This week Pastor Jon showed the tension we may feel when Jesus is now telling us that, as his followers, we aren’t allowed to hide! Even though we are called to humility or to suffer for Jesus’ name sake, following Jesus is not intended to be something we hide from others. Specifically, Jesus used 2 metaphors for demonstrate this. 

 

The first metaphor was that we are to be the salt of the earth. In current times, when someone is described as salty we typically think they are angry or bitter, so why is Jesus telling us to be “salty?” We have to consider what salt was used for at the time of Jesus’ teaching. In those days, salt was a primary way of preserving foods. If you had salt, you could preserve the integrity and quality of your food. In the same way that salt would keep food from spoiling by preserving its quality, as followers of Jesus we are to preserve and cultivate the goodness of God’s kingdom on earth. We aren’t invited to be salt, we are called to be salt. It is not an option for us to be spiritually bland, otherwise we would be as the dirt of a walking path, simply existing without purpose. 

 

The second metaphor was that of a light in the darkness, a city on a hill on a dark night or a lamp in a dark room. Light exists to give of itself, to add illumination to its surroundings. As believers, we are called to shine the light & goodness of Christ in dark places. It’s worth further consideration that a purpose or function of light is to specifically go to darker places so that light is experienced - what are the implication for us as light-bringers? Pastor Jon also made it abundantly clear, America as a nation is not the city on the hill. When Jesus spoke these words, he spoke specifically of the church! We must remember this particularly in our current day of heightened tensions within our nation. 

 

As followers of Jesus, it is clear that we are called to live our faith publicly. In our day of viral hits and online influencers it is important to exercise wisdom in our motives - are we being salt and light out of love and submission to Jesus? Or are we just out for “clicks” and recognition? The purpose of our saltiness and our light is God’s glory, that He would be more known, not us. 

 

So what does this mean for us? It means that we have neither a shallow optimism nor a dark pessimism. As Tim Keller states: “we do not look at the ideal like optimists do, or the real as the pessimists do. Christians look at Jesus.”

 

We must also be mindful that we cannot possibly expect to be involved in all areas of decay or evil in our world. We must exercise wisdom to know where to be involved. So how do we know how to discern this? Pastor Jon gave us 3 questions to ask ourselves to help with this process:

 

Join us next week as we continue our journey to learn how to become Kingdom people through Jesus’ teaching.