[Epiphany 5 & 6] salt and light, just as we are

You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Parent in heaven.

Matthew 5:13-16 (NRSV, alt.)

In Jeff's sermon, he talked about how he's heard from a lot of newbies that they feel like other folks in the congregation have it all together, etc. -- but this passage is part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and Jesus said to EVERYONE on that mountain, "YOU are the salt and the light of the world," so it seems legitimate to extrapolate to us all as well.

Nadia Bolz-Weber made a similar point in her sermon on this text.

Like Jeff, she talked about how this pericope follows immediately after the Beatitudes (which we heard Sunday morning on retreat -- I'd considered doing a separate blogpost for that, but hey, we get to talk about it here anyway!).

She says:

it's so easy for us to default to hearing Jesus' sermon on the mount as pure exhortation. As though he is giving us a list of things we should try and be so we can be blessed – be meeker, be poorer, and mournier a little more and you will meet the conditions of earning Jesus' blessing. But the thing is, it's hard to imagine Jesus exhorting a crowd of demoniacs and epileptics to be meeker. He wasn't telling them what to try and become. He was telling them you are blessed and you are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. This was his special class of people to whom he preached.

I mean, perhaps there were people in the crowd who totally had their crap together. People who had solid relationships and had paid off their student loans and always backed up their hard drives. People who had nothing they felt shame about and who didn't have terrible secrets and knew exactly what they were doing. Of course that is possible those people were in the crowd, it's just, that's not who we are told were coming to Jesus.

The ones we are told were coming to Jesus, the ones presumably to whom he was preaching, were described as the sick, those who were in pain, who fought with demons, who were broken and addicted and late on their back taxes. Who has more than one ex-wife, and who watch too much Netflix and think that maybe a little heroin might be a good idea. In other words, they were people standing in the need of God. And standing in the need of God is standing in the way of blessedness in a way that having it all together never is.

Yesterday at my office hours someone talked about how they had given up on church because church seemed to be a place that only well people went. People who were doing just great and totally had it all together. And if that is not who you are then you just pretend for as long as you can.

What's weird about that is that it's clearly not who came to Jesus when Jesus was walking the earth. It's just who we at some point decided Jesus wanted us to be after he'd left.

These people, the wretched ones left behind in the last verses of chapter 4, they follow Jesus, in a way that the least, the last, the lost and the lonely have followed him ever since, and to them he gives a blessing. The poor, those who mourn and are meek. Jesus gives them a blessing. You are blessed. He says, And then right after that, he says that they are salt and light.

To the broken and hurting he gives a blessing and then he says that they are of the Earth, that they are earth and breath of God. Like in Genesis 2:7 God breathed into the dust of the Earth and created humanity. To the flawed and sick and crippled he says Your bodies are created wonders filled with light. The salt in your tears and in your sweat is a reminder that you were created from dust and the very breath of God.

I thought that to be the light of the world, to let your light so shine before men, you have to be whole, be strong, be perfect. That special class of people I'll never belong to.

But perhaps this is when we best listen to the words of the prophet Leonard Cohen "ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfect offering.

There's a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." In other words, It is exactly at our points of weakness, of pain, of brokenness, of insufficiency that force us, like those who originally followed Jesus, to stand in the need of God. To stand in the need of the true light.

So perhaps those cracks…made from bad choices, from anxiety and depression, from addiction, from struggle and remorse. Maybe those cracks are what lets the light of God's love in.

And maybe those same cracks also how the light gets out.

We perhaps should not miss the fact that Jesus does not say "here are the conditions you must meet to be the salt of the Earth." He does not say here are the standards of wholeness you must fulfill in order to be light for the world. He looks out into the crowd of people in pain, people who have been broken open – those cracks that let in and let out the Light, who have the salt of sweat and tears on their broken bodies, and says you ARE salt. You. You are light. You have that of God within you the God whose light scatters the darkness. Your imperfect and beautiful bodies are made of chemicals with holiness shining in it…you are made of dust and the very breath of God.

In other words, you are a broken jerk and Jesus trusts you. Don't wait until you feel as though you have met the conditions of being holy. Trust that Jesus knows what he is doing. And that you already are salt and light and love and grace. Don't try and be it. Know that you already are. And then, for the love of God, take that seriously. The world needs it.

I really don't have a lot to add to Nadia's words (and I'm aware that I stole at length).

We often talk about striving/being inspired to change our behaviors, but the good news is that God loves us just as we are (and as we are becoming).

Our very selves are a blessing.

When Val Tutson preached here, she said that she once asked her mother why she hadn't been at the March on Washington, and her mother (a white woman who had married a black man in 1963 -- when interracial marriage was still illegal in 17 of our United States) said: "We were marching every day of our lives, just trying to be family."

Just living into the authenticity of who we are can be a radical act, providing salt and light to others, and helping to build God's kin-dom.

Val said that when we elevate one single person (e.g., Martin Luther King, Jr., or Nelson Mandela) as THE light, we don't have to think about our own light or saltiness. But we ARE the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Jesus reminds us to let our light shine before others, to not let our salt lose its saltiness.

Jeff said that even if we don't feel like THE salt and THE light, we can do bright and salty things (fake it until you make it). And I would add that softer lights, lighter seasonings of salt, are sometimes what's called for -- just because we are not doing big unmistakable things doesn't mean we aren't doing exactly what God is calling us to do.

In the Prayers of the People the Sunday that Val was here, Molly said that when the light fills the whole house, it spills out into the streets.

It has been said that church is not a museum for saints but a hospital for sinners. And one of the functions of church is to bind up our brokenness, to fill us up when we felt empty and wanting. So maybe you don't feel very bright or salty in this moment, but you can bring yourself back into community and be filled up.

And yet I keep coming back to Nadia's point -- that the broken people Jesus was addressing were salt and light just as they were. Yes, the passage ends with an explanatory bit about people praising God on account of your good works -- and I'm not a scholar to speak to how likely that bit is to be a later interpolation -- but certainly there was a huge crowd listening to Jesus, and there is no indication that Jesus was being selective in these "you" statements.

What does it mean for us to be salt and light just as we are?

What do you think, Beloved?

Or perhaps you'd rather talk about some other aspect of the passage altogether.

As always, you're welcome to comment anonymously/pseudonymously if you prefer.