The Gospel of Matthew 5:13-16 „You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be made salty? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by people. You are the light of the world: a city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand; and it gives light to all who are in the house. Likewise let your light shine before people, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”
Greetings, dear congregation and honored guests!
It is a true joy for me to greet you on this day so significant to me. I thank God, the congregation and the church for the office of pastor entrusted to me, and I rely on God’s help and yours in fulfilling it to the best of my conscience, as a blessing to people and for the glory of God.
It is fitting that today’s reading is a very beautiful and inspiring text from Jesus Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, which we heard a moment ago.
Christ says – you are the salt of the earth. What does that mean? How are we to understand it? What does salt do? The first things that come to mind when reflecting on the properties of salt are that it cleanses, gives flavor, and preserves, conserves.
This means that, as the salt of the earth, we have the task of giving flavor to this life, perhaps even of determining the flavor of this life! The presence of salt in food also enhances all the other flavors – thus making the whole affair considerably more interesting.
Then, as the salt of the earth, we must cleanse this world – of bad thoughts, words and deeds. Beginning each one with ourselves, through our changed thinking and acting, influencing the people around us, and so on, until everything is clean and pleasing to God. And through this we must take part in God’s plan of salvation.
And the third – preservation – through our actions we must take part in preserving the Earth; we must act consciously to maintain the health of our planet and ensure its sustainability.
If we do not do this, we will be useless salt – we will be thrown out together with the filth and the refuse. There will be no place for us in the clean, new, interesting world.
It should be noted that Christ in no way associates Himself with salt. Therefore it is our duty, one that we must fulfill – to care for our environment and our planet.
Christ says – you are the light of the world. In the Gospel of John He says: „I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
And in today’s text from the Gospel of Matthew we receive His further commission: „You are the light of the world. [..] Let your light shine before people, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”
Christ is the light. For us to become light, we must be united with Christ. One could say that each of us is like a light bulb with its own particular potential, but we can only shine when Christ’s love flows through us. And this light of love is the only criterion of our worth. Unfortunately, we often begin to judge ourselves and others by looking at the lampshade each of us has been given. They are many and varied, in fact different for each, one more functional, another more ornate, one with a skirt, another with trousers, but the intensity of the emitted light does not depend on the lampshade. And neither does where we have been placed to give light determine our worth in God’s eyes.
Light and love are needed everywhere – in the church, in parliament, in school, in the shop, in the barn, in the boiler room.
Christ’s light of love is for us at once a gift and at once a task. No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket, but on a lampstand. So we too, having received Christ’s light, must not hide, but our task is to carry it onward – as warm, bright, radiant love.
When we draw near to Christ’s light, then much becomes visible. And not always only the good. And God knows us; it is not in vain that we have been given the sacrament of Baptism, in which we have the opportunity to wash away all this filth in God’s grace.
It is held that this is a time of awakening, a new dawn: in its rays we see that the old way no longer serves – neither us personally, nor our country, nor the world. Perhaps the church as well. But how to do everything anew, with Christ’s light, we do not yet clearly know. That is why this is a time to think and dream about it. So that with our thoughts and strength we may take part in God’s work of creation. We must realize what a great responsibility this is. The future depends on the good thoughts and good deeds of each of us.
The human being is between heaven and earth. The human being unites heaven and earth within: our spirit is God’s spirit, our flesh is part of the earth; this we know both from the creation story and from other verses of the Bible, for example in Chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes: „..the dust returns to the earth from which it came, and the spirit to God who gave it.”
It depends on us how we see ourselves, and from that follows how we act. Do we see ourselves as physical beings who occasionally experience a spiritual revelation, or as spiritual beings who live out and savor an earthly experience? Where do we place the emphasis, and what is our priority?
If our connection with Christ – through the reading of God’s Word, through prayers, meditations and contemplation, through the sacraments, through the experience of congregational fellowship – is close enough, if we yield to the guidance of the Spirit, then we incline to perceive ourselves as spiritual beings. For spiritual beings it would be self-evident that we are here to make this life, this experience, this environment better. And not only for ourselves, but for everyone, for each one – and all of this for the glory of God.
Let our light shine before people, so that they may see our good works and glorify our Father who is in heaven!
pastor Ieva Puriņa,
on the day of her ordination, 9 February 2014
photo on the left: Matthew Dent “Pictures of the day: 18 November 2011“, Telegrapgh.co.uk