Dave Burke

Matthew 5:13-16

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This was an all age service and the challenge for me was to keep everyone (from 5 to 85) interested. So we resorted to a number of activities and a little group discussion!

It’s nice being a Christian. You get:

…to come to a meeting each Sunday and sing nice songs.

…to make some nice friends who try to be kind to people

…to be part of a community that will support you if you have a problem.

But there’s more to being a Christian than this; Jesus wants us to have an impact on the world.

To make this point, he uses two pictures; we are to be like salt and like light.

But what does that mean?

"You are the salt of the earth"

In Jesus day there were no refrigerators… so how did you stop things going bad? You rubbed salt into them, and the salt acted as a preservative.

Christians are to have an impact on the world, we are meant to stop things going rotten.  OK… but how can salt lose it’s saltiness?

[Here we did The Salt Experiment with the kids - Take three bags of chips fresh from Macdonalds and try them without salt.  Not very nice!  Now try them with first century salt - a mixture of sand and salt.  They taste better but gritty!  Now put some first century salt into a seive and pour water over it - the salt is washed out and the sand remains.  Try this on the third bag of chips - tasteless and gritty!]

[Now we used a roving mike to discuss this:  "In what ways can Christians become washed-out?"  "How can we avoid becoming washed out?"

So here’s a challenge: are you a washed out Christian?

[Now we make the room as dark as possible - lights out and blinds closed - when it is dark the speaker begins]

Have you ever been in the country where there are no lights at all? It is so dark, you can see the Milky Way;  so dark, that you cannot see a hand held right in front of your face.

Very few of us have been in that situation because wherever you go in Britain there is always some light… even in the middle of the Pennines, miles from anywhere, you can still see because the lights of the towns and villages nearby reflect off the clouds and give you just enough light to see.

That is what Jesus is saying – a town on a hill is visible for miles – the lights are visible all ‘round.

"I want you to be like this", Jesus says, "I want you to be bright and visible".

[Now we do The Glow Stick Experiment - unknown to anyone, there is a glow stick under every seat, we get them out and break the seal - little points of light shine all over the room.]

Now, you can choose what to do with that light.  You can hide it away [everyone hides their lights - it is dark again] or you can put it on show [everyone gets their lights out again]

What is it that makes us visible? Jesus tells us in verse 16 it is the good deeds that we do.

[More discussion with a roving mike, "What sort of things make Christians shine?"

Now here's a challenge, are you luminous, or dull?

It is no good just being a Christian and enjoying the benefits. We are told to have an impact on the world.

We are to be salt – taking action to stop the rot. “Salt” in Jesus day was a metaphor for “wisdom”.  God has given us so much wisdom, we need to be filled with it and ready to share it with people.

• Be filled with his wisdom, not washed out
• Don’t be sanctimonious… be real

Salt is what you say.

We are to be salt... and light – remember how we saw that a little light goes a long way?

My next-door-neighbour once reversed into my car.  When I got out to see the damage my first words to her were, "Are you alright?"  It's not much is it?  But she had expected me to be furious, angry at the damage to the car - the fact that my first thought was for her deeply impressed her.  I know this because for weeks afterwards strangers kept stopping me and telling me how impressed they were... she was telling everyone!  A little light goes a long way.

St Francis was one of those impressive people who lived a luminous life. He said, “Preach the gospel, use words if you have to”. The way we are from day to day, and the things we do,  should tell those around us that we are different.