not light you up with grace and a desire for justice just to stuff you away under a bed where you cannot shine. That is ridiculous!
“Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”
If it is true that we are salt and light, why does Jesus even need to take time to remind us?
Ever thought of asking that?
Is it because, for some inexplicable reason, when Jesus came to earth he discovered, to his surprise, that the salt had ceased to provide taste and the light was inexplicably hiding under baskets? In other words, he saw his people being ordinary, and he created them to be extraordinary!
Why? Why does it happen? Why do the extraordinary become ordinary?
Maybe, it is because we do not actually believe that we are salt and light. Maybe, we really believe…deep down in our core…that we are the Mrs. Dash of the world. We say we are like salt, but really we act like dried out, barely tasting herbs.
Do not look at me like that; you know that Mrs. Dash just does not cut it.
You do not turn to the Food Network and see the chefs there using generous amounts of freshly crushed, kosher Mrs. Dash. The finest chefs of New York do not lean over to you and tell you that the secret to the life of their dishes is the Mrs. Dash.
Jesus wants you to be more. Jesus needs you to be the salt!
Now, the Pharisees know the law of God in and out. They know what is right and what is wrong. They know what the Lord requires. And, that is all well and good. They know that all the law and the prophets boil down to these two commandments: Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.
There is nothing wrong with God’s law here. Not one letter of it needs to be struck. But, there is a problem that does remain: though we know in our heads that we are the salt and the light of God’s love, we act with our hands and feet like the unused Scrabble game of the world.
Our letters do not form into words and our words do not form into actions because they are high up on a shelf in the basement somewhere.
You are more than that! You are salt and light.
You are more than a Pharisee or Scribe who knows that God’s kingdom is about love and justice, but may not do anything about it. You are to be love and justice!
Deitrich Bonhoeffer, the famous martyred theologian of World War II, was incensed when he saw that many Christians of the German nation seemed to be happy to be lights hidden under bushel baskets in the face of horrible acts against the Jewish people on the part of the German government.
It is not enough to know what is right and wrong. It is not enough to know that God and neighbor are to be loved.
In the face of Christian inaction he said, “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”
In other words, salt that has lost its taste gets thrown away because it is good for nothing. Salt is to be salty, and light is intended to be put up high where it can reach the darkest places.
“Love God and love your neighbor as yourself” is not simply a nice needlepoint project to be hung on the wall of your home. Love is an action. Love changes lives.
Theologian Karoline Lewis in her www.workingpreacher.org commentary for February 5th, 2017 brings the message home when she states, “It is knowledge without action that perpetuates existence of racism in our world. It is knowledge without action that contributes to our silence about sexism. It is knowledge without action that continues to oppress the poor, to ostracize the marginalized, to overlook the hungry.”
You, my friends, are not the lost crumbs under the table of the whole world. You are not nuggets of food that could taste good, but get stuck under people’s feet instead. You are not that.
You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.
You were bought with a price. The price of God’s own Son was not too much to pay for your life.
If that is true, you are free to act as if your life was saved for a purpose, because it was.
You are the salt of the earth who make God’s love and mercy for all people real through your acts of love.
You are the light of the world that shines truth into dark places.
You will not be hidden under a basket when the face of evil desires to do wrong to the neighbor. You will shine into the dark and dissipate the evil that resides there because that is who you were created to be.
In the waters of baptism, your old self that acted as the dusty encyclopedia of the world, or the hidden dust bunny of the world, or the Mrs. Dash of the world, or the unused Scrabble game of the world, or the lost table crumbs of the world, is put to death.
Out of the waters, Jesus raises you to a new life of salt and light. Yes, it is true that Jesus is the light of the world, but because you have been raised with him, and you now reside in his body, you also are the light of the world!
So hear me one last time as I call out: Be the salt of justice for your neighbor. Be the light of love for those around. Be who you were created to be. Your Godly actions make real the kingdom of heaven in your neighbors' lives.
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