Well, let's turn together in God's word to Matthew 5. We're taking a break from our normal series, both in the morning and the evening, so we're not gonna be looking at Hebrews or Exodus, this Lord say. We're gonna be looking at two different sections from Matthew 5, or from the book of Matthew, rather. This evening, we'll be looking at Matthew 6, verse 25 to 34. But this morning, looking together at Matthew 5, verse 13, through 16, Matthew 5, 13 through 16. Let's look together at Matthew 5, verse 13 through 16, where God's word reads as follows. 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. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is God. in heaven. So Father, reading from God's word this morning, may He add His blessing to our hearts. Well, there's not anything familiar about these times, at least not in my lifetime. I don't remember ever a time where we as people in this nation were restricted from going wherever we wanted to go without consideration of the health of others. I don't remember ever a time in my own lifetime where there was an illness moving at such a fast speed that the medical community really couldn't even contain. I don't remember ever a time when restrictions were placed on society by the civil magistrate with kind of an open-ended termination point of those restrictions where there's always going to be a reconsideration of whether or not now it's safe or now it's not safe. And so we have this curtain of uncertainty hanging over the country, hanging over our homes. And as people, that can be very, very unsettling. But what we want to do this morning is look at God's Word, because God's Word is sufficient. God's Word is sufficient in times of great ease, which we have enjoyed in this part of the world for so many decades, but it's also sufficient for times of great uncertainty, which we are facing. And so, as I've said before, not going through our regular passages of Scripture from Hebrews or Exodus, we want to take a look for the next several Lord's Day sermons at the Sermon on the Mount and lessons that we can learn from the Sermon on the Mount. Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew 5 through 7. It's one of the greatest sermons ever preached, and I know that to be true because God himself preached it. Jesus Christ, the living word, when he walked on the earth, preached this sermon to his disciples. And in this sermon, from the mouth of God, In his word, written down in his word, we are going to receive comfort. Because what Jesus does in the Sermon on the Mount is Jesus really talks about things that everybody experiences, the things that we face in our normal lives. And he talks about our normal lives from the perspective that in every circumstance, whatever part of our lives we're in it, that nothing really changes, that the life of the Christian is expected to be constant no matter what the circumstances may be. And so as we look first at Matthew 5 and verse 13 through 16, we think about what it means to be salt and light. We want to learn that the Christian lives in this world as a representative of the Father who orchestrated his salvation. We want to see the Christian living in this world as a representative of the Father who orchestrated His salvation. To learn that lesson, we want to see the call of the disciple and we want to see the goal of the disciple. The call of the disciple from verses 13 through 15, the goal of the disciple in verse 16. So let's look first at the call of the disciple in verses 13 through 15. Before we get into the nitty-gritty of the Sermon on the Mount, we want to understand The context. We want to understand the context of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has been ministering to crowds. You see that in chapter 4 and verse 23. He's going throughout all these different regions and so crowds have gathered around Him from all over the place. They've heard of His works. They've heard of His words. He has become a celebrity. of sorts. He's been famous because of his teaching, famous because of his healing. And it says in verse 24 of chapter 4 that his fame has spread even as far as Syria. Now Syria is far to the north of Israel. His fame is also spread in Galilee, in the Decapolis, which was a region of 10 cities, which was east of the Jordan. On the other side of the Sea of Galilee, you can look that up on an atlas when you have time, he was famous in Jerusalem, he was famous in Judea, and it says that he was famous also beyond the Jordan. And so his fame had spread to a wide geographical area, And this gathered to him a crowd. The crowd gathers to Jesus and then Jesus does an amazing thing. In the beginning of our sermon that we're considering, the Sermon on the Mount, verse 1, Jesus sees all these crowds coming and then Jesus leaves them. Jesus does something that is counterintuitive in some sense. He sees the crowd and then it says in verse 1 that he goes up on a mountain and his disciples come to him. Now we don't know how many disciples came to him, but not everybody came to him. His disciples came to him and he taught his disciples. So Jesus up on the mountain preaches this Sermon on the Mount to the disciples of Christ. And he begins the Sermon on the Mount by pronouncing blessing. They're called beatitudes, these nine blessings that Jesus gives to his disciples. They're declarations of supreme blessedness. Now these declaration of blessedness, or these beatitudes, they're often misunderstood. They're often taken to be more of like a fortune cookie saying, something that is good for everybody, a declaration about man in general. But the Beatitudes are not to be understood in that way. The Beatitudes are to be understood in terms of the Holy Spirit's evidence seen in a man. So Jesus is at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount describing the fruit of the Holy Spirit in the life of the disciples. And so when you look at Jesus' pronouncement, blessed are the poor in spirit. Jesus isn't talking about anything other than those who know they're standing without Christ, those who are aware that apart from Christ, they are subject to doom and to judgment. And so when it speaks of the poor in spirit, we should understand it in that way. When it says, Blessed are those who mourn, Jesus is not talking about those who are generically sad, he's talking about those who grieve over their sin. Or when it talks about blessed are those who are meek, talking about those who recognize God's dominion. And you can go all the way down the list of those beatitudes and understand them from a perspective of the Holy Spirit working in the lives of the disciples. So that the disciples would reflect these kinds of manifestations of And so we have to understand them these ways. You can see a wrong understanding of these kinds of verses when you look, for example, at blessed are those who mourn. That's one that would be used often at a funeral service, for example. So that would take that verse to mean, blessed are those who mourn. Anybody who endures and experiences sadness, they will get by on the other side and they will be happy at some point again. That's not the intention of the verse, blessed are those And so we have to understand the words of Jesus based on the context that he's speaking to his disciples. He's speaking to his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount, and we should understand his words in that way. So the Sermon on the Mount is not a set of general parables of wisdom that all people can take and apply to themselves. It's not something given so that everybody who reads these words can apply them to their lives and come out further ahead, and so that's important for us to realize. The Sermon on the Mount is written to those who are disciples of Christ with the intent that they would follow after him. This is the intent that there would be a reaction by the disciples through the teaching that is found in the Sermon on the Mount. And so, before we're gonna talk about that call that the Christian has to a different kind of living, before we look at the call, we're gonna look at the why the disciple follows that call. To talk about how we should live as Christians, without talking about why we should live that way would be to be moralistic. A moralistic person would be somebody who approaches the Bible as a self-help book, a book that helps us modify behavior without really a change of heart behind the behavior that is modified. Now, of course, the Bible does help people and the Bible does give us principles to live by which would increase our happiness even in general, but we're not to read the Bible exclusively as a self-help book. We're not to read scripture in that way. The scripture is not a book that helps people outside the general manifestation of the truth of the gospel. And so we have to read scripture in that sense. We have to become disciples of Christ first, and then we live according to the principles that he teaches. Now as we think about what it means to be a disciple of Christ, to be a disciple of Christ is not primarily about behavior in the first place. And I say that because believer and unbeliever can manifest the same kinds of behavior. They can show the same kinds of behavior. So, for example, the Scripture will call somebody to be generous and willing to share, but an unbeliever can be generous and willing to share. A Christian is called in Scripture to be kind and compassionate, but an unbeliever can be kind and compassionate. A Christian is called in God's Word to be respectful, but there are unbelievers who are respectful, even putting some of us to shame. And so when we think about behaviors, behaviors are not the identifying thing of a disciple primarily. The life of a Christian disciple is not about behavior in the first place. It is the why that sits behind the behavior that distinguishes unbeliever from believer. And that why that sits behind the believer, of course, is the cross. It is the blood of Christ shed for the guilt of the sinner who is called by grace. That is the fulcrum, that is the hinge on which the Christian life turns. That is the why for the Bible's how. When the Bible speaks of the how, the commandments, the way we should live, for the Christian beneath it, there must be that corresponding why. There must be that corresponding understanding of the ministry and work of Christ in the life of the believer in order to make the obedience to the Howl possible. And so you have the Christian made alive by Christ. Because of the work of Christ, because of the blood of Christ, because of the Spirit of Christ, therefore, Therefore, these different behaviors are required of you. Because of Christ, we are called to walk in the ways of the Bible. So, it is within that context, which is established by the first four chapters of Matthew's Gospel, but also by the broader context of Scripture in general, it is because of the answering of the why question in the context that we can look at the call of the Christian specifically here in these four verses. These four verses are addressing for us how the Christian should live from day to day because we are Christ's disciples. Because we are called to live for his honor and glory, because the blood of Christ is applied to you, therefore these things are asked of you. Now Jesus teaches his disciples, whom he has called, the way to live, giving two word pictures here in these four passages. And as he gives us these two illustrations, we should realize that both of these illustrations really are pointing at the same thing from two different perspectives. And the two word pictures that Jesus gives us here in verses 13 through 16 are salt and light. Those are Jesus' illustrations in the Sermon on the Mount. Let's look at each of those in turn. So first, let's think about salt. The purpose of Jesus talking about salt is not for the purpose of illustrating that the Christian must be the most spicy, enthusiastic person in the world. It's not saying that the Christian is to be the life of the party, the peppy extrovert, the mover and the shaker, the leader of the people, the compelling person, the most positive person in the room. He's not talking about that. And I know that because you don't need Christ to be that way. Anybody can assume those kinds of functions and roles in the world. There are plenty of unregenerate people who do those very same things. the call of the Christian is not to be that kind of person. When it speaks about being the salt of the earth and warning us against not losing the taste of salt because it can't be restored. All it's good for is to be thrown out and trampled under the feet of men. Jesus isn't talking about superficial things. He's not talking about being happy from day to day, bringing sunshine into a room when you walk into it. Because the purpose of salt is to show the world what life with Christ looks like. Without Christ, life is a fairly hopeless situation. You can see that in different places. You can look at different people, people who are in some sense used to brighten the outlook of the world. I think of comedians. There's a fairly famous comedian, Ricky Gervais. He's a British man. He's an atheist. As a comedian, he is used, his job is to make people laugh, and he doesn't. He has made a lot of money doing it, but accompanying his gift to make people laugh is his atheistic outlook on life and his view is so depressing. You hear him express it from time to time. This is basically the summary of his worldview. He says, we're all going to die soon and then it's all over. There's a tremendous amount of hopelessness and purposelessness to that kind of statement. If it is true that we have 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 years on this planet and after we're gone then nothing of us remains, what is the point of it all? Where do you find joy? Where do you find happiness? How do you take the next step? How do you put one foot after another when we get into situations like these, like the corona virus? virus, all you're doing is taking one step closer to your extermination. But Christ says something different. And Christ calls his disciples to live in the world. He sends us out into that world to combat that very sense of hopelessness. And Jesus sends us to be salt in the world, to show the world that it is not hopeless. And he calls us to do that through our words and through our deeds. Certainly, the message of hope is the message of the gospel. In a sense, all the things that we've talked about the things that sit behind the call of the Christian, that is the good news of the hope of salvation, that Jesus has come, that he makes alive those who cling to him by faith. And that when you are made alive, your heart is changed, you're made aware and awakened to the life of righteousness, the hope that we have in the gospel. So, that's the word in a sense that the Christian is called to communicate the hope and comfort for all who trust in Christ, who trust in his works for salvation. So there's the message of hope, there's the message of comfort, but that message of hope and comfort is then complemented by the salty deeds that the Christian is asked to live out. The Christian church, especially at this time, has to be very careful as we think about what it means to be salty during this time of isolation. Are our deeds as a church reflecting the hope that we profess when it comes to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ? Our staying home this Lord's Day, this Lord's Day, it is prudence. I don't feel guilty about it. I don't think you should feel guilty about it. This is a prudent step done in obedience to the request of the civil magistrate. But we should still be thinking today as Christians and as church, as a church body, how do we manifest the salt of the gospel as we live from day to day in these difficult times? These times where movement is restricted, where gatherings are limited. How do we live out our sense of hope and comfort from day to day? We'll come back to that. The second illustration that Jesus gives to us in this passage of Scripture, in verse 14, he talks about the Christian being the light of the world. Now this illustration is not saying that we are the light beam of the world. The Christian's light is really more like a moonlight, a reflective light. So we're not saying that the Christian as light should be the one to whom the people see, shouldn't be the one to whom people give their attention. The Christian must be so exemplary in how he lives that the world will take note, admire him, follow him. That's not what Christ is calling his disciples to. That is the mentality of the Pharisee. That's how the Pharisees would live. The Pharisees wanted their good behavior to cause people to look at them. That is not the call of the Christian. Instead, what the Christian does, the Christian provides light to the world that lives in darkness, and in providing light to the world that lives in darkness, really what the Christian is doing is helping the unbeliever see who he is, helping the unbeliever see his need for a redeemer, helping the unbeliever see that, yes, your life without any hope is that, it's hopeless, it is purposeless, but there is hope, there is comfort, there is purpose in life. And so that's the message of the gospel, again, setting before them the truths that we have rehearsed already earlier on in this sermon. The light of the Christian is to help the world see the message of salvation, help them realize their sin, help them know where comfort and hope can be found. Those are the words that we would speak, the words that we would express to a watching world. But there's also the deeds of light that the Christian is required to practice. Now, what are the deeds of light? What are the deeds that the Christian must live out? Well, they are the opposite of the works of darkness. There's several places in scripture. Oftentimes in scripture, giving an opposite will help you understand what the positive is. So if you look, for example, in Romans 13 and verse 13, he talks there about what the works of darkness are. He says that the works of darkness are orgies, drunkenness, sexual immorality, sensuality, quarreling, and Jealousy, another place of scripture, the way of light is defined for us in Ephesians 5 and verse 17 and 18. Ephesians 5 and verse 8 and 9 speak of the fruit of light, speak of the working, doing the works of light. Verse 18 speaks about some of the works of darkness. Again, drunkenness, debauchery, and the contrast is given there with the works that come when you are filled with the Holy Spirit. There it says that we are to address each other in Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, that we're to sing praise to God, that we're to give thanks to God, that we're to submit to one another. Those, in Ephesians 5, are some of the deeds of light that Scripture defines for us. So how is the scripture applied to the Christian today, to these exceptional circumstances? How does the church give praise to God today? How do we sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to each other? Today, how do we give thanks to God? How do we maintain the fellowship of the congregation? Those are all questions that the church must struggle through and answer in this time of difficulty. The need for the world to have the light of the Word of God shone in them remains. The darkness of the world remains, and so the light should still be shone into the world. Now more than ever, perhaps, the saltiness of life in the world has lost its flavor, right? There is no saltiness in the world. The world is restricted. There's nothing to live for, in a sense. But the Christian gospel can provide that saltiness to the world. How is the church to communicate that today? The sick as well as the healthy continue to have the need to know salvation, to know sin that leads to a knowledge of salvation. And so that's what the Christian disciple is called to do here in these two illustrations that Jesus gives to us. He speaks to us about being salt. He speaks to us about being light. We are the salt of the earth. We are the light of the world. The Christian disciple in that sense is to serve the world by being salt and light in the world. The Christian disciple is to show the world where hope and purpose and joy can be found. The Christian disciple shows the world the things that are necessary to embrace that hope. shows them their need for Christ. But those things, the saltiness and the light of the Christian, are not found in the Christian himself. And we know that because we consider the goal of the disciple in verse 16. That really sets it straight for us. So we want to think about the goal of the disciple next. The Christian disciple has that call to be salt and light, has a call to share the message of Christ, the message of hope and joy, to show the need for Christ, to dispel the darkness of the soul by the reflective light of the gospel. That's the call, but this text isn't only about the call of the Christian disciple. It also explains to the Christian what his goal is. The question of salt and light deals with how the Christian should live, but the why of the context keeps popping up. That's where we began, and that's where we're going to finish as well. The why behind the call of the Christian is demonstrated through the goal of the Christian. And so the Christian is to fulfill that calling of being salt and light for a very specific purpose. There is a goal that is in mind. And if you look with me in verse 16, The first part of the purpose is set before us. Verse 16 says, in the same way, let your light shine before others so that, there's a reason that's coming in verse 16. And so the purpose that is indicated with those two little words, so that, is given to us. The salt that doesn't lose its taste, the light that is not hidden under a basket, the call to be salt, to be light is given so that, this is the reason. It says in verse 16, so that they may see your good works. So that people will see you. Growing up as a young boy in Massachusetts, I was about four, my parents had the somewhat dubious idea of buying soccer boppers for my older brother and me. Soccer boppers are big inflatable boxing gloves and you had a red pair and a blue pair. And I had only one sparring partner, he was way bigger than me and he was much stronger than me and And so my parents would allow us to engage in this kind of behavior. I hope they're not watching right now. But anyways, we would have these soccer boppers. And it didn't strike me at the time, but as I think back of it, it always seems like my brother wanted to try on the soccer boppers and play with the soccer boppers when company would come over. And so company would come over, visit our parents' home, and my brother would wanna put on the soccer boppers, and we would have a sparring match in front of the company. And undoubtedly, I always would get We'd get pummeled. I would always be reduced to a puddle of tears on the floor. When I was living through it, I didn't think much of it. It was just what life was like. But now when I think back of it, it's telling that my brother always wanted to do the soccer bopper thing. When people came over, what was my brother trying to do? He was trying to draw attention to himself, of course. He wanted people to see him. He wanted to see his skill. He wanted to be seen pummeling little Jeff Gleason. His intention was to get attention. That was the purpose, but that's not the purpose of the Christian. That's not where verse 16 leads us. It doesn't say we are to be the light of the world so that they can see your good works and it ends there. For the Christian, the goal is that people would see your good works, not so that they would pay attention to you, but the good deeds are done so that the people would see your good deeds so that they would give glory to your Father who is in heaven. You see, the Christian is not called to give his spiritual resume through his good deeds. The good deeds done by the Christian are a result of the life-changing work in him by God. So our good deeds, whenever they are manifest, they are no reflection of us as individuals. They are a reflection of the work of Christ in your soul. to make you new in thought, word, and deed. Really, this idea is what I consider to be the major flaw in what's described as lifestyle evangelism, where the Christian lives before a watching world without saying anything, just lives doing good things. It is a tremendous flaw because without specific statements about God, the world may never understand why you are doing what you are doing. The Christian, the world will only see your call without ever seeing what sits behind you following that call. It will only see your deeds, it will never understand the why behind the deeds. Brothers and sisters, we are to be salt and light to the world, but in order for us to be salt and light to the world, we must live in a certain way, but that life must be accompanied with an explanation. There must be some kind of an explanation of the words of the gospel, how we live this way out of faithfulness and gratitude to the God who saved us. The message of salvation must be spoken by the church in order for the church to be salt and light. It's not just changing outward behavior. It is setting forward a behavior with the explanation of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The command of Christ to his disciples here in these four verses is, let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds and do what? And give glory to your Father who is in heaven. The purpose of the Christian disciple in all of life is not to manifest good behavior. It's that God's work would be known in the world. That is the light of the world. Your good behavior doesn't make you salty. Your good behavior is not light to the unbeliever. Your light and your salt comes as you reflect the good news of the gospel, as you speak of the good news of the gospel to the people who live around you. So then we want to think a little bit now about what it means to be salt and light in our words and to be salt and light in our deeds. So let's think about first what it means to be salt and light in our words today. What does it mean to be salt and light when we as Christians are so restricted in our ability to move? Our world has gotten very small in the last week, hasn't it? And we don't even know for sure what the future holds, when things will return to normal. But the reality of God's Word, and the reason we turn to God's Word in times of uncertainty, is because the message of God's Word, the calling that God's Word gives to his disciples, has never and will never change. There is this abiding call in God's Word to be salt and light with our words. And so there is the call within the church to the members of the church, to the body of believers. There's that call that we would speak to each other, message of hope, that we as a congregation, as a church of the Lord Jesus Christ wouldn't give way to fear. There is the application for fathers, for parents, a chance for you in your homes to reassure your children in a world where fear seems to have taken over, that there is hope for the believer. The hope of the gospel can be taught and pressed home to your children. You can guard your family against the paralysis. of fear. It is your chance to, as a Christian, check in with your neighbors to speak with them of the hope that you have in Christ. Many of them won't know that hope. You are able to speak that hope to them. It's a chance for you to keep up with colleagues when shifts have been reduced. You can speak to them of the hope and the comfort that you have in Christ. And there are countless other ways that you can speak to people to be salt and light in the world through the things that you say. Are you a disciple of Christ today? Do you follow after Christ today? Do you believe the promise that's found in Scripture which says that His death on the cross pays for the guilt of the sins of His people? Do you believe those things? Do you believe that the pain and sorrow of this life will be replaced one day with peace, eternal peace, peace that can never be interrupted? Well, you have a chance now more than ever to speak the words of hope to the people who live around you. Here at this time more than ever, there should be no basket covering your light. It should be plain for all to hear from your own lips that the good news of the gospel gives hope to all who put their faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. You can do that in your home. You can do that in your neighborhood. You can do that with friends. You can do that with coworkers. Be salt, be light today more than ever. Be salt and light today in the words that you speak to the people who live around you. And so we're to be salt and light in our words. Next, we want to think about what it means to be salt and light in our deeds today. At this time, I believe with all my heart that it's right to isolate yourself, to minimize the risk for others that we come into contact with. We're not afraid of the disease, but we don't want to unnecessarily spread the disease. We're to heed the request of the civil magistrate as much as we can. There's not any other, there's not any way right now anyways to know whether their request is an overreaction or not. Different nations are treating this response, responding to this virus differently and we don't know the effects of those things yet. You know of Denmark and Netherlands who are opting for the herd immunity approach and Italy and others are shutting down everything and we can't tell or at least I can't tell from my vantage point, it's too early to know to discern which is working better, if any of them will work. But in the midst of crisis, wherever you find yourself, our deeds continue to be an avenue for salt and light to be brought to the world. How can you be salt and light in your deeds today? It's not complicated. It's in the little things, right? It can be seen in checking up on others, accompanied with your words of light. Could be seen in purchasing groceries for the elderly so that they need not go into public It could mean simply just checking up on them in person or with a phone call to see how they're doing. It could be seen in a willingness to, a selfless willingness to serve and help the people around you. It could even be seen in something as simple as your calm and friendly disposition towards people. who have been abused by others who are ragged and fearful because of the Corona virus. If you are in Christ, you can be salt and light. If you are in Christ, there is hope for you. There's not any doubt in the life of the Christian. It is true. All of us will die of something. All of us will die of something. And some of us will die of awful things. But the light of the world is not that you will never die. The light of the world is not that you will not contract coronavirus or that everything will be returning to normal very soon. The light of the world isn't those things. The light of the world is found that if you belong to Christ, there is an eternal inheritance that awaits you. There is a gift that God gives to His people through Christ, purchased by Him, that because of that inheritance, you need not fear anything, anything. We need not fear even the coronavirus. Why? because the Christian disciple has been given a firm confidence in the work of Christ. The Christian disciple is poor in spirit. He mourns over his sin. He's meek before the will of the Father. He hungers and thirsts for righteousness. He's merciful to those who are ill. He's pure in heart because God has washed him clean from the fear and saltlessness, the darkness of life outside of Christ. By God's Spirit, the blood of Christ has been applied to your heart and now you are salt and light. That is the firm conviction of the Christian. The Word of God teaches you something, believer. It teaches you that nothing can separate you from the love of God. Nothing can. No virus, no war, no famine, no hardship, nor death. If you are in Christ, nothing can separate you from Him. And that is the light, and that is the salt, and that is what we must remember. from day to day as we live in these uncertain times. We may not be delivered physically. I don't know if we will. I hope that we will. But I don't know that we will. There's no guarantee that we will be delivered physically. But if you are in Christ, you know one thing to be true. You know that you are eternally delivered in a spiritual sense. And so it's good to be prudent. Prudence is the best course of action right now. But it may be God's call to you some point to be salt and light in deed and in word by exposing yourself to risk, to manifest the love of Christ to your fellow man. But when you do that, and if you are called to do that, The goal will never be that that person would think well of you. The goal will never be that the world would say, wow, look at those Christians, aren't they nice people? The goal for the Christian church in being salt and light in the world is not to modify behavior or to draw attention to behavior, but to have an opportunity to speak the light and salt of God's word, the gospel of salvation to them. and to impress on them that it is because of the work of God in us that we live in this way. That's the call of the church. That's the goal of the church. The goal of the church is not the restoration of a life of peace. The goal of the church is not that we would get back to normalcy. The goal of the church is not that everybody would be able to return to their life of ease and comfort, the life of idolatry, really, in so many ways. But the goal of the church is to be the salt and light to the world, that the world would join in with the church in worshiping the one true God. That is the purpose of the church. The purpose of the church is that the world would see her good deeds and give glory to your father who is in heaven. And so the Sermon on the Mount, that's the first lesson that we learn from it. Sermon on the Mount has so many treasures for us. And the first one is this, the call and goal of the Christian disciple. The call is to be salt and light, salt and giving hope to a world consumed with tasteless depression, fearfulness. That's the outlook of the world. Light in illuminating the darkness and showing where salvation can be found. Salt in living according to the hope and joy that we have in Christ. Light in turning away from the deeds of darkness and walking according to our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And in so doing, the goal of it all becomes plain. The call is one thing, but the goal must be plain, that the world might see God. That is the desire of the church. That is the goal of the church, that the world would worship the God of Scripture. Now make no mistake, God doesn't need you for that. He doesn't need me for that. He doesn't need human beings to make Himself known in the world. He can make Himself known without you. But in this moment, and at this time, God has placed you in this circumstance of panic, in this circumstance of fear, in this exceptionally unusual circumstance. He has placed you there to be salt and light today. He has asked you, called you as his disciple to do that work. He has planned to use his people. That is the lesson from the Sermon on the Mount today, that Christ calls you, disciple of Christ, to be salt and light with your words and your deeds for one purpose only, for one purpose only, that the world would hear of the gospel through you, that the world would see the gospel displayed in you, that they would know you, and in knowing you, would give glory to the Father in heaven who has changed you. Let's pray together.