How do you know if your life is actually making a difference? You know, we tend in our culture to measure influence by a number of followers or the platform or applause. But Jesus measures influence very differently. See, 2000 years ago, he sat on the mountainside with a group of ordinary everyday people. These were not the religious leaders, these were not the political leaders. These were just people trying to walk through life together, listening to this intriguing new rabbi. And Jesus looked at those people, looked them in the eye. And he said directly, you are the salt of the earth, and you are the light of the world. You see, according to Jesus, influence is not measured by the attention that you get. But rather, Jesus is measured. By where you direct the tension that you already have. With 20 years of ministry, I've seen many times, I've seen uh people in conversations say, well, OK, my, my faith is a private faith. It's a, it's a, it's, you know, it's personal to me. And while, hopefully it is personal. And hopefully, there is a private factor to it. These analogies, these pictures that we're gonna study today, salt and light. Are anything but private. The purpose of salt, the purpose of light. is to be shared and given and used. And that influence is really how we impact the world and that you can and will make a difference in the greatest mission in the history of the world. And that influence comes directly from and directly through the power of a resurrected Jesus Christ. And so while the world is chasing clout, We are living not for our identity, but from our identity. And Jesus describes making a difference in this way. He tells us that the way we live, Should point to the God we love. The way we live. should point to the God we love. As we sang worship songs this morning, that last song comes directly out of Psalm 34. There's a great verse in Psalm 34 verse 8, that says, oh taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. I love that imagery, don't you? Taste and see. I feel like there's probably a good chance that many of you grew up in a home in which religion was not taste and see. It was rules and regulations. It was behave and control, command and control, right? Get in line or else. It was fear and judgment, not taste and see. But have you ever made the connection between taste and sea and salt and light? If the world is supposed to taste and see that the Lord is good, how will the world taste if we are not salt? And how will the world see if we are not light? The declaration To taste and see that God is good. is a commitment for his bride, his church, his people to go be in the world and to be salt and light in the world. Because salt impacts how you taste and light influences what you see. And we're called to be both. If you have your Bible, let's go ahead and open up this uh Matthew chapter 5. We're in what's described as the greatest sermon in world history. If Jesus Christ himself is speaking. Last week, we talked about the beatitudes, what it means to be blessed, what it means to have the good life. And we shared That Jesus invites everybody into this process. And talked about our condition. We talked about our character and we talked about our conduct. And have we, as we start to live. As people of God are supposed to live, we might, and not might actually will face persecution in this world. So he's then going to describe why it's worth it. And what does it look like to make a difference in this world? And so we pick up the Sermon on the Mount in verse 13 of Matthew chapter 5. He says, you are the salt of the earth. But if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? I love that he starts with an identity statement. He doesn't say, if you're good enough, you will become salt. He doesn't have like a series of belts, like in karate or taekwondo or any of those things where like, oh, if you're the yellow belt or the black belt, you get this, if you get, if you become good enough, then you will be salt. Now you see with Jesus and the new covenant, and the gospel, identity always comes before activity. We live in a world where influence is completely different, right? If you do and say the right things, that eventually you'll be praised and accepted and loved. So you must do this activity. And then you will live for identity, but Jesus says, no, I will give you a new identity. And from that will come your activity and says you are salt of the earth. These are not the leaders. These are not the quote unquote influencers of the day. They are Hebrew. People who will become believers in a Greek society ruled by the Roman Empire. Nothing about this makes sense. Bless you. That was really great if like you would have sneezed during we were singing bless the Lord. I'm like, bless the Lord and you. Yes, let's bless the Lord. OK, OK, sorry. Identity always comes before activity. It says, but if the soul has lost its taste. How shall it be restored? It is no longer good for anything. Except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. Now the phrase there for lost, it's saltiness. Within that is this Greek word Moreno, and, and really it gets this idea where we get our modern concept of a moron. To lose taste is also to become foolish. And if you think about it, like salt has to do a lot of things to lose its saltiness. Like it, it, it is salt. Like it's, it's, it's very identity. So to lose its taste, is to lose the very identity that makes you who you are. So if a Christian loses his or her saltiness, It's, it's the idea that you are forgetting the very person that God made you to be. Go ahead and do me a favor and turn to your neighbor and say, hey, be salty today. Right. But he doesn't stop there. He gives another picture. He says you are the salt of the earth, but then he goes on and he says, you are the light of the world. A city set on a hill that cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light and all the house. Notice that this idea of light covers both the macro and the micro. The macro is a city on a hill. They are on a hillside. They're on a mountain. And so you can imagine a beautiful city that is displayed at night in the distance. And even before the increase of technology and electricity and lighting, you have candles, you have campfires, and so you can see light coming up from the hillside. Have you ever made the journey home from LA back to Phoenix, and it's like both equal parts stuck in LA traffic, and then just an empty drive through the desert, you know what I'm talking about? If you make it back to Phoenix at night, right, you eventually come up and you start to see civilization again. You're like, oh, I'm almost there. I'm almost there and can stop by Bucky's. It's a new place right there. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. It's identity again. So it's the macro. It's a collection of people that cannot be hidden away. And yet, not only is it macro, it goes to the micro. It says, and. A lamp, a candle gives light to the house. We are called to be a light to the world, but you're also called to be a light to your family. To the close relationships. Can I ask you a question? When does a candle start to give off light? As soon as it's lit Right? If you have the power of the Holy Spirit living inside you, you already have what is needed to be a light to the world. You know, a single candle. Can shine and be seen from miles away in a dark setting. Understand that your light is needed in the world, in the city. But also in your relationships at the dinner table, in your marriage, in your parenting. In your friendships, on your teams. It makes a difference. He says in verse 16, in the same way, let your light shine. I love that because it's, we, we don't create the light, we carry it. Like candles don't go, shine. No, just let it shine. Let God work through you. That they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. So two thoughts there. One, The word, the word good in this context is not just morally correct. Uh, I think oftentimes we think of Christianity as like, Like a Ned Flanders from The Simpsons, like, oh, follow all the rules. I, I, I, I'm a Christian, uh, uh, uh, like, go through and we make it this robotic kinda like get morally correct, like, don't upset anybody, don't do anything that's like out of character, like just, just follow the rules, get in line. But that's not what the word good means here. The word, the word good here actually carries this idea of good, beautiful, noble, attractive, and winsome. Like when you hear Like, OK, Have you ever been to like a 4th grade choir concert? Some of you're shaking your head cause like that's not a concert, right? It's like a series of squeaky wheels at that one of them you have to take home with you. And you have to be there, right? Versus, you ever hear somebody sing and uh you get the goosebumps? Right? That's good. Right. The difference between grabbing a circle K. Like process rapper thing. And having this freshly prepared gourmet meal, where you find yourself, like, what's the movie, What About Bob, where you take a bite and you're like, mm. Right? That's good. We should live in a way that is winsome. Attractive, not just necessarily in looks, but like in in life. Beautiful, incredible mosaic-like. Where the broken pieces come together for a masterpiece. And then Notice that this noble attractive winsome act of or deed. Brings glory not to self, but to God. You see, Jesus didn't just save us from something, he also saved us for something. Don't get me wrong, I am so incredibly grateful that God has snatched us out of the perils of our destination where we were set to go hell. And there is nothing we did to earn to to deserve any of that. That's grace. So we have this incredible picture, this incredible God. But then he invites us to become partakers of his divine nature. And he says, I'm going to give you a mission. I'm gonna make you part of a family. I'm gonna make you part of the largest movement in world history, and I'm gonna use all your questions, and all your worry and your personality, and your doubt, and your giftings, and your callings and your desires, and I'm gonna mold it together in a way that's gonna bring glory to me. How will the world taste and see unless we're salt and light? Let's, let's get real practical here. What does salt do? Well, salt, even more than today, was valued in the context in which God was speaking. Salt at one point was seen as equivalent for salary, right? If they weren't given money, you could be given rice and spices and so people would literally, some soldiers would be paid in bags of salt. So if somebody wasn't doing their job, they would say, oh they're not worth their salt. And, and even the root word for assault, uh, and through a series of translations also has a shared root as our word salary today. So it was currency, it was a difference maker that had extreme value. Why did salt have such value in that day? Number one, Salt had value because salt preserves. Soult preserves You see, salt protects what is good and it slows decay. So they didn't have freezers, then they didn't have refrigerators. And so if you were going to preserve food, for example, uh, you could, you would cover branches in salt and then place those branches on or around the, the food. And eventually the food would decay because it's food. But you can slow the decay and preserve what is good. And if you are here and you feel like, man, our world is literally going to hell, it is. And We have the opportunity to slow the decay. By bringing in what is good, to preserve the good in the workplace, on your sports team, in your relationships, in your family, in your friendships. Salt preserves. Second, we see that salt purifies. See, salt was used as a cleansing agent. You know, a lot of times now we have water, water, uh, filtration systems and things where salt is a process, but even in medical, uh, practices back then, salt was used in a way to purify certain treatments. And so we don't just simply avoid broken people, but rather we transform and help bring healing into broken places through the purification of the gospel. So salt preserves, salt purifies, and then 3, my favorite one of the four is uh salt adds flavor. Salt is used to bring the flavor out. And what I love about salt is salt, it has a taste itself, but what it's really good at is bringing out the flavor that's already in the food. Right. And Here's the thing, is that like, have you ever had just like really bland food? Sorry, all my white people are looking at me like, I don't know what you're talking about. It's probably not correct, but you understand what I'm talking about here. So, so we're just now thinking about it. What? I don't know. When you throw in the spices, when you throw in the salt, if you add salt to something, it brings out a little bit of flavor, even to like simplified things like you can actually throw a little bit of salt on like some sourdough bread, right? It brings out a little taste, or eggs or other things too. I mean, yes, the meats and other vegetables and all that stuff too. But it brings out the flavor that's already within, and I love that picture because as Christians we are called to bring out the flavor that's already in life as we know it. Too many Christians are living tasteless lives. How are you adding flavor and life into your relationships? Right? And then the last one here we have is salt creates thirst. Salt creates thirst. Uh, I don't know what it is about chips and salsa in a restaurant, but I just lose all sense of boundaries when I go to a restaurant. Anyone track with me on that? Like at home, we like, we like portion sizes and like this, and we're like, when you go to a restaurant, like, you want more chips? Yes. Yes, I do. And before you know it, a couple of baskets have come and gone. And you're like, someone stole the chips. No, honey, you just ate all of them. And, and I find myself downing water or lemonade or Diet Coke or whatever it is. Why? Because the more chips I eat, the more thirsty I get too. And here's the thing, as Christians, We help create or demonstrate someone's thirst for God. Is how you live, are you pointing to God? Multiple times in the Gospel of John. Jesus is offering eternal life or also referred to as the Holy Spirit in in John 4, John 7, talking about living water. I think some of us are hesitant to drink living water because we're really not thirsty enough. But what I love about being a believer. is that we're called to preserve what is good. We're called to purify what is broken. We're called to add flavor and bring out the flavor in life as it should be, and ultimately we create the thirst pointing to a God who offers us living water. OK, but we don't do that sometimes. Why not? Two reasons or two ways Christians lose their saltiness. One more time, do me a favor here. Just turn, turn to the other neighbor this time and say, hey, be salty. Um What are ways that Christians lose their saltiness? The first way that we lose our saltiness is isolation. See, salt cannot add flavor if it's still in the shaker. OK, Little life hack. We're here to help you spiritually, but also to be successful. And so if you're at a fast food place, uh, and you want fresh fries, order fries with no salt, so they have to make them. But then just get packs of salt on the side and then add it. Um, this is for free, it's a bonus. Um. OK. But here's the thing, I've, I've done that before. But then I ordered it, and then I forgot to add the salt back in. And I was like, man, these are kind of bland. I don't know why. Meanwhile, the packets of salt that I have are just right on the table. Right. Why is that important for you and I? Because we have to stop saying, hey, stay away from the world at all costs. Why I love salt is because salt cannot be delivered digitally. Right? You cannot Zoom call salt. Right? You have to be in proximity. You have to actually make contact. How are we supposed to reach the world if we never go out and interact with it? Do you understand that right now in this room, we have a giant salt shaker. And I love it. And we, we spur one another on, and we encourage one another, and we confess with one another, and we pray with one another, and we lift each other up. But understand that the first part of the great commission is to go, as you go. Make disciples, who we believe that to make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that God has commanded. We will not reach the people that we don't come into contact with. You cannot preserve life that you're not in contact with. You cannot salt and flavor a life that you never experienced in proximity to somebody else. We have to view our mission to go into the world to bring about flavor and preservation and salt, and we have to stay connected to what it means because we have to be close. We have to stop isolating. Salt has to leave the shaker. We are not doing our job as a church, we are not, I'm not doing my job as a pastor. It's like, hey, make sure you come back next week. So then, and we never make a difference between now and next Sunday. It's the salt actually leaving the shaker in your life. It's hard to add flavor if it never gets out there. The 2nd, well, the 2nd way we make mistakes though, is imitation. This is when salt mixes, it loses its distinction. See, isolation says stay away from the world, imitation says become just like the world. So we have to get close, but we have to stay distinct. I grew up in the Midwest, born in Chicago, grew up in Ohio. That's why you hear me talk about the Bears or Ohio State, those things. But we moved to Florida when I took a church job, and my, uh, my two boys were born in Florida. And so they had never really seen or experienced snow. And we came back to, uh, we moved over here to Arizona. And so their first winter in Arizona, and if you're in winter here in Arizona, one of the things you do is one, thank goodness we're out of the summer, but two, if you want to see snow, you just drive up to Flagstaff, right? So we take the kids up to Flagstaff, we're having their first experience of snow. And I don't know if you've ever had this with little kids, but we pulled in and we had to run some errands first. And so we pull in and we pull in the parking lot of Target. And, and in the parking lot of Target, there was all the shoveled snow to the side. Have you seen that? Where it's like all like muddied and like gross and like mixtureed and every, all the rocks and everything, and it's like discolored, right? And like we, we pulled into Target and my kids go, snow. And then when I was like, uh, yeah, have fun. I was like, no, no, no, that's not snow, that's slush. Right? Wait, wait till you experience the powder of a freshly snowed field. You know what I mean? Like that's not, that's not what you play with, OK? Too many of us are offering the slushy mixture and calling it Christianity. You have to be close enough to make an impact, but you have to stay distinct to hold its flavor. If you mix and try to become just like the world, We won't impact it So that's salt. What does God say about light? Well, this idea of light was actually processed and predicted hundreds of years before the coming of Jesus. The prophet Isaiah wrote down these words of God in Isaiah 42:6. And God said, I am the Lord, and I have called you in righteousness, that I will take you by the hand and keep you. I will give you as a covenant for the people. So this new covenant, a light for the nations. Then Jesus says these words in John 8:12. He says, again, Jesus spoke to them saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. In other words, we don't create the light, we carry it. We take it with us. Because then in Ephesians 5:8, Paul writes that for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Notice that identity language. So therefore walk as children of light. 3 ways that light makes a difference in this world. Number 1, light reveals. Light helps us see. Light exposes what darkness hides. Have you ever uh tried to get something from your house in the middle of the night without turning the lights on? It's this room you've walked repeatedly, but with the lights off, we bump into stuff, right? Light reveals what's there. But secondly, we see that light guides. Light shows us the way. And that's why when you're driving at night, the headlights point out in front of the road, not just in the car. Anyone get annoyed at their family members when they turn the lights on inside the car? Oh, we're driving. And anyone else get told as a kid, like if the light was on, they could get pulled over. Anyone? I don't think that's actually a thing, but it worked to this day. I'm driving and like the light goes, I'm like, no, turn it off. Right. Why? Because you got to see the light is for where you're going. In the Psalms, it says, your word is a lamp unto my feet. That tells me that I'm walking somewhere and it tells me that I'm surrounded by darkness. I need a lamp. Right? If you've gone camping, OK, you shine the light where you're walking. If you shine the light back at yourself, what are you doing? Telling a spooky story. Stop telling spooky stories as Christians and start actually pointing people where to walk. You know what I'm saying? Light reveals, light guides, and finally, light shines. It gets people's attentions. Light cannot be hidden. From the macro or a city on the hill, and the micro light fills the house with light. It makes a difference I love Christmas lights. Right. But imagine putting Christmas lights on the house and then never turning them on. Seems a little crazy. But when you have that neighborhood where everything's lit up, right, now all of a sudden, it'd be like people are driving from miles away to come see it. Growing up in Ohio, we lived close to this thing called, uh, the Clifton Mill, that actually was on ABC's Christmas light fights a couple of years ago. Because here's this tiny little mill, um, in the middle of nowhere, Ohio, but they put up over a million lights every year. And people drive for miles to see. Right. But instead, as Christians, instead of shining our lights, so we can see, we, we either don't turn them on or we point them at ourselves. Two ways Christians dim their light. Number 1 is concealment. We're too afraid to shine. We replace light with fear, comfort, embarrassment, or people pleasing, and we let that hide what was meant to be seen. Don't hide the light You live in a dark world. And last time I checked, light versus darkness, light always wins. When you turn on the light switch in your house, it doesn't, there's not this battle between light and shadows. That's why I love Psalm 23 as well. It's as though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. I will fear no evil, why? Because you were with me. Here's the reality is that Jesus dealt with the substance of death, so all that's left is a shadow. We're scared of shadow puppets. Oh, they're gonna get me. It's a shadow. And the only reason you have a shadow is because there's also light. Stop focusing on the shadow and start recognizing the light. We're called the Shine. Beautiful city on the hill. A light that lights up every home. A light that reveals, that guides, that shines. And lastly, we can't, we, you can't conceal it, but also let's stop competing with it. We compete. We want people to focus on us. When Elijah prayed his prayer that defeated the prophets of Baal. And defeated a whole like nation's worth of pagan evil prophets. The goal was not like, whoa, Elijah, great, great prayer, man. Excellent prayer. The response was, your God is God. You are holding the flashlight. So that others can see. See the beauty and the nobleness and the winsomeness and the goodness of God so that they can give him glory, not you glory. The way we live should point to the God we love. How are you living today? It's not perfect. Right It it's not pretty at times. But isn't it true that the people you respect the most are typically the people that have been through the most? that have overcome the most. That have been literally to hell and back. And come through stronger than ever before. Why? Because they have the power of God that defeated death itself. That Jesus rose again and then, and then gives that power, the Holy Spirit to those who believe and trust in Him. So that nothing can separate you. From his love Nothing can take away what God's already put inside of you. Believers, Christians, you are salt. You are light. So let me ask you, who in your life needs to taste and see the goodness of God this week? Take the salt out of the shaker. Turn the flashlight on. And point this tasteless dark world. To a flavorful, glory-filled God who can change everything for you and for them. Let's be salt and light this week. We're gonna end this morning with two people who are doing just that. Two people who are demonstrating for us what a transformed life looks like. I love it. See, there's not an age limit on this. We have one gentleman getting baptized today at 82. Yeah, come on. We got another gal getting baptized at 19. Come on. Look, salt and light doesn't have an age. Life change doesn't have an age. You have a soul. You have a God who loves you, a God who's, who died for you, a God who brings about salvation, and they're taking that step today to go public with their faith as a demonstrate demonstration for you and for me, what Jesus already did on the cross, died on the cross, was buried and rose again. May we take inspiration and courage from their example today and let us go and be salt and light this week. Will you pray with me, dear Heavenly Father. Thank you for giving us this new identity. Thank you for making us on purpose with a purpose to now go and be salt and light in this world so that others may taste and see how good you truly are. We love you, God. We commit our lives. We commit this week to you. Let us go be salt and light to a world that desperately needs it. We love you, God. In your Son's name we pray. Amen.