I invite you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 5 as we continue with our consideration of our Lord's Sermon on the Mount. We're going to read verses 1-16 of Matthew chapter 5. As you, those of this congregation, recall, we have considered now all of what we call the Beatitudes. That kingdom character that our Lord describes that His people have. And now with the text this morning, verses 13 through 16, he points out very clearly how it will be used about the influence that God's people will have on this world, the function that we have as a people of God. Beginning at verse 1, reading through verse 16, again verses 13 through 16, serving as the text this morning, Hear now our God's holy, inspired, inerrant Word. Now when He saw the crowds, He went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to Him and He began to teach them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. Rejoice and be glad because great is your reward in heaven for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead, they put it on its stand and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. That is the truth of God's Word. May He impress its eternal truths upon our hearts. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, in our Lord's High Priestly Prayer in John 17, And Jesus says of His disciples both that they are in the world, but at the same time, He says they are not of the world. And with the Beatitudes, being poor in spirit, mourning, being meek and merciful, and all of the other things, with these Beatitudes, we might say that He explains what it means to not be of the world as the believer's kingdom character we have seen is completely opposite of the character of the world. But now with this powerful text with which our Lord follows up the Beatitudes, Jesus, we might say, explains now what it means to be in the world. How? And what place the Christian has in it, particularly the Christian's influence in the world. He makes it very clear that His people will have an influence into this world. On this side of glory, kingdom citizens, those of whom Peter says you are a chosen people, you are a royal priesthood, a holy nation of people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful light. Again, setting God's people apart of kingdom citizens, like Peter says, kingdom citizens still live in the midst of a world that is entrenched in deep darkness. And therefore, it is impossible to live as kingdom citizens in that context and to do so in a purely private way. To do so without being noticed. We saw that with persecution. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, The world will see that. And the world will persecute for Jesus' sake. And also, our Lord is clearly teaching us, reminding us here, that we are not to go off and be in some private monastery somewhere to shut off the outside world. No, we have a place. Kingdom character will not be inactive. And it cannot be hidden. But instead, it will be experienced by those with whom we have contact. Christians will influence the world in a way, first of all, that is unmistakable. And our Lord shows us just how unmistakable with the examples that He uses. He uses two metaphors to describe believers using two very well-known daily things, even in that day, things that everybody could understand, And those daily items are salt and light. Salt was plentiful. So was light during the daytime. But on the one hand, it's no compliment to be called these things, to be called salt and light, because salt, though it was plentiful, salt all by itself, it looks insignificant, it is relatively inexpensive, and all by itself it has no value. And light is only useful if there is someone who is able to benefit from the light that it gives. These two items are only good if they are able to service their surroundings. Yet on the other hand, both of these have powerful properties with a potential ability to affect their environments, to transform their environments, the things with which they come in contact. Now, salt we know has a number of uses. It's used for medicine purposes. It's used for hygiene. The two most common that I believe are most likely in view here are its preserving function and its flavoring function for taste. It's used for preservation, maybe more so back in our Lord's Day even than today because we have refrigerators and freezers. But indeed, it was used to preserve, for example, meat from rotting and spoiling. And probably the use that we are most familiar with is seasoning. It brings out, it enhances the flavor in food. We don't eat salt all by itself, yet it makes some food taste rather good. And light, we know, exposes what's in the darkness. If you walk into a room or into a place that you've never been before, you have no clue what's there. Cadets, I remember the camp out last year was a new place, at least for me, and we got there in the dark. had no clue what was around. We're fishing around with our flashlights trying to find a good place to put the tent. And then in the light of day the next morning, what a difference. You walk into a room in the darkness, you don't know what's there. But light exposes what's in the darkness. It removes the fear of the darkness. Now, truth be told, most of us have probably never really experienced the blackness of the dark. Because of our day of electricity and streetlights, even as a child back in the Midwest, you could see the farm lights for miles. They were clear to see. Once in a while, if we got a cardboard box that was big enough, we would hide under the cardboard box in the living room, maybe put a blanket over it, shut the light off, just to see how dark we could make it. You can't see your hand in front of your face, and that's kind of an eerie feeling. But if there's even a crack with a little bit of light coming through it, it removes the fear of that darkness like a nightlight in the hallway in the middle of the night. But not only does it expose what's in the darkness, then of course, it illumines the darkness. It makes the situation clear. It shows the way. It helps us to see obstacles that would otherwise be dangerous in the dark. Salt and light are useful only in their serviceability to their surroundings, and then their influence is unmistakable in its experience. Again, we know that from practical experience with salt and light, but the same is true for the world in its experience of believers as salt and light. First of all, as salt, the world of mankind we know is wicked, sinful, Rotten, harmful, destructive. Downright tastes bad. It is spoiled and it is spoiling. But kingdom citizens, Jesus says, with their character of humility, the humility of being poor in spirit, understanding my sin and understanding the holiness of God and that I am not worthy to even be in His presence. The humility of being poor in spirit the humility of mourning because of my sin, hating it so bad it makes me weep. The humility of being meek, not returning evil for evil, but trusting God to help me in those situations. That humility along with desiring righteousness and showing mercy and seeking peace. All of these things you see that are foreign to the world. The kingdom citizens, kingdom character, Jesus says flavors seasons the world. Just as salt changes how something tastes, in the same way the world tastes the flavor, is to taste the flavor of kingdom character, your godliness and mine, and it will experience a completely different taste than what the world is used to. Kingdom citizens flavor through their attitudes and actions and the words treating the world differently than the world treats believers. God's people season with selflessness and humility and kindness and joy, contentment, honesty, trustworthiness, faithfulness. Do we need to go further? God's people season through their very lifestyles and through their work habits all the while expressing and demonstrating the attractiveness and the holiness of Jesus Christ. we have an example from paul in colossians 4 verse 6 he says let your conversation let your speech be seasoned with salt and he explains what that means in ephesians 4 when he says do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs that it may benefit those who listen not just our speech but our entire way of life that entire character is to season in such a way the conference that i was privileged to go to a couple of weeks ago one of the speakers there is whom some of you are aware of was dr sinclair ferguson and he told a story in one of his messages about a gentleman that the lord used to bring dr ferguson to the faith many many years ago and he told a story about this gentleman's own road to conversion. Again, many, many years ago, this gentleman, I don't remember all the details, but I remember the pertinent point. I believe it was he was visiting a business. I don't think he worked there at the time. He was visiting some sort of a business, maybe a newspaper, maybe a magazine, because there was a room full of typists. There were no computers back then. A room filled with desk after desk with a typewriter and ladies typing away. And he said what was interesting is he would hear typing and then there was stopping for a while and some more typing and then stopping except for one desk. The typing never stopped. It went on and on and on. And that was so puzzling to him. Finally, he asked whomever he was with, what's the deal here? Why is there never a pause? There's constant typing. And the answer he received was, well, she's a Christian. She's a Christian. and he was so struck by that that he had to go back and talk this late and find out what does it mean to be a Christian why does that affect your work beloved we have the opportunity and indeed we do flavor in a number of ways young people we flavor by God's grace when we are able to go to Mexico and serve and build houses as those people there who have nothing see you and me and we're not drawing attention to ourselves we ought not be. But we flavor through that work. I have a friend in a church in the greater Los Angeles area and he told me that that church for many, many years has been every Saturday, I believe it is, members of the congregation get together. They have transformed a community. A community that once people would not even want to walk into, but they have gone in Saturday after Saturday cleaning up yards, painting houses, cleaning up parks. transforming a community that otherwise nobody would ever want to walk through. God's people flavor season through their everyday living and the evidence of that flavor is seen as the world is brought to ask why. Why do you work as you do? Why do you talk as you do? Why do you give of your income, especially now in an economy that has gone downward? Why do you give to help others when you may be struggling yourself? Why do you serve in a variety of ways as volunteers or just helping people? Why do you keep your body pure? How are you able to have such contentment, especially when the storms of life come crashing down on you. You see, flavoring, seasoning, I believe, is our Lord's main point here as He talks about salt, because as He then points to the effect on men that they may see your good deeds, or we might say as they experience your good deeds and praise your Father in Heaven, yet I believe also that that flavoring function is used by God then to preserve. to preserve the world from becoming totally spoiled and rotten as God continues to build His church. You see, with true believers in it, this world will never become totally spoiled and rotten. And God may even be pleased to use His people to influence the world in such a way, maybe only one person at a time, to restrain evil, to restrain sin in others, that it might not grow. Maybe you have enjoyed that experience yourself with your co-workers that once they've gotten to know you, that you notice that when you come into their presence, all of a sudden, well, the language is different than it used to be, and then the jokes are different than they used to be, and the conversation is not inappropriate like it once was. God's people preserve this world, for example, through voting. continuing to be diligent in voting to pass laws, we pray, that will keep citizens of our country from being unleashed in all kinds of immorality and godlessness. God's people preserve, for example, through a love for the unborn. As I learned recently with some of you with regard to, for example, the Alternative Women's Center here in town and many places like that place throughout this country, I was struck by the fact that as they are able to put ultrasound machines in their clinics, that many, many women who come in to have an ultrasound, and they came in with the idea, the decision already made that they were going to abort that child if they found out they were pregnant, once they see that living being on that ultrasound, they change their mind. They change their mind. That's a preserving function by the grace of God. But may it never be that there would be no difference detectable between us and the world. And the world also experiences God's people as light. The world for all of its enlightenment, for all of its knowledge, knowledge of, for example, in technology or medicine or space, the world still lives in complete darkness, the complete darkness of sin and darkness to the truth. The world is even blind to the truth of itself. and of its desperate condition. The unbeliever doesn't see, he doesn't realize that he's on the road a course straight to hell. But the believer as light exposes first of all the sin and the sinfulness of the world. The believer's selflessness exposes the world's selfishness. The believer's love exposes lovelessness. The believer's humility exposes arrogance. Meekness exposes anger. Righteousness exposes sin. Mercy exposes hard-heartedness. Honesty exposes dishonesty. Indeed, the contrast between kingdom character as it ought to be and the character of the world is unmistakable. The believer as light exposes the sin and the sinfulness of the world And then also the believer as light illumines the very reason that believers are salt. Because of a saving relationship with Jesus Christ by faith. And that too, beloved, points to a contrast, doesn't it? Our relationship with Jesus Christ points to a contrast with a world that does not have that relationship and instead is totally estranged, separated from God. Our Lord is powerfully teaching His people here that we are called to show Jesus Christ. But it doesn't end there. Not only show Jesus Christ, but show the path to Him who is the source. You see, the believer can only be salt and light insofar as he himself is influenced by Jesus Christ who is the light of the world To be light, we need to be transformed by and filled with the source of light. Jesus said, I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life. The light of Jesus Christ and His truth drives away the darkness of sin in His people so that Paul can then say in Ephesians 5, verse 8, For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the world. our Lord Jesus Christ gives us His light. And He makes us transmitters of His light. And as salt, we are seasoned by the truth of His Word, a seasoning that for us is to be constant. It is to be ongoing. By the Holy Spirit, believers are seasoned and energized, we might say, to be an unmistakable influence on the world out of which we have been rescued. We were there. We've been rescued, delivered. The world is living in the darkness of sin and shame, rotting to death, facing eternal consequences. All that the believer has been delivered from. We have been rescued. And therefore, our privilege in Christ Jesus is to be used of God to show the world the only way to be delivered. as well. And not to do so by responding to hatred and persecution by taunting the world as we have said again and again. Not by returning evil for evil. Not by saying, ha ha, look what we have that you don't have. Not by hiding it. But by sharing it. Sharing what has been given to us so freely. Desiring that the world would come to know the only truth that sets one free. and delivers one from the darkness and the decay of sin and death. And therefore, that influence is also to be, in the second place, purposeful. It's not just a good idea here that Jesus is throwing out. It's not just a theory. It's not just a possibility. There is a purpose. He says in verse 16, In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. He has a purpose for you and me. God intends to use His kingdom's citizens to share what they have been given. And therefore, there is something here that is oh so necessary, and that is that salt must be salty. It must be salty. Jesus says in verse 13, You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men. Now, salt in the ancient Near East was in great supply, but at times it would be mixed with gypsum, I read, or with sand, and it served no function then. It ruined it. Salt that is not salty has absolutely no secondary value. It has no recycle value. It's not even good enough to be fertilizer. It's useless. Salt must be salty. At the same time, light must give light. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead, they put it on its stand and it gives light to everyone in the house. No doubt, Jerusalem set on a hill for the traveler. If they saw candles at the nighttime, they could see Jerusalem. It was there to see. And we understand too, with our large cities, our metropolises, that the glow of the city lights is seen all night long and it is reflected for miles and miles and miles. And in that day too, when they would take the bowl of oil with a wick in it and light that wick and light that candle, you didn't cover it. It simply didn't make sense. To cover it would take away its purpose. It would take away its benefit. If a light bulb does not give light, what do you do with it? Tempted to ask if anybody recycles them. I suspect we all throw them away because they have no value. You can't fix them. They're good for nothing. Now ultimately, I believe Jesus is talking here in these two illustrations about saltless salt and covering a light that He's talking about false Christians because he clearly says that true Christians are salt and they are light. But the question that we do need to ask ourselves is what kind of salt are you? What kind of taste are you giving? What kind of light are you giving? But he's talking too about false Christians. He talks about salt, as some say, becoming adulterated, mixed with sand. Literally it says if Saul becomes foolish that's the word that is used and foolishness the Bible teaches us applies to men the fool has said in his heart there is no God if Saul becomes foolish the fool who has said in his heart is useless he will be thrown out as I think Jesus is pointing to some of his other parables for example the foolish virgins are without the oil who will be cast into the outer darkness where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth. Beloved, Satan's desire and his temptation is that you and I hide the light of Jesus Christ and that we be afraid to live openly for Him and to openly confess Him. As well, Satan's desire and temptation of you and me is that we dilute our saltiness through compromise. He would much rather have us look like the world instead of different than the world. But the closer and the more attached we stay by the grace of God with the source who promises to energize and equip and strengthen us as we stay close to Him through His Word and prayer and worship, His means of grace. God has promised to energize us, to refresh us, to nourish us, to strengthen us through the preaching of His Word and the sacraments. the closer we stay by God's grace to that source, the less we will compromise with and look like the world on the Lord's day or on any given day. We have a purpose. And the goal is the salvation of mankind. Notice that they see not you and me personally. Again, young people, I think about going to Mexico, for example. That's fairly fresh in my mind yet. But sometimes we want to go down there or do whatever we might do for our neighbors here. We want to be noticed. We want to be patted on the back. We want to be congratulated for what we have done. We kind of like that. But Jesus says, no. Not so that you and I may be seen personally as it were, but so that the work of the Holy Spirit may be seen that is in me. That the grace of sanctification, God's grace of His work of sanctification might be seen. And that we might make the world thirsty. That's another effect of salt, isn't it? Just like the tiniest light, if you're in a black cave and you don't know where you're at and all of a sudden you see a tiny light out ahead, that light draws one to itself, that light gives hope. In the same way, sort of, salt makes one thirsty. And it is to be our goal as God's people that He use us to make the world thirsty. That as they see our good works, our good deeds that flow from the kingdom character of the Beatitudes like sincerity and faithfulness and love and self-sacrifice and honesty and mercy and meekness and all the other things which demonstrate love for God and our neighbor, that those things might make the world thirsty. like the man who had to find out why that lady was typing without a break. So that if it is God's will, the world might ask you and me for that reason, for the hope that is in us. As someone has said, as the world experiences you and I as light, the world is to see the difference. And as the world experiences you and I as salt, the world is to then experience that difference we are called to plant and to water the seed of the gospel it is god who promises to give the increase where he has determined and praise god that he may very well use you and me to draw some to himself in faith for which we pray indeed our god continues to build his church from every tribe every tongue every nation and he uses his church to be an influence in the world but as well we know too as the bible says that one day every knee will bow before him of those in heaven those on earth those under the earth every knee will bow before him and confess jesus christ as lord as the world then on that day recognizes that it was not the church that was living in a fantasy world sometimes we're kind of accused of that. We're living in a fantasy world, but it was the world that was living in a fantasy world, a world that will come crashing down because she has rejected the truth. You are salt. You are light. What a high calling. Our God Himself has made us to be active and serviceable for him, empowered and enabled by the Holy Spirit, yet a calling that is guaranteed and protected by God himself. Jesus Christ, as he completely transforms those who put their faith in him, he makes us serviceable to the world. Imagine that, being used by God. God, the Holy Spirit, makes believers useful to him, to serve a purpose for him in this world there is no greater privilege beloved than to be a tool in the hand of God to give a taste of Jesus Christ alone to demonstrate the love of Jesus Christ alone and to point to Jesus Christ alone who alone tasted death for us and brought us into the never-ending light of salvation dear people of God what a privilege to serve Him by representing Him before the world and pointing the world to that One whom it so desperately needs. May we never be content to disguise that relationship with Him. And instead, may God be pleased to increase our saltiness, to expand our light, to make our influence for Him genuine and powerful and effective so that God may be glorified both now and forever. Amen. Let's pray together. Our great God and Heavenly Father, we are humbled as we consider Your transforming power and work in our hearts and lives. What You have made Your people to be. And Father, may we be in this world what You have made us to be. We pray that You would continue to fill us with the joy of Your salvation so much so that we cannot contain it. That it is visible, that it is experienced by those with whom we have contact. Even as You continue to work in a powerful way to build Your church. Father, we confess that so often we are weak. We pray, Father, that you would encourage us and strengthen us that more and more we might be useful by your grace for you in this world. Hear our prayer, O Lord, for Jesus' sake. And in his name we pray, amen.