Be the Salt and Light of the World

Matthew 5:13-20

Grace and peace to you from God the Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Jesus said it: “You folks are the very salt of the earth!” and “You folks are the very light of the world!”[1]

Jesus isn’t commanding us to “become” like salt, nor is he asking us to “work harder” to shine like the star pupil in a classroom. Jesus plain out tells us we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.

This emphatic proclamation follows directly on from last week’s encounter with Jesus’s beatitudes – his blessings- where we learned that God’s real presence meets us in profound spiritual and moral crises with comfort, mercy, justice and by naming all of humanity as beloved children of God.

The things we are called – salt and light - are ubiquitously useful things. Salt’s usefulness spans the globe. It’s found in every pantry and has been in those pantries as far back as human memory and tradition can go. It’s both a preservative and a flavor enhancer.

Light, too, is a ubiquitous and highly useful thing. It’s how we see. It gives color to objects. For every sighted creature on earth, light is what makes it possible for the eyes to function. Some creatures are gifted with the ability to see in low light, and others (like us humans) can only see in bright light situations. But there always needs to be some light for sight.

Jesus tells us today, that due to our blessed nature, we have become like these useful things. Indeed, we have become not only useful, but essential to the world as it is promised to us when God’s Kingdom comes.

There’s something essential about us blessed people and I came up with a short story to try to illustrate it. This story is from my imagination; however, details of it may ring true to many of you.

Imagine a community kitchen in a church basement. Let’s say this community kitchen is open every Friday night. When this kitchen first opened many years ago, it was intended to serve a balanced but simple soup supper once a week to those in need in the neighborhood.

The meals were well received by the clients who came to eat. And over the course of several years, something unexpected started to happen.

The food started to taste better and better.

One Friday evening, during clean-up, one of the volunteers said that his meal that evening was one of the best tasting, most filling meals he’d had in a long time. And his comment kicked off a good conversation in the room as people pondered what they did that evening to make that meal particularly tasty.

But they reflected, not much happened differently that evening. They served a classic soup supper, with some home-baked bread and a fresh salad. No new ingredients were introduced and it’s not like they had a Michelin starred chef come to cook. It was the typical cooking team that’s there each week.

So, why did it all taste so darn good and why did he leave feeling so filled?

One of the volunteers, who got to know the soup kitchen because he was a regular client and is now a regular volunteer, spoke up as he started cleaning the coffee cart.

He said, “You know, I’m not sure it’s the food that has changed taste. We can’t even think of anything special we put into the soup tonight. I think it’s the community. The chefs, the greeters, the servers and the clean-up crew, and our community of volunteers is made up of people from all over and includes people who are regular clients working side-by-side to prepare a meal to share together each week.

We’ve come to know each other, we ask questions about grandmas, and children. We forgive each other and don’t let people’s mistakes or histories define our relationships. We exchange Christmas cards, and we remember little things about each other like who likes a dash of cream and sugar in their coffee.”

And at that moment, it was like a warm light shined on the truth for the people to recognize: The meal tasted better and better because the community became the seasoning. The meal was particularly filling because the community was the nutrition. The people became the salt and the light.

This story about the community suppers is like an expression of the world that we people of faith dream about. As I said last week, it’s a world where comfort, mercy, justice and each person is named a child of God. A community like this soup kitchen is lived and experienced slice of that world by everyone. It’s a world that tastes so good and fills everyone up! It’s God’s Kingdom.

Even though this story came from my imagination, I hope it helps to capture the way Christians live together, the way we work together on behalf of other people; the way we talk about each other. It shows the way we relate to the not always friendly surrounding world. It shows a little bit how we Christians can catch the world’s attention, making the world ask, “what kind of people are these?” or “Who are these people?”

We become the seasoning for the world that makes life taste good and filling. We become the warm light that shines several Holy truths into the world. The truth that all people are beloved by God, which we proclaim in the face of a world that wants us to name enemies and to fight them. The truth that mercy and forgiveness is God’s will proclaimed in the face of a world where punishment is the most typical response. The truth that justice means all people have access to what they need, which is proclaimed in the face of a world where the strongest win and the weakest often lose. The truth that each person is named a child of God and is welcomed into the community with grace and love, which we proclaim in the face of a world that tells us some belong here and others do not.

This is what it means to be salt of the earth and the light of the world. It means that we sprinkle the blessings we have already received from Jesus. We sprinkle the vision for the world that we’ve caught a glimpse of through Jesus’s ministry of healing, mercy, forgiveness and love for people. And we are now called to follow in Jesus’s footsteps and to join with God who is already making this Kingdom real.  

Today, in our worship space, here at St. Matthew, you are invited to come to this font of blessing and to this altar table of abundant life to receive these blessings from Christ anew. Then Jesus himself invites you to go and do something with those blessings, be the salt of the earth, and be the light of the world. Don’t do something to earn more blessings, do something to honor the blessings you have already received.

Go and be merciful. Forgive your enemies. Be comforting. Act for justice. Give generously. Welcome all people. Love as God has loved you.

This glorifies, it honors, the blessing that has been poured out by God for you through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

Go! For you are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.

Thanks be to God.  Amen.

Rev. Ryan | 5th Sunday after Epiphany | February 8, 2026

[1] This translation from Frederick D. Bruner.