Church Conference: Matthew 5:13-20
Nov 13, 2011
During my Junior year in college I was a Junior Advisor to freshmen students who lived on the same dormitory floor where I lived. I also loved popcorn. It wasn't part of the training manual for being a Junior Advisor but I kept an oil popper from home with me throughout college. I also liked to be generous with the salt. (I still am.)
On Sunday evenings and often on week nights too I would fire up the popper and within a few minutes the aroma would be wafting down the hall. You can imagine what was coming. Before long others literally began to pop in. Over time this became such a routine that I would end up with a room full of people. It wasn't just freshmen either but upperclassmen too. If one batch ran I popped another. And kept on popping until no one was hungry.
Naturally as we munched we talked a lot. The problems of life and how to solve them. Politics. Sports – who was the best team? The latest national and world news. Campus news. Religion. Personal problems. It was very informal. Some wouldn't say much, but they stayed to listen and munch.
We were all different. Black and white, working class and private prep schools. I was the only one from a farm background. There were Jewish, Christian and others you might call resident aliens. I wasn't sure what they were. We were all different, but we all loved popcorn and talking. It was a bonding moment. I remember that year fondly. Serving as a Junior Advisor was a great experience personally. I can almost taste that popcorn now.
Since I have all of you savoring it too this evening, I want to offer some to all of you. Will the ushers come. Just to be safe, one box is salted and the other not. If you don't want any that's okay.
Sharing salt together around a bowl of popcorn in a college dorm comes so naturally. But for some reason things become a lot more complicated when we move out of a dorm into life at large. Our neighbor then becomes the people who live on the street where we live, or the next street over, or in another part of town or the next town over or half way around the world. Suddenly loving our neighbors and sharing the salt of Christ becomes more complex and even controversial. But it really shouldn't be. For followers who love Jesus sharing his salt should come naturally too. It's our DNA. Its what people do when they put on Jesus as their Lord and Savior. This is who we are.
Naturally then in the Sermon on the Mount Jesus calls his disciples the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Now I know that talking about salt as a good thing seems strangely out of place in our world. We know salt has negative effects on maintaining a healthy heart when we overdo it while watching TV or eating dinner. But in the right amount salt is good for our health.
Jesus is not referring to dieting in the Sermon on the Mount. Instead salt and light are metaphors to describe the nature of a true disciple. To appreciate what he says about 'the salt of the earth' we need to forget the negatives (for a moment) and focus on the good qualities of salt which were and are considerable.
In the OT salt was considered a valuable commodity to be sacrificed to the Lord along with grain offerings and animal sacrifices. It was a sign of loyalty and fidelity to God. Sharing salt with others came represent sharing food together. It connoted the value of binding relationships. This suggests that building relationships on love and mutual respect is a high priority for disciples of Jesus.
Gargling with salt water helps heal gums and tooth aches. Jesus was a healer too. As disciples we are to be healers caring for the sick and those broken in body and spirit. By teaching and modeling God's love and grace we help bring about reconciliation in broken relationships and establish new ones.
As seasoning we know salt is a small thing that melts away in our food to make it taste better. This is suggestive of disciples who melt away in and of themselves in order to flavor the greater human community around them. Sharing our salt is not about promoting ourselves or our church. It's about promoting God and God's purpose for life and for the world at large.
Most importantly, the use of salt as a preservative for food had a profound impact on human history. One commentator writes that "salt's ability to preserve food was one of the foundations of civilization itself because it eliminated human dependence on the seasonal availability of food." This set people free to travel greater distances from home. It made colder climates like our own more habitable. It was a stimulus to commerce and trade. It freed people to spend more time on other things than just daily hunting and gathering. Salt was like a currency. It is said that in the ancient world more wars were fought over salt than over gold. Salt literally made a lot of other things possible.
And so Jesus says to his followers that they are the salt of the earth. Today sharing the salt of Christ represents vital churches that stretch themselves beyond their comfort zones into what Bishop Schnase calls 'risk taking mission and service." This is one of the five practices of fruitful congregations he identifies in his book by that name. Saltiness broadens our horizon as disciples because it brings us into contact with people we would normally not connect with except for the sake of Jesus.
31 Do to others as you would have them do to you. 32 "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. 33 If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. 34 If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35 But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. 36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. 37 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven; (Lk 6)
Salty Churches by their spiritual nature dare to cross boundaries of race, economic status, political stripe, life style, culture and even religion to form relationships as part of a larger family. This means that salty churches are not afraid to connect with people who are unlike themselves. Instead they accept diversity as a given. They can count on it and they grow because of it.
Jesus said: "Where 2 or 3 are gathered together, there you will have2- 3 opinions." That's not exactly what he said. What he said was that he would be there in the midst of them. And this is good news that Jesus is always with us together because wherever there are divisions, wherever people are different, Jesus is there as the peacemaker. He's there to remind us that there's something greater and more important than getting our way or getting everyone to go along with our opinions. And that greater something is love, agape love, unconditional love. This is the salt that binds us together and makes a lot of other good things possible in our churches, our communities and all around the world.
Today we live in a time where diversity has become an excuse for argument, competition and strife. At no other time in history is the salt of Christ and salty churches needed more than right now. There is no greater need than for churches to be engaged in 'risk taking missions and service.' As United Methodists we have a wonderful heritage to support us. John Wesley's instructions to his followers about differences was this: 'In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. But in all things charity.' Love was the most important thing.
And so today when I smell popcorn I think of the aroma of Christ that is wafting out of our churches and down the hallways of our streets and neighborhoods. I think of the three questions that Adam Hamilton says every church needs to answer for itself. Hamilton is Pastor of the fastest growing UM church in America, Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas and he writes that vital churches need to answer these fundamental questions in planning for reaching people for Christ: 1) "Why do people need Christ?" 2) "Why do they need the church?" And 3) "why do they need your particular congregation?" What do you and I receive from our community of faith that we would want others to find here too?
He cites statistics that 40-60% of people in a typical community have no church relationship. "We have no reluctance telling others where we get our hair done, where we get our car fixed, where we like to eat. And so why not share where we get our orientation, support and purpose in life from? We don't have to give people answers. Just invite them, welcome them and they will find the answers on their own."
Sharing the salt of Christ doesn't have to follow the same pattern as in a college dorm, but it does have much in common. A vital church should always be cooking something in its house that sends a pleasing smell out into the community and grabs attention. A vital congregation is also one that reaches out and invites people. It also dares to take some of what its cooking out into the streets and share it rather than just sitting back and waiting for the aroma to bring others on its own. Fruitful churches also share the salt of Christ with their giving and their prayers and their service. They go beyond the dormitory of their own street and town and connect with places and people they cannot reach or touch on our own.
[Group Work Camp – 2013] Sherman UMC has commited to sponsor a Work Group Camp in the Sherman-Williamsville area in 2013. Group Work Camps are part of Group Publishing. They conduct camps for youth both in America and overseas during the summer. Our church has attended several of these the last few years – in Georgia, Ohio, New York, and New Mexico.
Each camp gathers about 400 youth together for a week and sends them out each day to work on home projects of needy residents. Painting, carpenter projects, cleaning, landscaping, roofing. The campers are housed in a local school building for the week.
This is what our church is wanting to do here locally in 2013 if we get approval on where to house the campers. After this approval we will need to start organizing 75 specific projects in the area which is why we will likely be contacting area churches to help find those who have homes in need of repair and refurbishment that they cannot afford and do on their own. This is a wonderful way to share the salt of Christ outside the walls of our church buildings. Stay tuned.
One thing I learned in college is that when you have something that tastes good people will come. The church of Jesus Christ has the best taste of all to share that will make people better persons, our towns better and the world better. And because of this you never know who will show up. Some will already be Christian, some may come from other church traditions, cultures, life styles and some will be like resident aliens with their own unique religious style and perspective. God bless them.
Salty churches draw many kinds of people together and do not judge who is acceptable and who is not. Because the goal is not about cloning everyone to be same, but to grow disciples in the image of Jesus so that everyone is filled with life in his name and built on his foundation of mutual respect and love.
Sharing our salt, letting our light shine makes a lot of other things, good things possible. The darkness of sin and death are overcome. Life is not a dead end, but a hope filled future. Give the glory to God, Jesus says. And so 'go and share your salt and your light and don't apologize because this is who we are as followers of Jesus Christ.