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Jesus has barely begun His “sermon on the mount”
when we come to these verses in chapter 5. The Beatitudes have hardly had
a chance to get from the eardrum to the brain before Jesus begins to employ
common images from the first century to describe what His disciples in the
world will look like—what impact their lives should and will have. If
you’ve preached for decades or if you’re just starting out, it
doesn’t take long to realize that years, if not more, could be spent
investigating, pondering, and proclaiming messages of meaning and power from
this greatest of sermons.
As I reread these familiar verses, my mind was drawn to several
places in the Gospel of John where Jesus’ life and ministry are portrayed
through utilization of the image of light. John 1 has multiple references
to that end. But I was drawn even more strongly to what Jesus said about himself
using this amazingly powerful metaphor. In John 8:12, Jesus says, “I
am the light of the world.” This is the second time in John that Jesus
has described himself with a sentence that begins with the words “I
am.” He does so five more times for a total of seven different occasions.
“Light” is also used as a way to describe God in 1 John. First
John 1:5 says, “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”
Isn’t it interesting and ripe for sermonic exploration
that Jesus uses this image to describe His disciples, one of the key images
for describing himself and also used to describe God? What an amazing and
humbling thought! There is clearly great responsibility and privilege in that
declaration by Christ.
It is hard for me to read the second half of verse 14 without
remembering the comparison former president Ronald Reagan made in a speech
between a “city on a hill” and the role of the United States in
the world. The late president was an accomplished politician, but he was no
biblical scholar. The “you” of verse 14a determines the meaning
of “city,” and clearly it is not a geopolitical state 20 centuries
removed from the sermon. As I tried to listen to the text, these were some
of the competing thoughts and voices. These “distractions” can
sometimes parallel the thoughts of your people and can occasionally become
fodder for preaching.
Verse 15, with its very practical conclusions regarding ways
to minimize or maximize the value of illumination, is easily brought forward
to our time. Anyone who has suffered through nighttime power outages as a
result of lightning storms, tornadoes, or hurricanes (our preferred method
in Florida) can readily relate to the gift light can be and the value of what
it provides.
The key, I think, to verse 16 is to read and preach all the
way to the end of the verse. Letting our light shine is important. Letting
it shine before others is important. Others seeing our good deeds, according
to Jesus, is necessary. But the ultimate goal is that others will turn to
praise the Father. Anything short of that would be a journey that fails to
reach its destination. It would be like heading for New York City to see the
sights and stopping short of the goal in Trenton, New Jersey. So, preach all
the way to intended purpose: the honor, glory, and praise of God by His creatures.
For some, the need is genuinely to embrace the biblical revelation
that God wants to use frail, fault-riddled human beings like you and me to
reach the world with the gospel. It’s hard to see, but we also know
God’s ways are not our ways. Us, the light of the world? How could this
be? We may need to remind our people and ourselves that we wouldn’t
have sent a kid to fight a giant, nor would we have picked a stuttering fugitive
to deliver hordes of people from bondage to Pharaoh. Any number of additional
examples could be provided, but the idea is clear: this is the way God does
things regardless of whether they seem sensible to us or not.
Another need the text addresses is the idea as to whether good
deeds have any value in and of themselves. Are good deeds good simply because
they’re good? Or, are good deeds good because they have a purpose beyond
the action itself? Jesus offers a longer-range view beyond the moment of service
or compassion or sacrifice. Jesus turns our eyes (and presumably our hands
and feet) toward the Father, whose light we have the privilege to reflect.
These verses are really about the living, indwelling, empowering
presence of God finding visible, tangible, effective expression through the
lives of His followers. God’s answer for the cares and needs of our
world is for us to be His representatives and ambassadors, offering help and
love in the name of Jesus. The purpose of light is not to draw attention to
itself. If you’ve ever looked directly into the sun, or into the end
of a flashlight for that matter, light’s usefulness can be quickly forfeited.
Light’s value is in its illumination of other things. In this case,
illumination of the greatness, love, self-giving, and praiseworthiness of
God is the goal.
Clearly, we can reflect the “light” powerfully and
attractively in our world or we can shelter it in safe places. The problem
with a lamp under a bowl is more than simply the loss of light; once the burning
lamp has consumed all the available oxygen under the bowl, the lamp is extinguished.
It ceases to function. Although requiring translation into our electricity-based
culture, this concept may be profitably and persuasively declared to folks
who are tempted to pack it in, disengage, and shield themselves from an increasingly
hostile and anti-Christian environment. The answer is not to pack it in but
to “power it up” ever brighter—not by our own might or resources
but by the Spirit.
(For the full manuscript
of this sermon go to www.preachersmagazine.org and click on “Sermons.”)
One way to get into the text (particularly v. 15) may be to
pay attention as you’re preparing to current activities by individuals
that don’t seem to make much sense. Examples and stories are never hard
to find. A quick glance through the newspaper or a few minutes viewing one
of the news channels should provide ready material. As I write this piece,
a semifamous illusionist submerged himself in a fishbowl for seven days in
New York City and tried to hold his breath for nine minutes. Tomorrow there
will be something else somewhere else. In February of 2007, there will be
different characters, but the same kind of silliness is on par with lighting
a lamp and putting it under a bowl.
Another way of approaching the text would be to track the “city
on a hill” imagery utilized in writings and speeches related to the
history of the United States. Access to a search engine should provide plenty
of fodder for sermonizing.
The idea of good deeds could be explored with a view toward whether they should be seen by others or whether the right hand shouldn’t know what the left hand is doing. How do you make sense of these two biblical ideas? Are they compatible? Should they be harmonized or allowed to critique one another? These are thoughts and conversations taking place in the study that would be of interest in the pulpit, if we share not only the conclusions, but the struggle as well.