"Find out who you are and do it on purpose"

Matthew 5:13-20

During the Christmas season, we sing the favorite song, “Oh Come all Ye Faithful.”  It’s a beautiful, Christmas hymn. On the third verse, which starts “sing choir of angles,” many choirs, including ours here, sing what is called a descant. While the majority of the choir and the church sing along to the regular melody, the sopranos sing a different melody that floats on top of the traditional song. The result is this extra color and beauty that enhances the song. Some of us listening or singing might not even notice the specifics of what’s going on. We simply know that, when we sing of this choir of angles, it sounds extra beautiful. If you haven’t heard this descant, think of a regular band that adds a harmony or an unusual instrument like a fiddle to add a certain depth, color or flavor, or sabor to the music.

The next few weeks, we’re going to be hearing from what is known as Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.  In the part that comes up today, Jesus talks about two things that enhance life by adding color and depth like that descant does to the hymn: Salt and light. 

At first blush, salt and light seem pretty easy to wrap our heads around. Light brightens dark spaces and salt brings out the flavor in food. Too much light hurts our eyes. Too much salt destroys the meal.

Take salt for starters. The disciples would have known about salt. While we might take salt for granted, even up until 100 or so years ago, salt was still a precious commodity.   In a time when there was no refrigeration, salt was a preservative. It was used for seasoning and medicinal purposes.  Roman soldiers in the time of Jesus were often paid in salt which is where we get our English word “salary.” (Salt was precious the way our salary is!) 

Then take light: Light is also something we take for granted now, but there was no electricity in the time of Jesus.  As soon as the sun set, that was it.  Any little bit of light took effort and likely some expense. It’s not like Jesus just pulled a book of matches out of his pocket to light a candle. It was hard work to manufacture and sustain light so it was precious. Even a little candle could be seen in the wide expanse of darkness.  

The disciples would have known that salt and light were precious and important. But what did this mean for their lives?

At this point in the Gospel of Matthew, it hadn’t been so long ago that Jesus had crossed paths with the brothers, Peter and Andrew and then James and John, son of Zebeedee on the beach and said “follow me.” Those fishermen had miraculously dropped their nets and followed.  They are all still getting to know each other. They had just barely starting to visit all the towns and synagogues where Jesus heals people. Word is spreading and he is quickly rising to celebratory status.  The people are flocking to him. 

On the day where Jesus offers this teaching, the crowds had been really big. Jesus took one look at the number of people and decided to huff it up the mountain. We don’t know why, maybe he needed a little breathing space, but the disciples huffed it up there after him.  He was magnetic. What was it about him that pulled all these people to him and gave everyone so much hope?!

As the disciples followed him up the mountain, they were probably pretty stoked about what an excellent career move they had made to have dropped those nets and followed celebratory-Jesus. Surely now, up on the mountain, he would reveal to them what his secret sauce was that made him so special! Or perhaps, a little of his shine would rub off on them.
They all sit down up there at the top of the mountain trying to catch their breath and Jesus starts sharing: But instead of launching into a list of books he had read on charismatic leadership or underscoring all the great mentors he had worked with who taught him how to give people hope, Jesus flips the script and tells them: “You are the salt of the earth.”  “You are the light of the world.” There is no special sauce. There is no magical quality.  

It seems like Jesus is saying that all of us have these qualities of salt and light in us whether we like it or not.  It’s not that we have to create the right spiritual conditions for salt and light,or wait for God add them in our lives. Yes, sometimes salt is used too sparingly to make a difference.  And sometimes light is hidden by a basket or covered up. But, Jesus explains, you already have this goodness of salt and light in you. It’s a fact.  The question is will we lavishly apply it to the world around us? 

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I want you to think back on the last couple of weeks about how God has allowed you to be salt and light.  Think of the different people you’ve encountered here at church, at school, at your gym.  Think about words of encouragement you’ve shared with others and the moments you’ve listened and sought to understand.  Think of burned bridges you have worked to repair and hard conversations you have made yourself have.  Where have you recently been salt and light?

If you work outside of your home, think about your workplace. Who has needed an encouraging word, a gift of grace, or an extra acknowledgement of their humanity in this super-charged, fast paced world? Think of your family—when have supported your child or maybe challenged them?   When have you been light to an extended family member? Think of places where you have volunteered, or the prayers you’ve offered, or moments of activism. Where have you been salt or light in this world? 

Being a disciples is less about believing a list of things, It’s more about acting on God’s Word the way that Jesus teaches it. 

Where is God acting in the world and how are you joining in? How are you a pinch of salt that doesn’t over power a dish, but enlivens it. How are you a single candle that adds warmth to a dark room? How are you bringing the joy of a gorgeous descant to the ordinary song around you? We are this salt and light.  The question isn’t will we learn to be salt and light, for we already are. 

St. Dolly of Parton who said “find out who you are and do it on purpose.” We might hear and know in our heads that we’re salt and light, but do we act on it? Do we offer the simple, daily moments of our lives in service to the gospel, as salt and light, or not?  

When we know we’re salt and light but don’t act, that knowledge without action has an impact on on-going social evils like discrimination or racism. It also affects our interpersonal relationships. We know what is right and what we should do, but don’t act. We idly watch injustice instead of believing that our action matters.  We gossip about a problem instead of working to fix it.  This is what happens when we find out who we are and don’t “do it on purpose.” 

I'm certain you all show up as salt and light in the world, too. How does your light make a difference in a world of busyness and hopelessness and worry?  How does it bolster weary hearts? How does it mend brokenness? How does your or your family’s presence make a difference in your neighborhood or here in this congregation on the corner of Wilson and Campbell make a difference? How does our work and witness enhance God’s love and show people that, in a world with a whole lot of despair, injustice, evil, this is not how it has to be.

You might feel only as small as a pinch of salt or a spark of light, but that is exactly how God’s kingdom is built: one moment at a time. 
When Jesus says “you” in scripture, it's plural. It means “you all.”  We don’t show up to do God’s work alone. Even when we are in our own offices or at school or in our own homes in the evening by lamplight, we are a collective. We gather here as a church this morning and week after week to name this calling, to be light and salt, to one another. We name it because we forget it an we get caught up in daily things and think it doesn’t matter.  Today, we are reminded that it matters. May God bless us and send us out to shine.