Soap - Matthew 15 - Jr. High

S: You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men.
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

Matthew 15:13-16

O: You. "You" represents the subject at hand and "You" happens to be the salt of the earth as well as the light of the world. "You" was and still are the Christians that live in this world.

Salt. What does salt represent? After reading a wikipedia article on salt, I found out that salt can't actually lose it's flavor due to it's chemical composition (sodium chloride)- and reading about the speculation of how true salt may represent how Christians cannot "lose salvation," I have to come to the conclusion that Jesus was fully aware that salt didn't lose it's flavor and neither do Christians lose their faith.

So we are Christians, and we are what we are-and that can never change. Just like salt, if we don't taste like salt, we aren't really salt. If we don't have faith in Christ, and aren't Christ-like, we aren't what we claim to be.

We are also the light of the world. This world that is so deeply engulfed in darkness and sin, we need to be ambassadors for Christ and shine the light that exists in us, that which is Christ. Christ is the light to darkness:

Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, "I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life."

John 8:12

And we who follow Jesus are also considered as the light of the world (notice the non-capitalization, however :), and Jesus commands us "Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven." - We must let Christ shine in our lives so that God may be glorified.

A: What are some ways can we shine our light (that which is Christ!) in our life?

How does shining our light glorify God?

Who do we shine our light before? Men? Who are these "men?"

Christlikeness should be apparent in the Christian-and I know the fundamental means of going after Christ and becoming more like Him is to spend time with Him. The Word is a person-and that person is Christ. But, I know that the application of what He teaches me should be taught and shared-how can I personally shine the light in my life? To make Christ more visible, through the very life I lead-I should strive to obey all He commands (in salvation, He chose us and in doing so, intending for the Christians he chose to be molded as holy and blameless). People are quite observant, and I want people to see Christ-that my love and my means of being anything...a guy, a musician, whatever would transcend that which would be anything anyone would expect-that people would see that Christ really is my Lord and Saviour and that I'm nothing but better off because of it. I want the message of the Gospel to be preached through my life, not just by my words-and I want to shine the light of Christ before my family and my friends.

P: Heavenly Father, I thank you for this day. You have made life so awesome lately and I wonder to myself why I wouldn't want to praise You or even dive right back into Your arms. So, I'm sorry for my callousness-it's not as if there's been a deep revelation or deep-seated conviction that's been going on-but just the fact that I know I have a responsibility and know enough to have myself judged. Bottom line, I know better and I'm sorry for my indifference and lack of diligent disciplines. I pray for that deep, radical change-because I know that the light is pretty dim at the moment, but I certainly don't want to act like the salt is no longer salty or put Christ underneath a basket-no, please teach me Father to chase after Your Son and to spur me on towards action. Teach me to apply the very things I'm setting out to teach. In Christ, amen.

Soli Deo Gloria