WEBVTT 00:00:00.239 --> 00:00:03.279 For the next season, we'll be making our way through the Sermon on the Mount. 00:00:03.439 --> 00:00:06.000 The Sermon on the Mount is the core of Jesus' teaching. 00:00:06.160 --> 00:00:17.679 We went through the Beatitudes this summer, those nine Beatitudes, and then we took a break the last two weeks as we had our last week at Walker School and our first week here at our new building. 00:00:17.760 --> 00:00:20.079 And now we'll be going through the rest of the Sermon on the Mount. 00:00:20.160 --> 00:00:25.440 So we'll be in the Sermon on the Mount, this core of Jesus' teaching for the next few months. 00:00:25.760 --> 00:00:30.320 And then we get this teaching here that Jesus says that you are salt and you are light. 00:00:30.559 --> 00:00:35.200 So we know light illuminates and salt preserves. 00:00:35.359 --> 00:00:38.079 That's the historic use of salt as a preservation. 00:00:38.159 --> 00:00:57.759 So what he's saying here is he's saying that you are the illumination by which the world comes to seed, that you are the preservation by which people's hearts come alive, that their wounds and their issues and the sin and the world, that you're the illumination by which they see this. 00:00:58.159 --> 00:01:04.000 And out of that, that you're the preservation by which their hearts come alive to him. 00:01:04.239 --> 00:01:08.560 And he's using emphatic language, I mean, really emphatic, motivating language. 00:01:08.719 --> 00:01:11.359 He's saying, you are this, you are this, you are this. 00:01:11.599 --> 00:01:12.319 Be this. 00:01:12.560 --> 00:01:13.359 You should do this. 00:01:13.439 --> 00:01:14.560 Your life should look like this. 00:01:14.719 --> 00:01:15.840 How can you not be this? 00:01:16.000 --> 00:01:19.040 He's being very emphatic, and it's quite a calling, right? 00:01:19.200 --> 00:01:22.400 I mean, especially when you're just trying to get through the day. 00:01:22.640 --> 00:01:32.079 I mean, when you're just trying to get through the school assignments you have, or trying to get a date, or just trying to, you know, you just to get a shower while you're caring for your kids. 00:01:32.159 --> 00:01:33.359 Like I took a shower today. 00:01:33.439 --> 00:01:35.359 That's a big deal for some of you this week. 00:01:35.519 --> 00:01:37.760 Because you got a shower every day of the week. 00:01:37.920 --> 00:01:41.200 And you know that if you're a stay-at-home mom, taking a shower can be a huge deal. 00:01:41.359 --> 00:01:42.719 The rest of you don't even know what I'm talking about. 00:01:42.799 --> 00:01:43.840 You'll get there. 00:01:44.239 --> 00:01:44.959 You'll get there. 00:01:45.040 --> 00:01:47.040 It can be a big deal. 00:01:47.760 --> 00:01:53.040 And so some of it, we're just trying to get through the day to keep the job or to find a job you're gonna like. 00:01:53.120 --> 00:01:59.599 And I'm supposed to be light and salt, and it can feel, it can just feel like quite, quite a calling. 00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:09.199 It's not the only place that we get a very clear sense of Jesus' calling on our life, of what we should be like as Christians, if you call yourself a Christian, what your life should be like. 00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:16.400 And maybe you're here and you're not a Christian, and you I think you'll even appreciate the calling Jesus gives to his followers. 00:02:16.719 --> 00:02:20.319 A guy comes up to Jesus in Matthew 22 and he says, Hey, what's the greatest commandment? 00:02:20.400 --> 00:02:22.800 So he's basically saying, like, what should my life be about? 00:02:22.960 --> 00:02:24.639 Just tell me what my life should be about. 00:02:24.800 --> 00:02:31.120 And he replies in verse 37, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul with all your mind. 00:02:31.280 --> 00:02:38.240 This is the great and first commandment, and the second is like it love your neighbor as yourself. 00:02:38.479 --> 00:02:40.000 So the calling is to love. 00:02:40.159 --> 00:02:48.560 That light and salt is about love, and it's about creating good works, that the good works shall lead people to God Himself, right? 00:02:48.719 --> 00:02:56.080 That we're the illumination by which people come to see, the preservation by which their hearts come alive. 00:02:56.240 --> 00:02:58.800 And so we have to ask, how does this happen? 00:02:58.960 --> 00:03:00.000 How does this work? 00:03:00.159 --> 00:03:06.240 How does this work in my life when I'm just trying to get by with all of my insecurity and all my anxiety? 00:03:06.400 --> 00:03:07.520 How does that work? 00:03:07.680 --> 00:03:09.039 What is this good work? 00:03:09.199 --> 00:03:13.360 Is this a fully put-together person that then is light and salt? 00:03:13.439 --> 00:03:14.240 Is that what this is? 00:03:14.319 --> 00:03:18.719 Is that that person, or is this possibly, possibly me? 00:03:19.120 --> 00:03:22.000 Well, the disciples don't look like fully put together people. 00:03:22.240 --> 00:03:26.960 Paul, who wrote most of the New Testament, he didn't look like a fully put-together person. 00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:31.280 I know most of you, y'all don't look like fully put together people. 00:03:31.439 --> 00:03:36.400 I know me, I'm not a fully put-together person, so it has to mean something else. 00:03:36.639 --> 00:03:42.479 So, songwriter novelist Leonard Cohen, he wrote this ring the bells that still can ring. 00:03:42.639 --> 00:03:44.960 Forget your perfect offering. 00:03:45.199 --> 00:03:47.840 There is a crack in everything. 00:03:48.080 --> 00:03:51.759 That's how the light gets in. 00:03:53.680 --> 00:03:57.439 Have you ever felt like you can't show the real you? 00:03:58.319 --> 00:04:01.599 You got all these cracks, and so what you do is you you cut you cover that. 00:04:01.919 --> 00:04:09.520 And maybe you call these cracks shame, and the Bible calls it sin, and out of that there's shame all mixed into that, and so we we cover it. 00:04:09.680 --> 00:04:14.400 Have you ever felt like you could never pull back that covering? 00:04:14.560 --> 00:04:15.759 But but what if? 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:20.720 What if the cracks were so busy hiding? 00:04:21.279 --> 00:04:25.600 What if that's actually the way that the light gets in? 00:04:25.680 --> 00:04:29.759 And what if that's actually the way that the light gets out? 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:34.160 So back in the spring, my girls were so excited for spring break, right? 00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:38.240 I mean, it's been all winter and no swimming for months. 00:04:38.399 --> 00:04:40.399 This is you know, huge deal in kid world. 00:04:40.480 --> 00:04:42.240 I mean, it's been months and months and months with no swimming. 00:04:42.319 --> 00:04:52.639 So spring break's coming up, and this is swimming week coming up, and so the weeks leading up to it, just more and more excitement about being able to swim because it's been months since they've last swam. 00:04:52.800 --> 00:05:11.920 And so I come back into the week, you know, the next week we're headed into spring break, and it's middle of the week, end of the week, and I get home, and I'm expecting what I want to be the ideal evening, which means you know, you have some dinner, clean up, a little dance party, bath time, books, bed, just kind of the normal rhythm. 00:05:12.079 --> 00:05:23.120 But I come home and my little four-year-old at the time, she's curled up in the chair, and she is worn out, white-faced, crying, ice on her elbow. 00:05:23.360 --> 00:05:33.279 And so Christy takes her to urgent care that night, and we end up, she ends up in a nice hot pink cast just in time for a week of swimming. 00:05:33.600 --> 00:05:35.519 This is not ideal. 00:05:35.680 --> 00:05:39.680 This is not ideal for her, it is not ideal for parents, right? 00:05:39.759 --> 00:05:45.439 This is not ideal for one of your kids to be in a hot pink cast in time for a week of swimming. 00:05:45.680 --> 00:05:47.519 The ideal is gone. 00:05:47.759 --> 00:05:50.480 All that's left is the actual. 00:05:50.800 --> 00:05:53.839 See, there's always a difference between the ideal and the actual. 00:05:53.920 --> 00:06:04.000 You know what I'm talking about because you bidd and won on that leather jacket off eBay, and you're so excited, and it showed up and it felt like a brown tarp. 00:06:04.319 --> 00:06:05.680 You know what I'm talking about. 00:06:05.839 --> 00:06:10.959 You bought something, you bid it, you got it, it came, and it was not what you thought. 00:06:11.120 --> 00:06:14.560 It was it was the actual, it wasn't the ideal. 00:06:14.720 --> 00:06:16.399 And we know this from experience. 00:06:16.560 --> 00:06:22.560 We we know it because there's a difference in us between ideal and actual. 00:06:23.040 --> 00:06:36.480 So in the world of psychology, this is called the self-discrepancy theory, that there's a discrepancy between our actual self and our ideal self, and that this difference creates emotional discomfort. 00:06:36.879 --> 00:06:40.959 Anybody feel the emotional discomfort? 00:06:41.759 --> 00:06:46.399 So, my ideal self, I'm very broad-shouldered in my ideal self. 00:06:47.199 --> 00:06:54.160 And I can grow a really nice salt and pepper beard that I can keep well manicured and it's full and it looks good, and I don't get headaches. 00:06:54.399 --> 00:06:56.959 I always feel good in my ideal self. 00:06:57.120 --> 00:06:59.439 I'm independently wealthy in my ideal self. 00:06:59.600 --> 00:07:05.360 I have a four-car garage instead of a two-car garage, as two's not enough, and apparently four in my mind will be enough. 00:07:05.600 --> 00:07:11.680 I never get impatient with my wife or my kids in my ideal self. 00:07:11.759 --> 00:07:13.199 And I'm not selfish either. 00:07:13.279 --> 00:07:17.040 I'm independently wealthy, but I'm incredibly generous in my ideal self. 00:07:18.240 --> 00:07:19.920 In my ideal self, I don't like sugar. 00:07:20.000 --> 00:07:20.720 I don't even want it. 00:07:20.879 --> 00:07:21.920 I don't even care. 00:07:22.800 --> 00:07:31.120 I like carrots and hummus, and I'm very happy with that in my ideal self, and I can build things, and I pray, and things happen. 00:07:31.439 --> 00:07:33.439 They just happen like all the time. 00:07:33.839 --> 00:07:35.040 And all this is great. 00:07:35.120 --> 00:07:36.800 Like I that's what I would want. 00:07:37.360 --> 00:07:38.720 That's the ideal. 00:07:39.120 --> 00:07:40.560 That's the ideal. 00:07:41.279 --> 00:07:46.079 And we want the ideal, and we see the ideal, and we know it's out there, and it can be a good thing. 00:07:46.240 --> 00:07:56.000 The ideal can be a good thing, it can be a godly thing, but it can also crush us because we also have our actual selves. 00:07:56.319 --> 00:07:59.279 And my actual self is a I'm incredibly skinny. 00:07:59.519 --> 00:08:00.240 I have been my whole life. 00:08:00.319 --> 00:08:03.439 I've been waiting to fill out since I was 12. 00:08:05.279 --> 00:08:15.040 And my body feels like I'm nearing 40 because I am nearing 40, and it turns out I'm not perfect, and I'm not able to maintain that. 00:08:15.120 --> 00:08:18.560 And sometimes I don't want the carrots and hummus, and I just want the jar of talenty. 00:08:18.959 --> 00:08:22.319 Anybody just want the jar, the whole jar of talenty? 00:08:22.800 --> 00:08:23.439 Is anybody? 00:08:23.759 --> 00:08:24.399 It's a small jar. 00:08:24.639 --> 00:08:25.839 It's a small jar, thank you. 00:08:25.920 --> 00:08:27.120 Yeah, so that can justify. 00:08:27.279 --> 00:08:28.079 That's your justification. 00:08:28.160 --> 00:08:33.679 Heather gave you justification to get talenty and eat the whole jar of it. 00:08:33.919 --> 00:08:38.320 And I feel insecure at times, I feel doubtful at times, I'm anxious at times. 00:08:38.399 --> 00:08:47.440 And then there's this passage, and this passage doesn't help a lot because historically I have read it as a calling alone. 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:52.080 And with that comes a lot of subjectivity that I should go do this. 00:08:52.320 --> 00:08:56.320 And so comes all this subjectivity and all this sort of like, well, how am I doing? 00:08:56.480 --> 00:08:57.360 Am I light enough? 00:08:57.519 --> 00:08:58.799 Am I being light enough? 00:08:59.039 --> 00:09:01.279 Am I preservative to this world enough? 00:09:01.440 --> 00:09:04.080 And how am I doing in that? 00:09:04.559 --> 00:09:08.320 But the language of this passage is jointly, this is what's so great about it. 00:09:08.559 --> 00:09:13.120 The language in this passage is jointly a calling, but out of a promise. 00:09:13.679 --> 00:09:17.200 See, he's promising that, he's deeming you this. 00:09:17.600 --> 00:09:19.840 You are light. 00:09:21.759 --> 00:09:22.799 You are salt. 00:09:23.120 --> 00:09:24.080 You are this. 00:09:24.320 --> 00:09:32.080 So it's a calling, but it's a calling based in the secure promise of something you have been deemed even before you become it. 00:09:32.879 --> 00:09:38.960 So he's deeming it over us, even though we're still filled with all these cracks in our actual selves. 00:09:39.200 --> 00:09:41.919 Because come to find out, amazing, right? 00:09:42.080 --> 00:09:46.960 Groundbreaking news here, come to find out, the light gets in through the cracks. 00:09:48.799 --> 00:09:50.799 I mean, let's not forget who's listening here. 00:09:50.879 --> 00:09:54.639 I mean, who's listening here in this context is sick hurting people? 00:09:55.600 --> 00:10:00.320 People, some people in this crowd have never cared about religion, and they're coming to hear. 00:10:00.480 --> 00:10:03.759 Some people are so addicted to religious striving. 00:10:04.480 --> 00:10:09.120 And then you have these disciples who just are constantly not quite measuring up. 00:10:09.200 --> 00:10:16.559 And Matthew 15, I love this story because Jesus tells a parable, and his disciples say, Hey, can you explain the parable to us? 00:10:16.720 --> 00:10:21.600 And Jesus responds, and this is in Matthew 15, are you still without understanding? 00:10:21.759 --> 00:10:26.320 And I like some other translations that say, Are you still so dull? 00:10:26.879 --> 00:10:27.279 Right? 00:10:27.519 --> 00:10:32.159 Like I want us to do a retreat, we'll do a student ministry retreat, Rob's gonna do it, and that's the theme verse. 00:10:32.399 --> 00:10:34.399 Are you still so dull? 00:10:34.559 --> 00:10:40.720 And we're gonna make little plates and put it on there, and then you can, you know, put it above your sink, you know, and you're doing dishes. 00:10:40.799 --> 00:10:42.240 Are you still so dull? 00:10:42.399 --> 00:10:44.879 Jesus' words to you, comforting words, right? 00:10:45.039 --> 00:10:47.279 But the answer is yes, yes, I am. 00:10:47.519 --> 00:10:48.879 I am so dull. 00:10:49.120 --> 00:11:01.200 And that's why I need, I need you in your grace to keep speaking, to keep illuminating to me because I'm dull and I don't see things right away. 00:11:03.440 --> 00:11:14.799 And I need the revealing, I need illumination, I need preservation, I need that light, I need that graciously to be coming into me because I am dull, and it takes me a while. 00:11:16.320 --> 00:11:25.440 And then he says, To those people that are so dull, you are the illumination by which the world will come to see. 00:11:26.559 --> 00:11:27.440 So, three points. 00:11:27.600 --> 00:11:32.799 Point number one, this is true about them because this is true about him. 00:11:33.039 --> 00:11:35.600 And I know that rhymed, and I was very proud when I wrote it. 00:11:35.759 --> 00:11:38.320 This is true about them because this is true about him. 00:11:38.559 --> 00:11:42.559 This is true about you because it's true about God. 00:11:44.480 --> 00:11:59.519 You ever been playing hide and seek, and maybe maybe it was this weekend with your kids, or maybe it was 15 years ago, maybe it was 20 years ago, maybe it's 40 years ago when you were a kid and you're playing hide and seek, and you dare to go into the one closet that has the really dark back corner. 00:11:59.679 --> 00:12:09.120 And so you get in there and you pull the door shut and you go all the way back to that back corner, and it's so dark, and then your eyes slowly adjust, and you realize it's not quite so dark in here. 00:12:09.360 --> 00:12:09.759 Right? 00:12:09.840 --> 00:12:16.240 And it's not so dark in there because the light shines in through all those cracks around the door. 00:12:16.480 --> 00:12:16.799 Right? 00:12:17.039 --> 00:12:18.320 Light finds its way in. 00:12:18.480 --> 00:12:20.960 John 8 12, Jesus says, I'm the light of the world. 00:12:21.120 --> 00:12:39.600 See, God, through the work of Jesus, the reside, the residing of the Holy Spirit in you, that is God's light coming in through the cracks to the core of who you are to create security, eternal life, transformation. 00:12:40.080 --> 00:12:45.120 The cracks are the only way in to the core of who you are. 00:12:46.639 --> 00:12:49.519 Point number two is that the cracks receive the light. 00:12:49.759 --> 00:12:57.120 Finally, we can embrace the actual self because we're secure in his work and validation for us. 00:12:57.279 --> 00:13:14.960 Because of the cross, Jesus on the cross takes our sin, our shame, our shortcomings, our actual selves, our cracks, and it gets cast upon him so we don't have to work our way out of our imperfection, and his righteousness gets deemed and put on us even before we are this. 00:13:15.200 --> 00:13:18.480 We are deemed this before God. 00:13:19.120 --> 00:13:20.639 This is the imputation. 00:13:20.799 --> 00:13:29.600 This is what brings us security before God, which means cracked and messy, and though you are a little too much in love with J. 00:13:29.840 --> 00:13:39.679 Crew or whiskey or yourself or people's approval or achievement, you are fully loved in Jesus. 00:13:40.000 --> 00:13:54.639 And you are fully secure before God if you are in Jesus and have received this sacrifice and person of Christ and have placed faith in him and not in your work. 00:13:56.480 --> 00:14:02.240 And that's the way that we can begin, begin to let this grace in through the cracks. 00:14:02.320 --> 00:14:10.399 So that's point number two, the cracks receive the light, and lastly, point number three, the light shines outward through the cracks. 00:14:10.639 --> 00:14:20.639 Our brokenness, those regrets and shame, can actually give grace to other people because finally something is real. 00:14:21.600 --> 00:14:22.960 Something resonates. 00:14:23.120 --> 00:14:28.559 And it's not just Pinterest perfectionistic self in front of them. 00:14:28.639 --> 00:14:32.320 It's not the portrait of the ideal self in front of somebody. 00:14:32.399 --> 00:14:37.840 It's just your actual self where finally, in the actual self, you can talk about God's grace. 00:14:38.720 --> 00:14:54.960 And maybe it's just one crack of the hundreds or the thousands that you have that you can let be known to a neighbor, but that one crack allows you the time, the place for you to speak about God's grace, and that's where the light floods out of you. 00:14:56.480 --> 00:14:56.879 Right? 00:14:57.120 --> 00:14:58.159 A light on a hill. 00:14:58.320 --> 00:15:04.080 A light on a hill is open and exposed by nature of being a light on a hill. 00:15:04.720 --> 00:15:08.080 By being a light on a hill, Jesus says, You're our light on a hill, you can't be hidden. 00:15:08.240 --> 00:15:12.720 But by being just the nature of that means you are open and exposed. 00:15:14.720 --> 00:15:19.279 So the cracks let the light in and the cracks let the light out. 00:15:20.559 --> 00:15:26.000 So, my brothers and sisters, the God that finds and preserves is inside of you. 00:15:26.639 --> 00:15:27.840 He's in you. 00:15:30.320 --> 00:15:41.600 And out of that floods the illumination by which the world comes to see, and out of those cracks comes the preservation by which the people need for their hearts to come alive. 00:15:41.919 --> 00:15:47.519 You are the light of the world and you are the salt of the earth because he is in you. 00:15:47.840 --> 00:15:49.200 Let's pray together. 00:15:50.879 --> 00:15:54.799 God, thank you that you do not give us a calling without a promise. 00:15:55.759 --> 00:16:01.679 Thank you that you do not give us a demand without great grace before it. 00:16:02.799 --> 00:16:06.080 Thank you that you deem us something even before we are that. 00:16:08.320 --> 00:16:10.639 God disinforms my heart. 00:16:11.919 --> 00:16:22.080 And all of that anxious subjectivity that I've so often have begins to melt away and rest in the security that you are light to me. 00:16:23.200 --> 00:16:26.399 You illuminate my path, you preserve my heart. 00:16:28.000 --> 00:16:34.240 Would you help us as a people to have honest confession before you about the cracks that we have? 00:16:34.720 --> 00:16:52.639 Our shame, our wounds, our sin, both in our hearts and our behaviors, and live an open, honest confession on a day-to-day, moment-by-moment basis, that we might be confessing over to you our shortcomings and receiving your great grace to us, the light that shines through the cracks. 00:16:53.759 --> 00:16:58.559 And would you teach us how to walk humbly in this world? 00:16:59.360 --> 00:17:08.240 And a measure of honesty, that we might speak love, care for people, listen to people. 00:17:09.359 --> 00:17:11.680 Would you help our pride melt away? 00:17:15.359 --> 00:17:21.440 Only by your grace, only by your grace have we learned to become anything. 00:17:22.400 --> 00:17:27.119 Thank you for the redemption that comes by your word for us and not our word for you. 00:17:27.279 --> 00:17:28.480 In Jesus' name we pray. 00:17:28.640 --> 00:17:29.279 Amen.