Morning Worship
25 May 2014
Reading 1 – Genesis 5 & 6:1-8 ‘The family tree of the human race – from Adam to Noah’ click to read
Reading 2 – Matthew 5:13-20 ‘Jesus tells his disciples ‘you are the salt of the earth’ click to read
Reading 2 – Matthew 5:13-20 ‘Jesus tells his disciples ‘you are the salt of the earth’ click to read
The text for my sermon this morning is from Genesis 5 verse 24; ‘Enoch walked with God. And then he was no more, because God took him away’.
Our Genesis 5 reading in the Message started with these words: ‘This is the family tree of the human race. When God created the human race he made it Godlike, with a nature akin to God. He created both male and female and he blessed them, the whole human race’
The passage then goes on to name the people in the first family tree. ‘Adam lived a total of 930 years, and he died’. ‘Seth lived a total of 912 years, and he died. Enosh lived a total of 905 years, and he died. Again and again we find the refrain ‘and he died’.
The chapter of Genesis before this one records the first murder (of Cain by his brother Able) and the three succeeding Chapters (Genesis 6-8) record the flood in which the entire human race, save Noah and his family, died. Whether by murder, or by old age, the result is the same, ‘and then he died’. To use a contemporary expression; It seems that ‘Life is hard and then you die’.
Why in these first chapters of Genesis, I asked myself in preparing this sermon, are people living to such amazing ages! Surely it cannot last, and it doesn’t; By Genesis chapter 11 the recorded life spans (as predicted in chapter 6) have fallen gradually to 120 years and in later years very few people live longer than 120 years. Today, life spans seem to be creeping up again! My own father, who died only one month ago, lived to be 100 years old. When my wife Susan & I went to register his death the registrar told us that the age when peoples deaths could be officially recorded as ‘old age had recently been raised from 70 to 80 and that it may will not be long before being raised gain to 90.
Whether we die of old age or an illness, I suggest that God does not want us to shut our eyes to the effect of our sin and the inevitability of death. He wants us to think of our lives as preparing for eternity, such that it transforms how we live now.
Thankfully, Genesis chapter 5 does include bright exceptions to the simple refrain ‘and he died’. Enoch; who we are told ‘walked with God. And then he was no more, because God took him away’.
And Noah too, is referred to differently; Of Noah who (with his family) was saved from the great flood (Genesis Chapters 8-10) we are told ‘Noah God liked what he saw in Noah’ ‘ Noah was a good man of integrity in his community’. Noah walked with God and when he was 500 years old he became the father of Shem, Ham & Japeth.
These exceptions show us that for those who ‘walk with God’, when they eventually die there is hope –in God’s Grace – of life beyond our inevitable death. But that hope – of eternal life- is tied to our walk with God.
Tell story of Churchill being ready to meet his maker, but added ‘whether my maker is ready to meet with me is another matter
How good is your walk with God? When you are ready to meet your maker. Will He be ready to meet with you?
Moving on to our gospel reading this morning; Matthew 5 13-20. As, I said in my introductory talk;
Jesus has just finished outlining what it means to be blessed by God and then goes on to describe what characterises being shaped by God’s blessing in how people live their lives; their ‘walk with God’.
Matthew’s gives three whole chapters (5, 6 &7) to the Sermon on the Mount (which is also recounted in Luke’s gospel).
There are two roads in life, a wide road that leads to destruction and a narrow one that leads to life.
In the sermon Jesus instructs his followers, his disciple then and us today to on the high standards of conduct that God expects them to have
The sermon instructs on Anger, Adultery, Lust, Divorce and Retaliation against people who wrong us.
Love Your Enemies Jesus says; You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Give to the Needy, but beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
Jesus’ commands are far from easy commands to live up to!
But we must try to live up to them. Jesus calls all those who follow Him to choose to be a godly influence, salt and light on the world in which they live.
Jesus clearly expects the world to be transformed by our presence.
Hear again Jesus words to his disciples and us today: "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men."
HOLD UP CONTAINER TABLE SALT
Sodium Chloride, table salt like that you buy at the Supermarket is pure. But Waitrose did not exist back in the first century. Even Tesco’s, and they get everywhere (well, they try!) didn’t exist then.
In Jesus’ time, in Palestine when salt was mined salt from the quarry or pit it was never completely pure. Occasionally the salt they gathered was so impure that it was not very salty at all. The streets were used for refuse; the saltless salt is thrown into the street where people walk on it.
The message for us here is that when Christians lose the saltiness of their spirituality they lose their enthusiasm for their faith in Christ. They lose their love for Christ, and the consequent desire to make a positive difference in the lives of others. They thereby lose their souls. When this happens a Christian faces judgment, being cast out.
What Jesus is saying in these verses is that if we as His followers are going to change the world we have to be pure salt, we have to be distinctively Christian!
Our lives cannot be a mixture of impurities. We have to be un-compromised, pure, and authentic.
So, how authentic is your walk with God?
Do people who cross your path recognize that there is a difference in the way you live? You may be the only Christian that your neighbour ever sees!
Are you authentic? Are you distinctively Christian?
Or have you let the impurity of the world dilute your saltiness?
We certainly do have an influence to flavour the lives of the people who cross our path; whether our families, our friends, neighbours, the people we meet, or if we are still in work our work colleagues. Our influence can be good or bad. God, of course, wants our influence in the world to be for good!
We are called to be the Salt of the Earth. Salt is a seasoning, a preservative, but unless it is BROUGHT INTO CONTACT with another OBJECT its influence is wasted! Salt becomes Invisible to have a visible effect. Salt by itself is nothing more than little fine particles and in that state it is worthless.
BUT when it is rubbed onto and into meat, or added to food it becomes INVISIBLE and THEN becomes what it was intended for INFLUENCING THE FLAVOR!
Are you having a visible effect on the world, on the people you meet .Are you influencing the flavour of those that God sends you, who cross your path?
Salt that just sits in the salt cellar, or on the shelf, is of no use!
It is much like believers, who become complacent, who no longer recognise God’s blessings on their lives; who refuse to take a moral stand; who refuse to share their faith. They are sitting in the salt cellar, or staying on the shelf!
Is your distinctively Christian salt sitting in the salt cellar or on the shelf? Are you in contact with and bringing flavour to those that God has sent you to? (Pause)
You are the salt of the earth (v13) and. You are the light of the world (v.14).
Just a moment though! Who is this you! Jesus is referring to? ‘You’, here, in both cases, is actually plural. Jesus was addressing a group of his disciples;
Jesus is addressing his followers as a community, not just as individuals. We, as a community, each of us, are to act on the world as salt acts on food. Salt, of course, was used in the ancient world, not only to add flavour to meat, but also to prevent it from going bad.
The purpose of the salt was to influence the meat, not the other way around! So Jesus calls his disciples to have a positive influence on the world around us, and of course we can’t do this if we’re no different from the world. In God’s plan, our usefulness to the world depends on our being different, living by different values to non Christians in the world.
Of course, in John’s gospel Jesus says, “I am the light of the world”, but here in Matthew he says to us, his followers, “You are the light of the world”. Darkness in the Bible stands for evil, sin, and ignorance, and Jesus is bringing light into the world – truth, goodness, holiness. It’s the call of his disciples to be like him, so that they also may spread his light wherever they may go. And the question for us as a community is surely this: does our life together as followers of Jesus remind people of our Master? Do they see his light in us? Individually, and as a church, a community.
Will people see Christ’s light in us when stress hits their lives or when tragedy happens. Of course, no one in their right minds prays for tragedy to happen, but Christian history contains example after example of God working in times of tragedy to shine his light into the world as his people respond together in a Christ-like manner.
Perhaps today is the day! The day to dedicate, or rededicate, your life to serving Jesus Christ in the world around you, as part of this community, Weybridge Methodist church.
You are an influence to those around you. You are the salt of the earth! You are the light of the world!
Let both your life and your light so shine before people that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
Amen! & Amen!
But in order for this to happen – in order for us to truly be salt and light and to have a positive influence on the world around us – there needs to be genuine transformation in our own lives, and it can’t just be superficial; it has to go deep, it has to be authentic This is what Jesus goes on to address in verses 17-20, where he says
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribe and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven”.
So what’s he trying to say in this passage? He wants to welcome everyone into the kingdom to begin a journey of transformation, so that together they can become people whose lives are visibly different, in such a way as to have a positive influence for God in the world. In this way, he said, he came to fulfil the law and the prophets; his movement would produce people who were more righteous than the scribes and the Pharisees, not less.
Everyone is welcome in the Kingdom of God, because God loves us so much that he accepts us just as we are. However, he loves us too much to leave us there! He knows that living lives of disobedience and sin is ultimately bad for us, and so his purpose is to lead us out of that darkness into the light of a new way of life. And he does this, not just for our own sake, but so that the world might be transformed by his light.
We, the disciples of Jesus, are called to be a community that learns a new way of life from our Master and lives it out together. We, as a community, are the salt of the earth, the city set on a hill, the light shining for all to see. The world is meant to be able to see our way of life and take note.
But in order for this to happen, our obedience, as individuals, can’t just be skin deep. Rather, the Holy Spirit has to work below the surface to transform us into people who love to do the will of God and Jesus his son.
Do you have a desire to live your life in such a way that people you come into contact with would know that you are a Christian and, most importantly, notice the difference?
Would people you come into contact with notice a wish in you, because you are a Christian, to make a positive difference in the lives of others.
When Robert Louis Stevenson was a boy, he watched an old lamp lighter igniting lamps as he went down the street. Stevenson said to his nurse, "I am watching a man put holes in the darkness." Likewise, John Ruskin watched a lamplighter light his lamps and said, "Now that is what I mean by being a Christian. You ought to be able to see where he has been by the lights that he leaves burning behind him."
A light is meant to "shine." Let the whole world know who you are and what you do. Why hide the light of Christ in you? Tell it to the whole world. Why not? We have nothing nor anyone to be ashamed of. We Christians are not ashamed of the Gospel. It is Good News for everyone. The light dispels the darkness of doubt, despair, and sin. Let the Gospel shine by the witness of our words, work, and life.
Jesus calls those who follow Him;
To be a godly influence,” salt and light on the world” in which they live.
To have the highest standards of conduct.
To "turn the other cheek.” to forgive people who do wrong to us. He commands us to love
To love our enemies, and to be sure we act with the purest motives.
These are far from easy commands to live up to! We need our Father God’s ongoing help to fulfil these commands as best we can. Let’s ask his help for this task as we sing Hymn number 436
“Father hear the prayer we offer ---“
May you be as salt where there is staleness; light, where there is darkness; truth where there is unbelief and love where there is great need. Go in peace to be God’s salt and light to the world. May you know the blessing of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, close to you each moment and each day, as you carry Christ’s light into the world around you. Amen.
Mike Widdup
Our Genesis 5 reading in the Message started with these words: ‘This is the family tree of the human race. When God created the human race he made it Godlike, with a nature akin to God. He created both male and female and he blessed them, the whole human race’
The passage then goes on to name the people in the first family tree. ‘Adam lived a total of 930 years, and he died’. ‘Seth lived a total of 912 years, and he died. Enosh lived a total of 905 years, and he died. Again and again we find the refrain ‘and he died’.
The chapter of Genesis before this one records the first murder (of Cain by his brother Able) and the three succeeding Chapters (Genesis 6-8) record the flood in which the entire human race, save Noah and his family, died. Whether by murder, or by old age, the result is the same, ‘and then he died’. To use a contemporary expression; It seems that ‘Life is hard and then you die’.
Why in these first chapters of Genesis, I asked myself in preparing this sermon, are people living to such amazing ages! Surely it cannot last, and it doesn’t; By Genesis chapter 11 the recorded life spans (as predicted in chapter 6) have fallen gradually to 120 years and in later years very few people live longer than 120 years. Today, life spans seem to be creeping up again! My own father, who died only one month ago, lived to be 100 years old. When my wife Susan & I went to register his death the registrar told us that the age when peoples deaths could be officially recorded as ‘old age had recently been raised from 70 to 80 and that it may will not be long before being raised gain to 90.
Whether we die of old age or an illness, I suggest that God does not want us to shut our eyes to the effect of our sin and the inevitability of death. He wants us to think of our lives as preparing for eternity, such that it transforms how we live now.
Thankfully, Genesis chapter 5 does include bright exceptions to the simple refrain ‘and he died’. Enoch; who we are told ‘walked with God. And then he was no more, because God took him away’.
And Noah too, is referred to differently; Of Noah who (with his family) was saved from the great flood (Genesis Chapters 8-10) we are told ‘Noah God liked what he saw in Noah’ ‘ Noah was a good man of integrity in his community’. Noah walked with God and when he was 500 years old he became the father of Shem, Ham & Japeth.
These exceptions show us that for those who ‘walk with God’, when they eventually die there is hope –in God’s Grace – of life beyond our inevitable death. But that hope – of eternal life- is tied to our walk with God.
Tell story of Churchill being ready to meet his maker, but added ‘whether my maker is ready to meet with me is another matter
How good is your walk with God? When you are ready to meet your maker. Will He be ready to meet with you?
Moving on to our gospel reading this morning; Matthew 5 13-20. As, I said in my introductory talk;
Jesus has just finished outlining what it means to be blessed by God and then goes on to describe what characterises being shaped by God’s blessing in how people live their lives; their ‘walk with God’.
Matthew’s gives three whole chapters (5, 6 &7) to the Sermon on the Mount (which is also recounted in Luke’s gospel).
There are two roads in life, a wide road that leads to destruction and a narrow one that leads to life.
In the sermon Jesus instructs his followers, his disciple then and us today to on the high standards of conduct that God expects them to have
The sermon instructs on Anger, Adultery, Lust, Divorce and Retaliation against people who wrong us.
Love Your Enemies Jesus says; You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Give to the Needy, but beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
Jesus’ commands are far from easy commands to live up to!
But we must try to live up to them. Jesus calls all those who follow Him to choose to be a godly influence, salt and light on the world in which they live.
Jesus clearly expects the world to be transformed by our presence.
Hear again Jesus words to his disciples and us today: "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men."
HOLD UP CONTAINER TABLE SALT
Sodium Chloride, table salt like that you buy at the Supermarket is pure. But Waitrose did not exist back in the first century. Even Tesco’s, and they get everywhere (well, they try!) didn’t exist then.
In Jesus’ time, in Palestine when salt was mined salt from the quarry or pit it was never completely pure. Occasionally the salt they gathered was so impure that it was not very salty at all. The streets were used for refuse; the saltless salt is thrown into the street where people walk on it.
The message for us here is that when Christians lose the saltiness of their spirituality they lose their enthusiasm for their faith in Christ. They lose their love for Christ, and the consequent desire to make a positive difference in the lives of others. They thereby lose their souls. When this happens a Christian faces judgment, being cast out.
What Jesus is saying in these verses is that if we as His followers are going to change the world we have to be pure salt, we have to be distinctively Christian!
Our lives cannot be a mixture of impurities. We have to be un-compromised, pure, and authentic.
So, how authentic is your walk with God?
Do people who cross your path recognize that there is a difference in the way you live? You may be the only Christian that your neighbour ever sees!
Are you authentic? Are you distinctively Christian?
Or have you let the impurity of the world dilute your saltiness?
We certainly do have an influence to flavour the lives of the people who cross our path; whether our families, our friends, neighbours, the people we meet, or if we are still in work our work colleagues. Our influence can be good or bad. God, of course, wants our influence in the world to be for good!
We are called to be the Salt of the Earth. Salt is a seasoning, a preservative, but unless it is BROUGHT INTO CONTACT with another OBJECT its influence is wasted! Salt becomes Invisible to have a visible effect. Salt by itself is nothing more than little fine particles and in that state it is worthless.
BUT when it is rubbed onto and into meat, or added to food it becomes INVISIBLE and THEN becomes what it was intended for INFLUENCING THE FLAVOR!
Are you having a visible effect on the world, on the people you meet .Are you influencing the flavour of those that God sends you, who cross your path?
Salt that just sits in the salt cellar, or on the shelf, is of no use!
It is much like believers, who become complacent, who no longer recognise God’s blessings on their lives; who refuse to take a moral stand; who refuse to share their faith. They are sitting in the salt cellar, or staying on the shelf!
Is your distinctively Christian salt sitting in the salt cellar or on the shelf? Are you in contact with and bringing flavour to those that God has sent you to? (Pause)
You are the salt of the earth (v13) and. You are the light of the world (v.14).
Just a moment though! Who is this you! Jesus is referring to? ‘You’, here, in both cases, is actually plural. Jesus was addressing a group of his disciples;
Jesus is addressing his followers as a community, not just as individuals. We, as a community, each of us, are to act on the world as salt acts on food. Salt, of course, was used in the ancient world, not only to add flavour to meat, but also to prevent it from going bad.
The purpose of the salt was to influence the meat, not the other way around! So Jesus calls his disciples to have a positive influence on the world around us, and of course we can’t do this if we’re no different from the world. In God’s plan, our usefulness to the world depends on our being different, living by different values to non Christians in the world.
Of course, in John’s gospel Jesus says, “I am the light of the world”, but here in Matthew he says to us, his followers, “You are the light of the world”. Darkness in the Bible stands for evil, sin, and ignorance, and Jesus is bringing light into the world – truth, goodness, holiness. It’s the call of his disciples to be like him, so that they also may spread his light wherever they may go. And the question for us as a community is surely this: does our life together as followers of Jesus remind people of our Master? Do they see his light in us? Individually, and as a church, a community.
Will people see Christ’s light in us when stress hits their lives or when tragedy happens. Of course, no one in their right minds prays for tragedy to happen, but Christian history contains example after example of God working in times of tragedy to shine his light into the world as his people respond together in a Christ-like manner.
Perhaps today is the day! The day to dedicate, or rededicate, your life to serving Jesus Christ in the world around you, as part of this community, Weybridge Methodist church.
You are an influence to those around you. You are the salt of the earth! You are the light of the world!
Let both your life and your light so shine before people that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
Amen! & Amen!
But in order for this to happen – in order for us to truly be salt and light and to have a positive influence on the world around us – there needs to be genuine transformation in our own lives, and it can’t just be superficial; it has to go deep, it has to be authentic This is what Jesus goes on to address in verses 17-20, where he says
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribe and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven”.
So what’s he trying to say in this passage? He wants to welcome everyone into the kingdom to begin a journey of transformation, so that together they can become people whose lives are visibly different, in such a way as to have a positive influence for God in the world. In this way, he said, he came to fulfil the law and the prophets; his movement would produce people who were more righteous than the scribes and the Pharisees, not less.
Everyone is welcome in the Kingdom of God, because God loves us so much that he accepts us just as we are. However, he loves us too much to leave us there! He knows that living lives of disobedience and sin is ultimately bad for us, and so his purpose is to lead us out of that darkness into the light of a new way of life. And he does this, not just for our own sake, but so that the world might be transformed by his light.
We, the disciples of Jesus, are called to be a community that learns a new way of life from our Master and lives it out together. We, as a community, are the salt of the earth, the city set on a hill, the light shining for all to see. The world is meant to be able to see our way of life and take note.
But in order for this to happen, our obedience, as individuals, can’t just be skin deep. Rather, the Holy Spirit has to work below the surface to transform us into people who love to do the will of God and Jesus his son.
Do you have a desire to live your life in such a way that people you come into contact with would know that you are a Christian and, most importantly, notice the difference?
Would people you come into contact with notice a wish in you, because you are a Christian, to make a positive difference in the lives of others.
When Robert Louis Stevenson was a boy, he watched an old lamp lighter igniting lamps as he went down the street. Stevenson said to his nurse, "I am watching a man put holes in the darkness." Likewise, John Ruskin watched a lamplighter light his lamps and said, "Now that is what I mean by being a Christian. You ought to be able to see where he has been by the lights that he leaves burning behind him."
A light is meant to "shine." Let the whole world know who you are and what you do. Why hide the light of Christ in you? Tell it to the whole world. Why not? We have nothing nor anyone to be ashamed of. We Christians are not ashamed of the Gospel. It is Good News for everyone. The light dispels the darkness of doubt, despair, and sin. Let the Gospel shine by the witness of our words, work, and life.
Jesus calls those who follow Him;
To be a godly influence,” salt and light on the world” in which they live.
To have the highest standards of conduct.
To "turn the other cheek.” to forgive people who do wrong to us. He commands us to love
To love our enemies, and to be sure we act with the purest motives.
These are far from easy commands to live up to! We need our Father God’s ongoing help to fulfil these commands as best we can. Let’s ask his help for this task as we sing Hymn number 436
“Father hear the prayer we offer ---“
May you be as salt where there is staleness; light, where there is darkness; truth where there is unbelief and love where there is great need. Go in peace to be God’s salt and light to the world. May you know the blessing of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, close to you each moment and each day, as you carry Christ’s light into the world around you. Amen.
Mike Widdup
