The Fifth Sunday After the Epiphany Salted and Lighted Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ! Amen. In today’s Gospel is from our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, where He says, “You are the salt of the earth… [and] you are the light of the world.” When Jesus says “you” in this Gospel, about whom is He speaking? Dear Christian friends, You have probably heard plenty of sermons tell you that you are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Such sermons might motivate, and they certainly provide opportunities to feel guilty, but they also fail to consider the possibility that Jesus might not have been talking to you or me. Jesus might have been talking to somebody else in today’s Gospel, merely allowing us to listen. Today’s Gospel is from our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount. Just prior to preaching, when Jesus saw the crowds, “He went up on the mountain, sat down, and His disciples came to Him. He opened His mouth and taught them” (Matthew 5:1). Whom did Jesus teach? Jesus taught the disciples. All the other people listened while Jesus spoke to the disciples. · Most of the time, we assume that the disciples here represent all Christians. Stated another way, whenever Jesus says “you” in His Sermon on the Mount, we generally take it to mean that He include also you and me and all other Christians. That why you have heard sermons tell you that YOU are the salt of the earth and YOU are the light of the world. Now get out there and shine. · Let’s head in a different direction: When the disciples gather to hear our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, maybe they do not represent all Christians everywhere. Although He preached this Sermon in the hearing of many people (Matthew 5:1), Jesus might be talking only to His twelve disciples; that is to say, His hand-picked apostles (Matthew 10:1-4) and future New Testament writers (Ephesians 2:20); that is to say, His specially chose men whom He gathered and taught and sent out into the world to preach and to baptize (Matthew 29:18-20) with His Gospel of life. (Compare Matthew 14:15-16, where Jesus again says “You” specifically to the disciples. “You give them something to eat.”) At the end of St. Matthew’s book, Jesus will give to His specially-chosen apostles all His authority in heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:16-18). Jesus will instruct these men to make disciples by “baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that Jesus has commanded [the apostles]” (Matthew 28:19-20). Here in today’s Gospel, Jesus prepares these men for their disciple-creating work by saying to them, “You are the salt of the earth… you are the light of the world.” Let’s not rush to a false conclusion! Just because Jesus is not necessarily speaking to you and me in today’s Gospel—just because He might be speaking only to His apostles, while we are allowed to listen—we should not assume that these Words of Jesus have no benefit for us! By listening from the crowd (Matthew 5:1) while Jesus speaks His Sermon on the Mount to His twelve apostles, you and I … · … stop being the salt of the earth and we end up being the earthy ones whom the apostles of our Lord have salted. Stated another way, perhaps we are not so much the salt shakers as we are the salt receivers. The apostles of our Lord have salted us with their New Testament teachings concerning the Christ and how He comes to us through His Word and His Baptism and His Holy Communion. Why is it so good that we would be the ones whom the apostles of our Lord have salted? o Because salt kills. Just ask the slugs in my wife’s flowerbed. Through the preaching and the baptism that Jesus gave these men to distribute into the world (Matthew 28:19-20), we get put to death like a salted slug. The preaching and the baptism of the apostles—that is, the preaching and baptism of Jesus—continually does its good work of working death in us, because “nothing good dwells in me, that is in my sinful nature” (Romans 7:18). Because of the divine salt delivered by the apostles of our Lord, you and I and every Christian can confidently say, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:19-20, compare Colossians 3:3). o Because salt preserves—just ask anyone who has eaten a ham. Through the preaching and the baptism that Jesus gave to His apostles to distribute into the world (Matthew 28:19-20), we get preserved unto eternal life. The preaching and the baptism of the apostles—that is, the preaching and baptism of Jesus—continually does its good work of preserving us against all evil and protecting us from all harm. Because you have the good and salty Word of the apostles living and dwelling within you, you can confidently say, “The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen” (2 Timothy 4:18). · … likewise stop being the light of the world. We end up being “the people sitting in darkness [who] have seen a great light” (Isaiah 9:2), upon whom the light of Christ has now dawned (Matthew 4:16). In our hearing, Jesus says to His apostles in today’s Gospel, “You are the light of the world.” With these Words, Jesus is assuring you that the New Testament preaching and Baptism of the apostles is really nothing more than the extension of Christ’s own life into our world, into our lives, into our here-and-now. Stated another way, Jesus closely identifies Himself with the apostolic preaching. You already know that Jesus Christ Himself is the Light that has come into the world (John 3:19), the Light that the darkness cannot overcome (John 1:5). Today Jesus wants you to know that His disciples’ teaching now carries Jesus the Light of the World to us, so that we will never more be cast into the darkness on account of our sins. Does all of this mean that you and I have no role at all in shining the light of Christ into the world, or in killing and preserving the people of the earth by means of the apostolic teaching? Again, let’s not draw destructive conclusions. Just as Christ inhabited the Word and actions of His closest apostles, identifying them as salt and light in today’s Gospel, so also our Christ inhabits the Words and actions of all who receive the teaching of the apostles. We simply do not need to think of ourselves as the salt of the earth. We can recognize that the salt of the earth does its good and important work through us, and often despite us. In a similar manner, the light of the world continues to shine, with or without us. It would be far better for everyone if we each devoted ourselves to doing we can to radiate the Light, even while we bask in it. Either way, “a city on a hill cannot be hidden.” _______________________________________________ Sermons mailing list [email protected] http://cat41.org/mailman/listinfo/sermons
