In his sermon 'Blessed are the Persecuted,' Paul Carrington explores the final Beatitude from the Sermon on the Mount, emphasizing that those persecuted for righteousness' sake are blessed, as theirs is the kingdom of heaven. He delves into the paradox that persecution, intended to destroy joy, should instead increase it. Carrington cites historical examples, such as David D'Lyden's case, the persecution of Christians worldwide, and the Waldensians' plight, to illustrate the enduring nature of persecution in the Christian experience. He contrasts genuine persecution with self-inflicted struggles due to folly or fanaticism, urging Christians to remain distinct from the world, embodying the roles of 'salt and light.' The sermon highlights the transformative power of persecution in advancing the Christian faith and encourages believers to shine their light and perform good works, ultimately glorifying God.

Alright, well good afternoon. We are going to be back in the Sermon on the Mount here this afternoon in Matthew, the fifth chapter, and we're going to be dealing with the final Beatitude and then going on to verse 15. So if you have your Bibles, we're going to be in Matthew chapter 5 and we're going to be reading in verse 10 down to verse 15. But here we find the the King of Peace, he surprises us in these following verses here. You know, on the heels of blessed are the peacemakers.

You would think that peace or some other wonderful thing would be the fruit and the next cascading beatitude, but we find something different here in this final one. In verse 10 it says, blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad for great is your reward in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You are the light of the world, a city that is set on a hill, cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.

Let's pray. Lord, that is our desire with The life that you've given us, Lord, that we would be salt, that we would be light in the world, shining, adding flavor, Lord, preserving the things that you would have us to preserve. Lord, we pray that you would please help us as we go through these verses spoken from the very lips of our Savior, Lord, that we would be instructed and helped. We need you Lord and we ask you now to come and be with us as we go through your Word. In Jesus name, amen.

Amen. Well if you've been with us as we've been going through the this sermon on the mount we've been looking at really the the various facets of what a Christian is at root what a Christian is to be and here's how we finish is really this portrait of a Christian And because of the character a Christian exhibits in the world, a world that's opposed to God, what we find is something entirely different, something actually quite difficult. He's saying to you in verse 10, because you're following me, because you're exhibiting the character of a Christian, Here is what is going to happen to you in the world. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. This is really the final beatitude.

From a human standpoint, we came close really to getting a real taste of what this verse means and what other people outside of the Western world have experienced for long long periods of time and even up until this time if you go around the world persecution is at an all-time high And we came pretty close as a nation. You know, in 2015, I'm not sure if you can recall, but there was a man, a young man, who went undercover in San Francisco. His name was David D'Lyden, and he went to expose the rampant evil of planned parenthood. Not only were they cavalierly slaughtering children, but then they would take the parts and then sell them and make profit off of the the body parts of the children and he presented the world really with irrefutable proof. There was nothing you could really say you know everything was on video from the executives of Planned Parenthood in their own words.

It was self-condemning. Even Republicans, they saw the footage and they started talking about we need to defund Planned Parenthood once and for all. But something happened. I remember watching this all unfold and I said this is it. But Planned Parenthood met with a friendly attorney general in California behind closed doors.

And the next thing that happened, this attorney general, she left into action. She raided David Delighted's apartment. Eleven armed men went in with guns in the K-9 unit. And They gathered all this stuff, took all this stuff. They labeled him what you call an ideological activist, quote unquote.

And before you know it, Planned Parenthood was the victim. They were awarded $2.4 million for damages to their impeccable reputation. And not only that, $13 million to cover all of their attorney's fees. And Deleiden, on the other side, the man who exposed all of this irrefutably, as we speak, he's I think going to court in December he has eight felonies that he's facing and time in jail and You know even the liberal Los Angeles Times this newspaper in LA They said that this was a disturbing overreach, quote-unquote, of the attorney general. They couldn't even justify her activity.

And it turns out that that attorney general was none other than Kamala Harris, our current vice president, who weaponized the legal system to try to destroy it. In fact, in a microcosm, in a single state, did something that shocked everyone who was paying attention. Imagine that had been done, not on a micro state, in a state level, but on a federal level, which seems to be the entire platform of the Democrat Party. So of course she went on to run for senator and the first thing she did was hire Cecile Richards daughter to be her top aide. Cecile Richards was the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood at that time.

And so Trump isn't the only one that seems to have dodged a bullet a couple of months ago. You know, you don't have to be too imaginative to really think about what would have happened to Christians who are standing for this very cause and saying no, God has spoken on the matter if she had won the presidency. But of course by the grace of God we have a reprieve. But it's not so as I mentioned for so many of our brothers and sisters when you go around the world. Really persecution is part of the normal Christian experience and it has been historically all the way through.

And in Hebrews we read about our biblical duty even though right now we have this reprieve and we've lived in an exit we've existed in a Christian culture for so long and really the benefits of that. Hebrew says to remember the prisoners as if chained with them those who are mistreated since you yourselves are also in the body and we can we can look back not even too far. Just a couple of years ago, if you go up to Canada, you had these brothers. One of the most inspiring talks at the last conference was by a brother, a pastor named, I think his name is Tim Stevens, and he talked about what happened to him during the time of COVID where he was, it's all on video, they took him away from his wife and seven children and carted him off to prison for 30 days simply because he refused to comply and say that the church wasn't essential. Or we have in December of 2019, there's a pastor by the name of Wang Yi, who is a pastor of Early Rain Covenant Church in China.

And he was charged and then imprisoned for nine years. He's coming up on his fifth year and his charge is inciting to subvert state power and illegal business operations. Notice how when they charge you with something, it's this kind of legalese, just like they did with David de Liden or they're doing with this man, not with being a Christian, but they hide and they coat it with something else. But it's not always prison or death, you know, it can take many forms. I remember that when we were in Turkey, there was a lot of persecution, but a lot of it was softer.

You know, you would be ostracized from your family. You just don't exist anymore, or you lose your job, right? These are still forms. You're shunned by the broader society. These are still forms of persecution, But look what the Lord says.

He says, blessed are you, or those who are persecuted for righteousness sake. And you know, there's a modifier here for righteousness sake. That's important. It's easy to think that you're being persecuted sometimes, maybe for something that might be folly. You've called down judgment or you've called down persecution on your own head.

And nowhere do you find in the Bible where the Lord exalts a martyr complex. That's not what he's talking about when he's talking about blessed or those who are persecuted. He says for righteousness sake. And so neither does the spirit of a fanatic really show itself positively in the New Testament. You know, the reality is that sometimes as Christians we can just be plain rude and obnoxious.

There is a, sometimes that can be an actual accurate statement. You know, you don't get to go Westboro Baptist on your opponents and then throw the persecution flag and say I'm being persecuted when you brought it on your own self. And I've seen this oftentimes in open air preaching. I felt that temptation as well, you know, and I've seen it firsthand where it can just devolve into fleshly insults. You know, they're insulting you, and then you start insulting them.

And then you can say, well, I'm being persecuted. I don't think that's what the Lord is really saying. But he's saying that blessed, happy, God's face shines upon you when you are persecuted for righteousness sake. This is really the beatitude, it's the greatest paradox of all of them because how can you be happy in persecution when you're feeling physical pain or you've been cut off or something else is happening to you. You see, this is what the Lord does.

He turns every hardship into victory because, you know, the persecutor, he or she, they become so aggravated to such a degree that they lash out, right? That's what's happening. And from the persecutors perspective, the persecution is designed to destroy enjoyment. That's the whole purpose of persecution, to destroy enjoyment, to try to strip away peace, to separate you from your God. That's really the whole point.

But here we see it's actually the subject of rejoicing. Instead of losing happiness, Jesus is saying no, it should increase our happiness. Do you remember when brother Trent he was going through Acts and we saw, was it Peter? It was Peter and John I think they were leaving the Sanhedrin and they were rejoicing that they were after being beaten whips on their backs that they had been counted worthy to suffer for the name. That's kind of the idea here that we have before us.

And nothing in the world is more God-glorifying and more perplexing than a person who is suffering persecution and rejoices. I remember reading of Pastor Wormbrand. He was a pastor over in Romania in the time of communism. And there he was for 17 years in prison and the things that they would do are unspeakable to these men, it was unbelievable. And after one time he was being beaten, he was sent back to his prison cell, He couldn't walk, his feet were beaten and everything.

So he's on his knees and he's praying. And one of the guards comes up to the prison door, you know, they're all locked in. He pulls the window open and screams in, what are you doing? Why are you praying? And he says, I'm praying for you.

He totally disarmed the man who had given him the beating just five minutes ago. What do you do with a man like that? There's not much you can really do. And this is really, again, this is the reality of many of our brothers and sisters around the world, but the reality is this that God and his church will not be thwarted with difficulty. A man might even die, but the church will continue.

In fact, that's what caused Tertullian to make that comment, that observation, where he says that the blood of martyrs is the seed of the church. It seems foreign to us here in North America in 2024, But it is a reality all the way through and we'll see it even more clearly, this idea of the blood of the martyrs being the seat of the church when we get to Acts, I think it's chapter 7, when Stephen dies. And you remember whose feet they lay the clothes at? The Apostle Paul. That must have been the most impactful thing that contributed to this man's salvation and not only his salvation but probably all through his life.

When he gets to the end and he calls himself the chief of sinners, he says, I was a blasphemer, but I did it ignorantly. He never forgot that. Not that he felt the weight and guilt of it, but he knew what it was to partake in something like that. And all through history, God has used the persecutor, he's persecuting the believer, and then that persecutor, you can go to all sorts of stories and you see that persecutor actually becomes a Christian. It's amazing.

Even up until the last century, with the treatment of the Jews and all these different things. Those ladies who were hiding the Jews in their house and years later meeting their persecutors. It's an astounding, powerful weapon that we should not diminish. You know, I think it is also in Acts, or the Apostle Paul actually says, yes, and all who shall live godly will suffer persecution. All who desire to live godly shall suffer persecution.

And I mentioned the fanatic, but there's also something else. You can have the fanatic on one side and then you can have the coward on the other side that knows nothing of even a terse glance. You know, the one who plays to the admiration of men in every circumstance. Jesus says this, woe to you and all men speak well of you and they speak well of you because you've mastered the art of being a chameleon. You change your color and shape depending on the company that you're in.

And that man will likely never suffer any persecution, but you need to beware. That's even more dangerous than the fanatic. And so if you've never perhaps faced even a terse glance or anything like that, it's likely because you're on the sidelines and haven't really engaged. You're watching the game that's taking place on the field without actually being a partaker. Beware of that spirit, the fanatic on the one side and the shape-shifting, color-changing chameleon on the other side.

And so if you wish to live godly in Christ, one thing you have to do is to make up your mind that you will encounter persecution. And there's one reason why Christians encounter persecution, and that's one word, different. They're different, and the non-Christian recognizes this. They're different. They are light in a dark world.

And we'll get to that in a second here. You know, if you go back in history, one of the most amazing stories is that of the Waldensians. And if you go just down I-40 actually, not too far, about three hours before you reach Asheville, there's a town called Valdez. And in 1893, a group of about 29 of these Waldensians traveled from Europe to North Carolina and they founded that town called Valdis. But if you go back to the 1100s, way back, there was a man by the name of Peter Waldo and he was a Frenchman.

He lived in a town called Lyon. And this man got a hold of the scriptures, the Latin Vulgate, and he began to read it. This is really at the same time, just for context, the third crusade was happening under Richard the Lionheart, who left England and goes all the way to the Holy Land. This is 300 plus years before Luther and he gets hold of the Word of God. He's a wealthy man.

He sells all his stuff and he goes out into the streets and he begins preaching open air to the people of Leon. And of course people now get saved, they start coming to a knowledge of the truth, they begin to follow after his teaching and a movement emerges and the key thing around this movement was a high esteem for the scriptures. That's really the whole thing that characterized these men and women. And so the Archbishop of Leon decides, I need to oppose this. And he makes an appeal to Rome, and he gets permission to treat these men harshly.

Well, long story short, Waldo, he rejects the edict. There's an edict that comes out forbidding him to preach and he quotes from Acts. He says that he would choose rather to obey God rather than men. Well, soon they find themselves on the run and they head out to the eastern part of France to the Alps. And they had very kind of imperfect developing doctrine, you know, they had just gotten their hands on the Word of God.

Sometimes people kind of chastise them for this, but they had the character of, again, a love for the scriptures. And that love led them into friendship centuries later with Jan Hus. And then 100 plus years later with men like Calvin and Zwingli and William Farrell and Luther. And so imagine these people, here they are living high up in the Alps, they're eking out a living any way that they could, it's not easy, of course. And their whole desire, it was to seek, they were seeking to lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.

They weren't fanatics, you know, but they also weren't cowards. They knew what they knew and they treated it as precious and valuable. Well, the persecutors didn't let up. From the 1100s, One of the greatest tragedies in the history of the Reformation occurred in April of 1545, so 300 plus years later. And political and Catholic leaders had finally cornered them.

It was led by the Archbishop of Lyon, and they massacred about 4, 000 Valdensians in 22 villages. You know, I thought about reading a first-hand account, because some of the men survived, but it's too gruesome, the things that they did. They didn't just kill these people, but it's unspeakable really. But guess what? Calvin, about a week later, heard of this account and he wrote to his friend Pharrell, and this is a side we don't often see of Calvin, but he says this, quote, I write worn out with sadness and not without tears, which so burst forth that every now and then they interrupt my words.

You know, he went, he didn't just talk though. So Calvin, he decides to use his influence and he went throughout all the Swiss churches and all the land and he began to zealously appeal to those in France also for his persecuted brethren, these Waldensians, even warning pastors not to relax on the Waldensian issue. And those men back in those days when they warn you they're not just playing a game, they're calling down God's judgment of you to say, you know what, I'm not going to get involved in this particular issue for political purposes. Well, long story short, Calvin rallied the pastors who then made their appeal politically, and the result was that the surviving Waldensians, they gratefully made their way to Switzerland, and they found refuge in Geneva at the academy. And now they can rest.

Well, guess what? The result of this was that Calvin had such a massive impact on sharpening the Waldencian doctrine. These men, now trained in Geneva, guess what they did? They went back to those same valleys, to the Piedmont, to the mountains of the Alps. They went everywhere preaching and diffusing the knowledge of God in every place.

It's an amazing account that took place over hundreds and hundreds of years. Here they are chased, harassed, persecuted until 1848. They finally achieved freedom to worship in Italy. For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Praise God for his goodness.

Over 700 plus years, a group of people living faithfully, not in the forefront. And so we've seen the eight character traits of a Christian man, really the qualities he possesses as a result of being a Christian. Blessed are those who mourn, we saw blessed are those who hunger and thirst, the peacemakers and so on. Well the Lord on this particular one, he doesn't just leave it, blessed are the persecuted, those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of God, but it's really the only one that he decides he's going to elaborate on, perhaps because it's such a difficulty. He says in verse 11, blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake.

Again notice the modifier, Just like persecuted for righteousness sake, on this side he says all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Not because you are a fool, not because you are immoral, not because you are calling for stripes, but because you are simply different in the world. You live by a different code, you have a different message, your life orbits around a totally different object. That's going to gain the attention of a watching world. You become salt and light.

Well what does Jesus do? He reminds you, as difficult as this is, you're in wonderful company. Look what he says, he says, rejoice and be exceedingly glad. For great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. And so if you go back even to the very first crime committed after the fall, you see this thread kind of woven all the way through Scripture from from men like Abel persecuted for righteousness sake.

David, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Daniel, Elijah, Mordecai, the Lord Jesus himself, and of course the Apostles and the early church. You fast forward, you see men like Patrick, fast forward, you see men like Luther, the Covenanters, the Huguenots, Hudson Taylor, John Patton, Wormbrand. This is really all through church history. You go to Hebrews chapter 11 and there you find your nation. That's your tribe right there.

And they conquered through apparent weakness. Isn't that amazing? This is how the church has marched forward so often. You know Paul, he was a criminal, again according to Rome. He was beheaded on Nero's orders at Rome's Mamertine prison, like all the other men who would be beheaded.

They just take your body, throw it over the wall, you're eaten by dogs. But look at the strides Christianity has made so that even today, 2000 years later, we call our sons Paul and our dogs Nero. See, it's totally flipped on its head as Christianity has advanced down through the ages. And so in our next verses here, look what we find here. We see what the Christian man is in the world and his mission is revealed.

You can't get clearer than this. This is really the DNA of a Christian. This is the DNA of the Church of Jesus Christ. Look what he says, you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.

And so with the Beatitudes we've seen what a Christian is and now we see how we ought to live and be in the world and how is his life characterized. It's by these two properties of salt and light. And I just want to talk a little bit about salt here and here we see again God, he reveals his mind and his purpose to us right here there's there's no monastery for you if you become a Christian but we also have to beware of the reformed monastery as well our little kind of I think our one brother I heard the other day call it a holy huddle, you know, and it can be just as ungodly or unlike what God really has for us as his people. Do you see your mission here right in this little verse? He talks about salt.

Well what are some of the properties of salt? Well, salt adds taste. That's one thing. But it also acts as a preservative. And in days, 2, 000 years ago, there's no refrigeration.

Salt was an essential commodity. It was traded all across the ancient world. If you didn't have salt, meat would rot. It just wouldn't be able to last very long, of course, and especially in a hot climate. And this tells you a lot about how Christ sees the world.

So he tells you who you are, but he also reveals how he sees the world. It's subject to rottenness. It's full of sin. It's tending to decay. That's what he's saying when he says, you are the salt of the earth.

Without you, everything goes to rot. And I wonder how much of our present day, when we look around, is a direct result. It's related to our own saltlessness as a church perhaps over the last 100 years. Is that, do you see a correlation between the two? That where salt is doing its work, working itself into every aspect that it preserves, but where salt is not or where salt loses its saltiness, everything tends to moral decline and decay.

Well what is the remedy for this? He's telling us right here, you're the salt of the earth, this picture of covering the earth, rubbing it into the meat, that's what you do, you rub it in and it acts as that preservative. You know, society actually knows that the church is there. Why? Because we speak.

Men operate businesses with Christian principles. We govern. Men govern in the sphere of politics with Christian principles. We serve with whatever opportunities we can. We love one another.

We raise godly families when all is tatters around us and those families shine or they display a difference. We display the character of Christ in our daily interactions. That's really the design and purpose that Christ is saying here. Our lives are observable, they're not cloistered, hidden away where men don't interact with us. And so as we do so, the salt, it gets into the meat and it's preserved.

Again, It's because Christians are utterly unlike the world around them. Our lives are different and it reminds men that there is a God. That's what a difference in a Christian life means. And not only that there is a God, but that he reigns. That's so critical.

You know, I was reading just the other day of a revival that took place in Wales in the 1700s at the same time of George Whitfield. And this is what the writer says. He says of Wales before and then Wales after. He says, ignorance can cover the face of Wales. Hardly any gospel privilege could stand against the corruption of the day.

Until about 1738 light broke forth as the dawn. And you know when I look at this I'm thinking of our nation. He says oh wonderful day. And then he speaks of this one man that was used mightily, this man by the name of Daniel Rowland. One man said, he had vast power to call all to Christ.

Never did I hear such calling, such earnest striving to call all to Christ. Now the tone, now look what happened as a result of this, now the tone of the whole district was changed. Instead of playing games on the Sabbath, dancing, cursing, swearing, blaspheming the name of God, singing unworthy songs, empty talk, gossiping, lying, and persecuting God's people. Instead of all this, the shepherds would sing hymns in the valleys. The plowman and the driver of his oxen often sing psalms and spiritual songs together in the fields.

The maidens, the children, and the old men together, discoursing happily about the works of the Spirit of Grace. And then this, to the flesh and the un and the natural man, this wonderful work of heaven was as full of awe and as fearful as blood and vapor, smoke and fire to timid men. You see what happened when the church was the church, even the ungodly man is sitting back saying what in the world is going on and he's afraid. It's amazing what happens. And so this is the great indictment really against the modern American church that has spent millions of dollars and decades trying to win the world by being like the world.

When here the Lord is saying the exact opposite, that's not what works. Don't try your own little strategies. You know, Brothers and sisters, we need to recognize that worldliness constantly threatens to make our church weak, in vain. Think about that, to absorb us, and just to take away what makes us different. That's the war right now going on at Hope Baptist Church.

And Jesus says, if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. Question for you, where are the seven churches of Asia Minor today? Where are the mighty churches of Switzerland and Scotland today? Where are the Waldensians today?

Go to the Moravians or the Huguenots. You won't find salt. They've lost their saltiness or saltness over the time. They've been swallowed up and Jesus says as a result they're good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. These aren't just soft little words.

He says, not only though are we to be salt, look at this, he says that you are reflectors of the light of the world himself. He says in verse 14, you are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a lampstand and it gives light to all who are in the house." It's amazing to think here's Jesus he's sitting on the side of a hill and he's looking at this little band I don't know how big they are on a hill in Palestine and he's saying you're the light of the world. He's not referring to the opulence of the palaces and courts of Rome and their temples, but rather this little band of disciples saying, you're the light of the world.

We saw that the world is subject to decay, that's what he meant in the last verse, that necessitates salt. But also now we see the world is dark and that necessitates light. And just like the salt, there's a warning. Salt, be certain you don't lose your saltness or you'll be useless. In the same way he says, light, remember that a city on a hill cannot be hidden.

It's an almost comical picture he paints when he says this idea of you light this lamp, you get it going, and then you come and you put a basket or a bushel over top of it. It'd be kind of a strange thing to actually see. He says no, the whole purpose of light is to give light to all who are in the house. Just as salt salts the world. It's almost kind of a similar type of thing.

Why is he saying this? This is how the Lord really defines a Christian. A true Christian emanates light wherever he is, wherever he goes, there's light emanating from him. He has a message to tell and he holds it forth. It reflects and refracts in the way that he lives and interacts with those around him.

He says it's no different than a city on a hill. It's unhideable if I can make up a word. You know, how ridiculous when you think about it after all the things he just described in the Beatitudes, this amazing beautiful portrait of what it means to be a Christian, right? Blessed are the poor in spirit all the way to persecuted, that now the temptation would be to hide all of that. After all he's done underneath a basket, to be hidden and to prevent those very characteristics from being observed by the world.

You know, it's really difficult to know what to do with saltless salt and lightless light. It's a real difficult thing. And there are times when we're tempted to live like this. I know I felt that temptation at times, you know, just to win the favor of godless men, maybe to smile at something you wouldn't normally smile at. Sometimes it seems out of season to stand for Christ.

I wonder have you ever felt that temptation yourself if you've lived any length of time as a Christian maybe you have. And often of course not only that but we yield to our own flesh as well right. It's like a basket sometimes you know you're a Christian you're the light of the world but then you just lash out in your own flesh at maybe a circumstance or another person in your family, you're irritable or whatever it is. It's like that idea of you're being light and you're just covering it over with a basket. Well if salt adds taste and preserves, what does light do?

Well in a dark world what does light do? It's unignorable. It's a city on a hill. Everywhere Christianity is going it's shining. It's exposing the darkness.

And so a Christian is light in the sense that he shows what man was actually made for. You were made for relationship, right relationship with God. And so the problem that we run into because we're different as Christians and we ought to show forth the light, there's one big big problem is that men love darkness rather than light. The watching world doesn't necessarily admire. They recognize, but they don't always admire light.

In fact, they love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. And so we see the properties of a Christian in the world and then we come to our very first command in all of the Sermon on the Mount. Are you ready? Do you want to see the Christian manifesto, so to speak, or really the entire book of Acts in one verse? He says, let your light so shine, this is a command, before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven." And so really this is about being a vibrant joyful proclamer of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

And he's basically saying, be on the lookout here for opportunities for works that you can do That will bring glory to your father. You know if I were to say to you men here today, you know I think it's optional for you to provide for your family. If you feel like it, you can. If not, it's no big deal. I'd probably be attacked or mocked or who knows what for that statement, and it would be rightly deserved.

But why then do we sometimes persuade ourselves that it's also optional to evangelize, to spread the gospel when we have very direct commands, to spread it as far and wide to every creature. It's interesting how we can do one and not the other. And so seeing what you have been made, you know, the Beatitudes, you were made this way to shine light in the world and to testify of God. This is really, again, you look at the book of Acts, this is exactly what's happening from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth diffusing the aroma of Christ in every place. They couldn't help but do it.

And so this is really the grand purpose. It's not for our glory but his because we are his handiwork. And I just want to end with a quote here from Martin Lloyd Jones. He says this, you and I are to live in such a way that as men and women look at us, we become a problem to them. They will ask, what is it?

Why are these people so different in every way, different in their conduct and behavior, different in their reactions? There is something about them that we just do not understand and we cannot explain it. So their only conclusion is to consider and to acknowledge God and in acknowledging him to do what Jesus said, whether they bow their knee or not, that they give glory or glorify your Father in heaven. So let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for these words of our Savior.

Lord, we pray that you would challenge us to live in the light of them. Lord, help us to be the things that we've read about, to be salt, to be light, Lord, to impact the surrounding culture and to preserve the things that are good, to uphold your truth in the world, Lord. Even if it comes at great expense and cost to ourselves, we need you. We need your power and your strength, Lord, to enable us. Lord, be with us for this week and help us, Lord.

Give us opportunity to even speak a word to a stranger or to people that we know at the workplace or neighbors. Lord, please open up our Eyes and ears that our light would shine in Jesus name. Amen