Podcasts about matthew 5:13-5:16

"Pursue the presence of God and let His presence overflow in your life." Pastor Matt Janzen.

Led By The Spirit ~ Steve Lounsbury

Led By The Spirit ~ Steve Lounsbury

Cornerstone Church of Christ

This week, as we continue our Like a Good Neighbor series, we are taking a minute to check our motives.

This week, as we continue our Like a Good Neighbor series, we are taking a minute to check our motives.

Harvest Bible Fellowship's weekly Message.

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

You can be His light to others in a world that so needs His light!

Organization: Foundation Christian Ministries Speaker: Pastor Chris Pena City: Bastrop State: Tx

Salt brings flavor and makes things taste good. This is what Jesus followers should do in their communities. When Jesus followers shine we become beacons of hope and we're destined to help save the world.

Our value as salt: flavor and preservation Our value as light: reflect the light of Jesus

Sermons from the pastors at Redwood Christian Fellowship.

Sermons from the pastors at Redwood Christian Fellowship.

Salt and light - their integrity and necessity, and the glory to which they point

Jesus depiction of a lamp, as he continues to explain the parable of the Sower to the disciples, shows us how we can become the 100 fold soil instead of just the 30 or even 60 fold.

Jesus depiction of a lamp, as he continues to explain the parable of the Sower to the disciples, shows us how we can become the 100 fold soil instead of just the 30 or even 60 fold.

This week Pastor Aaron gives us an overview of the first section of the Sermon on the Mount.

This week Pastor Aaron gives us an overview of the first section of the Sermon on the Mount.

Organization: Foundation Christian Ministries Speaker: Pastor Chris Pena City: Bastrop State: Tx

An experience with God in a grocery store parking lot? You never know where you might be when God calls you to share his love with others. As we continue our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, we will learn how a selfless life can bring us closer to God.

College Hill Presbyterian Church

This is the audio podcast from Wednesday July 28th's Take Two with Sam Scotti and Brian Oliva. Sam and Brian discussed Sam's talk on Sunday on The Politics of Jesus: Salt & Light.

St Columba @ Botany

A disciple of the kingdom of heaven who does not live like a citizen of the kingdom, is worth about as much as tasteless salt or invisible light.

We are a local church in southwest Oklahoma City committed to loving God, loving our neighbors, and making disciples of Jesus Christ.

Christ Community Church

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus uses the images of salt and light in addressing his audience. We explore how these images might have been understood and look to what this understanding teaches us about the nature of discipleship today.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus uses the images of salt and light in addressing his audience. We explore how these images might have been understood and look to what this understanding teaches us about the nature of discipleship today.

Christ City Church

In the sermon on the Mount, Jesus told his disciples that they were the "salt of the Earth." We understand that saying in our modern context, but what did it mean back then? In this sermon, Michael Moorhead breaks down the sermon on the Mount and places Jesus' teachings and words in historical context to explain how we can become the salt--and light-- of the world.

When Church Feels More Like a Social Club… May 5 message Today I have an important update to give you, and I’d like to clothe it in this message, so here goes: Jogging I would like to share with you one of my newfound hobbies. For the past year I have really enjoyed something that as a younger man I hated, and never could understand other people enjoying. Crazy thing is that now I get it, and I love it. I’m talking about jogging. Any runners in the room? I can’t explain the love of jogging, I can’t explain it better than just to say that joggers are strange people who love pain. I started off running 1 mile. And today 10 months later after steady incremental growth I am now jogging (pause) 1.2 miles. (I’m kidding) Just a little more, 3.6. Definitely nothing to brag about. But it goes like this the 1st mile, I have my headphones on, My head is up, nice steady pace, I am listening to a podcast and It’s funny so I am laughing periodically. 2nd mile, my headphones are still on, but my head is down because I am staring at the dashboard and I’m listening to the funny podcast but I’m not laughing anymore. The last .63 miles, I have thrown my headphones off my head, I am now a praying man, I am now a man of the cloth, and I am calling down the power of Heaven for strength. 3.6 miles later. It is the most thrilling moment of all, I’ve been waiting for this I hit the red stop button; I’m gasping for breath and as I leave the gym I am thinking, this was so great, let’s do it again next year. No honestly, I can’t wait to do this again. The Apostle Paul near the end of his life in 2 Timothy said these famous words: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I’ve kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness… Today I want to make the point that our life together as a church should be like this: its like fighting a good fight… Notice Paul used a sports illustration. Finishing the race. You’re sweating, you’re fighting, you’re heart is pounding, you feel like you’re not going to make it, you are doing everything you can, crying out for strength because you know you have one race and you want to make it count so you are crying out to God to give you strength to finish, you are single-focused. You are giving it everything you’ve got. Leaving it all on the field. Cross the finish line… And then you get to rest and you get to fall in his arms and drink the heavenly ice cold Gatorade. The Problem Every Sunday we are addressing a problem that we have in community. And maybe it wouldn’t be right for me just to come right out and talk about a problem because the issue I’m addressing is the shadow side of a strength. Let me give you an example. Recently I had a new family checking out our church ask me Pastor Andrew, what do you think the strength of our church is? And I think I said without hesitation, that the strength of our church is community, and that if you come here you are going to find a rich church family, where people have known each other for decades, and people introduce you as uncle or as auntie to their kids. So it’s not just a program but it’s a church family. And then they asked me like well, what do you think the weakness is? And I think I said without hesitation, that the weakness is also community, or at least the shadow side of having a rich church family community, and part of that shadow side is that we can very easily become NOT God‘s army, NOT these athletes who are running this race together, but we can very easily become a social club. Have you ever been part of a church community that felt more like a social club? I mean, don’t get me wrong, we are in a way a “social club”, much deeper than that, we’re a family. But we’re not JUST a social club? We’re an army! We have this mission together! Ironically the way to a richer community is through mission! Turn with me in your Bibles to Matthew chapter 5. This is a passage from the sermon on the Mount. It’s about how Christians are called to be different from other people in society. Christian are called to be different. They are called to be holy. And it is through that quality of being different that you see your purpose and your mission in the world. Verse 13: “”You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. Matthew 5:13-16 ESV https://www.bible.com/59/mat.5.13-16.esv First observation: salt is different from meat. If God is inside you and working in your life then you’re different. People in the Bay Area may think and do one thing, about sex or ambition or comfort or what they want out of life, but you are qualitatively different. First observation from the text is that salt is different and so you are different. Lemme go through the text and then talk about what this means for us. Jesus says if salt has lost its taste… Saying something like unsalty salt is a contradiction. Salt cannot lose its taste, OK? Just like water cannot lose its wetness. If salt loses its salty taste, it is no longer salt. Interestingly, in the ancient world, it did happen. Historically around the Dead Sea you can collect salt with other minerals that looks like salt butis not really salt. Keep in mind Jesus is not giving a science lesson! The point is don’t lose your distinctiveness. Don’t you lose your holiness! So you go, well, Why Not? Like why is it important to be different? And here in this passage the answer to that question is all leveraged on mission. Do you see that? OK now I want to ask three questions from this text. Please stay with me these are important questions. WHAT IS THE SCOPE OF OUR MISSION? WHAT IS THE URGENCY OF IT? WHO IS RESPONSIBLE? Earth/World First, the scope: Now, I want you to look at two words: earth verse 13, you are the salt of the earth and world verse 14 you are the light of the world let me hear you guys say, Earth. Let me hear you guys say, World. Notice the scope of the mission. Jesus could have said you are the salt of Israel. You are the light of Jerusalem. No, not just Jerusalem nit just Israel, Jesus say the entire planet. Now this is not one isolated passage where Jesus gives A global perspective. I would make the case that it has always been God‘s intention from the creation of the world that His glory extend to the the entire world. This goes all the way back to Genesis when God says multiply and fill the earth, in other words bring my glory to every place on Earth. Abraham was chosen to be a blessing to all nations. I mean I could make the case and just go through the entire Bible and show you book after book, it has been God‘s intention from the beginning and throughout history that his glory extend to the entire world! Urgency So that’s the scope of the mission, but look in this passage for the urgency of this mission. What is salt good for? Thomas Keller would say it’s really good for enhancing flavor. He would say pepper is a “flavor-changer” but salt is a “flavor-enhancer”. It doesn’t change what it comes into contact with, it enhances, makes the flavor more intense, it brings out the true flavor. So if you add salt to pizza, doesn’t change the pizza it makes the pizza more pizza, makes the pizza better pizza. If you add salt to cucumber, what do you get? I more terrible cucumber. You are the flavor-enhancer of the world. You bring out the true favor of the world. Show the world the true flavor of self-giving love in all your relationships. Salt in the ancient world also had another purpose. Irene can you play the video while I’m talking. This is a video of a whole chicken and what happens to it without salt, and without a preserving agent. I think it’s worth a few minutes of our time just to consider this. A person in the ancient world would salt their meat and dry it and the meat would be preserved and saved to be eaten at a later time. This is a video of meat that is not salted and not dried... This is the urgency of our mission. When Jesus says You are the salt of the earth He was saying… The Christian by their message and way of life is preserving a world that would otherwise go putrid. Do you believe that? Today, 1.5 billion people have never heard the name of Christ and as far as we know when they perish without putting their faith in Jesus they will perish eternally. Right now, over a billion people live and die in desperate poverty. Thousands die of hunger-related and preventable conditions. While others, like myself, live in comfort everyday. Right now, pornography is destroying the lives of millions, especially young men, shaping how they see women, shaping how they relate to women. I can keep on going, you know… OK what is the scope of the mission? The entire world. What is the urgency of the mission? We and the world are going this way; Putrid rot. We need the gospel. We need the gospel. We need the gospel. Last point who is responsible? I think a lot of us feel like don’t look at us; just look at Jesus. Don’t put too much on the church, you have Jesus in heaven. And I do agree with that theologically. People, Christians, the church, keep failing us. Don’t put your trust in them! Right! But, it’s just... in this passage Jesus did not say I am the salt of the earth. In this passage the focus of Jesus seems to be YOU; you are the salt of the earth, people. IN other words you are my ambassadors. You are my witnesses. You are the agents of change. If people are going to be looking at the reality of my existence, in other words, they will be looking first at you. Ultimately at Jesus, but the first glimpse will be You! OK, quick review, what is the scope of our mission? The entire world. What is the urgency of our mission? the world like a piece of meat is heading towards putrid rot and it needs the preservation of the gospel of Christ. And who is responsible to bring that to the world? You the church you and I are responsible for that. You guys, we are so much more than a social club! We have a mission. Lives are at stake! Eternity for many people are at stake. We have a mission! The dream Several years ago I was on an airplane to Taiwan, and I had a dream. I don’t dream that often, I don’t remember my dreams, and I never have dreams where I’m feeling like God is speaking to me. But I woke up from the stream and I was like 99% sure God just spoke to me. I saw this beautiful mountain range and valley it was lush and green and I heard God say I’ve called you to be the lead pastor at CLC for 11 years. And then God gave a blessing to the church. In 2021 I will have been lead pastor at Christian Layman for 11 years. And so in 2021 Summer my time as lead pastor will be coming to a close. From now until then I still have two more years to run my race here and to continue in my role as lead pastor. I know there’s more to say about this logistically, and so after church today there will be a Q&A where we will try our very best to answer all your questions, OK? But after this dream I started to ask God, like so what’s next? Lord, am I going to die? My my father passed away at 45, so that was a legitimate question. During this time our church was going through the book radical by David Platt. So I am preparing to give a message and I’m reading chapter 7. And I’m telling you, chapter 7 just… Crushed me. In chapter 7 David Platt goes, there are 1.5 billion people who have never heard the name of Christ. There is probably not a more important question for the church to be asking then what happens to those 1.5 billion people after they die? And Platt with his three advanced degrees, applies all his hermeneutical skill towards interpreting the book of Romans to the best of his ability and the conclusion that he arrives at is that, OK to our best read a scripture it seems like the 1.5 without Jesus without ever hearing about Jesus are going to hell. And that is why God sends his missionaries. And that crushed me. During that time my prayer changed. It always used to be, God if you make it undeniably clear to me, OK… Ok I’ll go. And my prayers changed to here I am, send me. Life is short Eternity is really really long. 1.5 billion and your strategy is to send people… Here I am, send me. My Journey I really care about this. It’s weird, though. Its funny because when I first came to Layman 20 years ago, it was a missions Sunday Sunday. And when I heard that it was a mission Sunday… I let out an inward groan, like, Man, I should have come on a different Sunday. Like missions was something I know I should care about, but secretly don’t. So what happened? It’s hard to explain. I guess it was a process. First for me it was just like I was blown away by the gospel. Like God would give up his Son…for me? Are you kidding me? I was blown away by grace. It started with grace. Knowing the unmerited favor of God! And so I started to fall in love with Jesus. To the point, like I’ll do whatever you want me to do. And the more you care about someone the more you care about the things they care about. I realized that God cares about extending His glory around the world. And God cares about all forms of human suffering, but especially eternal! And that the 1.5 billion have never had a chance to hear. That’s not right! God cares about them. And God’s method is to send people. So what about me? How about my family? During this time God started to speak to Rana, and after service we’ll have time to hear Rana’s story. APPLICATION So here is my application to all of you, I’m not saying that all of you should go overseas. I know that David Platt in Radical seems to be leaning that way, but I am not as radical in that interpretation as Platt is. There are incredible needs here in the bay area. There are loved ones, Mom And Dad, family members, coworkers, classmates who do not know Christ. And if they parish without Christ they parish eternally. There is urgency here in the bay area. America knows of loneliness and disconnectedness that is so great and so painful that is not experienced in other parts of the world. The world may have poverty of economy but we have poverty of community. in this world that is rotting, in this world that doesn’t know the hope of Christ, I think the appropriate prayer is: here I am, Lord, send me. We have a social justice team that’s about to start. What if we started to say Lord here I am send me to join this team? We’re going to do an eye screening in the inner city and we could use some help... first we could use people to volunteer at least one day to serve… It would be cool if people in our church who have administrative gifts, Here I am, send me. We could use volunteers to serve on the planning team as well. We have about three people in our church that are preparing for the mission field, what if we as a church said hey let’s be great senders, Lord here we are use us. I will share one last story. I was in Tijuana with my middle child Christopher. And if you guys have never been to the Tijuana missions trip, you totally need to go. Anyway all weekend I was just kind of weepy I just felt like this amazing presence of God. It was an incredible weekend and we’re all heading back home. But because of a domestic terrorist attack the border crossing lines going back into San Diego we’re just crazy long and so crazy long that it seem like we’re not gonna make it. Then a line opened up and Gordon Who is very humble and personable very aggressive on the road, swerved and made it first in line. We get to the San Diego airport my passport goes right through but even people in my van their passports were not checking through. Gordon turned to me and said just go. I’m running I get there they let families with young kids in first and so I’m one of the first people on the plane. I sit down on the plane, i’m like, oh thank God, we’re going to make it. People on the team weren’t even going to make it, but I was going to make it, back in my home warm bath home cooked Trader Joe’s meal. and I was so suddenly overcome by an emotion that I was not expecting. I was feeling shame. And I thought come up man you call yourself a pastor? First on the plane, and half of your team isn’t going to make it. Gordon and Ami were on the curbside helping people get in and you’re on the plane? And right there and then I could swear to you I heard a voice and it was the voice of God and the voice said this this will not be your fate. You will not be one of these guys sitting on the plane just happy that you are saved but you were going to be like Gordon and Amy on the front lines helping people get in. And I just started to weep I just started to weep. And I look back now and I’m even more sure that it was from the Lord because the voice of shame and condemnation was from Satan or myself but it is the voice of the Lord that is encouraging that won’t be your fate you’re going to be like them. Church I charge you to fight the good fight. We are not just a social club, we are in an army of Christ with a very urgent mission. We are in a race! Life is short, and the mission is great. don’t say like Gideon, I’ll do it God, if you make it really really clear to me. But say like Isaiah here I am send me. Don’t be like the pastor who just sat on the plane happy that you are saved, be like Gordon and Amy who are helping people on the front lines helping people get through. Run your race like the jogger on the treadmill is going strong for the Lord looking at the dashboard saying, I can’t wait I can’t wait for the red button to fall and to splash into that heavenly Gatorade. Church let’s fight the good fight together! I’d like to invite the worship team to come forward… I’d like to pray for you, and then I’d like to give you a few moments to pray as well. Could I have you all pray for our church? After I pray for you, I will guide you in a time of prayer for our church, I will share a few needs and invite you to pray. So church I am going to invite you to pray for our church. Pray in your own voice and pray in a volume that is natural and comfortable for you. First, please pray that God will give us a new lead pastor of His choosing, and I’ll give you a minute to do that. Second, please pray that God will give our board of directors wisdom and guidance during this next season.

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

You are commissioned to build the kingdom through beautiful, messy relationships for God's glory.

Today starts the mark of a new series entitled Seeds: Planting for Change. We don't have to be world beaters or overly important people to create positive impact in our communities, families, jobs, workplaces, leagues, etc. We can change the world simply by planting small seeds and allowing God to cause all the growth. Join us the next several weeks as we discuss being seed planters and how that impacts the vision and direction of our church.

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

Sunday sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church.

Covenant Presbyterian Church (The Barn)

The Importance of making the Right Choice

Welcome to First Presbyterian Church, Columbus, Georgia! We hope you will be blessed by the ministry of the Word through our Sunday morning services! Click here to alternately view the Concise service video on Youtube Click here to view the Complete service video on Youtube

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

Sermons from Bellevue Presbyterian Church

Pastor John asked an important question: As God's salt and light, how are we making a difference in Petaluma, In Sonoma County, In the world? We continue to look at what our mission is as a Christian congregation.

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

Have you taken responsibility for being a positive influence in your world?

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

"in Long Beach as it is in Heaven." For more information visit: garden.church

Brian Tan, Go and do likewise

We can be great because of Jesus, the great I AM.

We can be great because of Jesus, the great I AM.

"Salt and Light for God"