Salt and Light in Unsettling Times

The events of Wednesday, January 6, 2021 in our nation’s capitol were deeply unsettling. Our country is deeply divided over many issues. Further, we remain in the midst of a global pandemic, people’s thoughts are frenzied, their emotions are frayed, and fear reigns in many hearts and minds of many. What is your role and mine as Christians in our culture in 2021? Jesus said about us as His followers, “you are the salt of the earth . . . You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:13-14 NIV).

It is hard for us to be salt and light in our culture just now. We are sorting through the same issues and emotions as everyone else. However, as followers of Jesus, we are called to respond differently! Here is how the Apostle Paul described that difference, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:3-5 NIV).

Here are some important reminders as we seek to live authentic Christian lives and bring salt and light into our culture.

Our primary allegiance is to Jesus.

The tribalism in American culture is incredibly powerful. It is easy for us to take on the labels and identities of those tribes. However, as followers of Jesus, we have a higher loyalty that should always be first. The Apostle Paul wrote, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ . . .” (Philippians 3:20 NIV).

Whatever is going on around us, good or bad, we place our hope in Christ. We seek to live as citizens of the kingdom of God. Therefore, we can love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us just as Jesus commanded (Mathew 5:44).

Intimacy with God is essential.

As we watch newscasts and read newsfeeds on our devices, all that is happening seems overwhelming and certainly beyond our control. In this overwhelming world, you are called to be salt and light. We probably will not have opportunity to do that from a big platform, but we certainly are called to be salt and light with our neighbors and coworkers.

So where do we start with being salt and light? We start with cultivating an intimate relationship with God. “The greatest gift you’ll ever give the world is your intimacy with God” (Dwight Robertson, You Are God's Plan A and There Is No Plan B, 141). If you lack intimacy with God, you have little of substance to offer to those around you. Think about all the time that Jesus spent in the wilderness in prayer with the Father. Intimacy with God was so important to the great church reformer Martin Luther that he is reported to have said, “I am so busy now that if I did not spend three hours each day in prayer, I could not get through the day.”

We must commit to seeing others as God sees them.

Mature Christians will have the desire to see others as God sees them. Trying to understand the perspective of others, particularly from different social groups is difficult. It is tempting to label those with whom we disagree politically as evil, because if they are evil, we do not feel obligated to treat them kindly.

All people who walk this earth were created in the image of God, whether we view them as friends or foes (Genesis 1:27). We must not discount the value of those created in God’s image. I love the way that C.S. Lewis described the importance of how we view and treat others, “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors” (C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, 46).

If we are not salt and light in our world, we are not fulfilling God’s mission. “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 underfoot. “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. (Matthew 5:13-14 NIV)

My prayer for us: Father God, help us to make our primary allegiance to you. Give us a hunger for an intimate relationship with you that changes how we live in the world. Allow us to see others as you see them. In so doing, may we be salt and light and become part of Your solution to the deeply fractured world in which we find ourselves. Amen.

Faithfully,

Pastor Roger