Jesus said that we are the salt and light of the world. All his disciples should be people who make a difference in the world. Do we really make the world a better place?
The reading from Isaiah tells us that making a show of our discipleship does not fool God, saying that we are followers is not enough – we have to “Walk the Walk” as well as “Talk the Talk”.
Isaiah told the people that their acts of fasting and wearing sackcloth and ashes to show their humility was useless – God could see inside them and knew what was in their hearts, even if they were fooling other people. God could see that for all the outward show, the people were still leading the same everyday lives, they were behaving as badly as ever. Repentance is about being sorry and CHANGING – not about saying you are sorry and carrying on doing the same. “True fasting” is to love others by doing good to them, to give our time and our actions to help others – when we do this it shows true worship, it shows that we are honouring God’s will with our whole being. When we do this it is what God wants to see, it is then that our light shines out for all to see. We always have to shine from the inside out to let the world know that God lives in us.

If you tell someone that they are “the salt of the earth”, you are giving them a compliment, telling them they are special. In the ancient world, salt was highly valued. It was pure and useful, it was produced by the sea and the sun. Salt is used to add flavour to food, using just the right amount in our cooking, enhances the flavour – as you will know if you have to have a salt-free diet, something I didn’t enjoy – and it needs to be added at the right time. If you sprinkle salt on food after it is cooked it doesn’t have the same effect, it has to be in the food from the start, working away throughout the cooking. It can also be used to preserve things – in days before freezers, I can remember my family salting runner beans to keep them through the winter. Christians should be to life what salt is to food,
we should be working away with everything around us enhancing life for others and preserving the good things and preventing the bad things taking over. We should be making a stand, even when it is hard, having God in our lives should make us sparkle. Sadly many think that following Jesus means that you have to give up everything that is fun – that’s not true, we just need to stick to the things that are good and that don’t cause harm to others but help others.
When the sun shines on salt it makes it sparkle, if we look to Jesus – our Light – he will shine on us and lead us to do the right things and help us to enhance lives and to reflect his love on to others, That is the great thing, as Christians we are not left alone to get on with our lives on our own, Jesus is always there with us, he will always help us if we just ask and then listen to what he tells us.

The light we reflect has a purpose it is to lead others safely and lighten the dark places around us, places where people are struggling and have little hope, so many needing help. Our light can’t stop at our own front door or at the door of the church, the light we reflect from Jesus is intended for the whole world, for all people, starting in our communities and workplaces. Each of us has the opportunity to make life better for others, just where we are if we let God’s love work through us to help those in need.
Let’s make sure that all our thoughts, words and actions show that we are the Salt and Light of the world, we have God in our lives and we want to make a difference, to make things better – Let’s “shine from the inside out so the world can see God lives in me!”

Amen