Jesus 101: Salty and Shiny


What role did Jesus want his followers to play in the world?  Matthew 5:13-16 says he wanted them to be penetrating and transforming agents for God's kingdom.

In this passage, he said they were the "salt of the earth" and the "light of the world."  In Jesus' time, salt was a penetrating and purifying agent.  It penetrated food and killed the corruption in it.  That's why in the days before refrigerators people salted meats and other foods.  Light was a penetrating and revealing agent.  It penetrated the darkness and revealed what was in it.  It showed what was true.

This passage appears in Jesus' Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7).  In this section, Jesus described the ideal attitudes and behaviors of kingdom citizens.  When you read through it, you'll find that kingdom citizens were to have unique lifestyles that went against the grain of our broken world.  As they went into the world and lived by the distinct values of the kingdom, they would transform the world.  It would become more like God's kingdom.

Jesus still wants us to be salt and light in this world.  We're to be distinctive in our love, forgiveness, righteousness, justice, and more.  When we fail to be distinctive in these things, we lose our saltiness and hide our light.  And the world is worse off for it.

"Deep divisions" are words we hear repeatedly today to describe the western world, particularly America.  Some say America is more divided than its ever been since the Civil War.  Enemies like Russia are feeding and exploiting those differences.  

People need the good news of Christ in our country.  That's it's greatest need.  But beyond that, it needs people living by the values of the kingdom.  It needs people who will tear down walls and build bridges between hostile parties.  

It needs salty and shiny Christ followers who live in this current age by the values of the age to come.

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