Real Self Esteem! - Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Now, what's interesting is he didn't say you were formerly in darkness. He said you were formerly darkness.

That's who you were. He said, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of the light. So, notice, he picks up what Jesus said. He didn't say you talk about the light, he's saying you are light. You were darkness, now you are light. He said live as children of the light, for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth. Notice, goodness and righteousness has to deal with how you live and truth is what you say. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana.

Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. In their world, there were two kinds of salt. Sea salt, which is pure. In fact, we still see restaurants have sea salt.

You know, that's pure. You know, we got sea salt. But the most of the salt in Israel at the time was dead sea salt. Dead sea salt is not pure. In fact, it's not pure at all. It has a lot of minerals in it.

That's one of the things. But it also has gypsum. It has lots of gypsum. If you have gypsum in your salt, you can't eat it. It won't preserve.

You see, it's of no value at all. It becomes tasteless. And even when they use salt sometimes as part of their fertilizing process, you couldn't put gypsum on a field.

You'd kill everything on the field. And you'd ruin the soil for a period of time afterwards. So the only thing you can do with tasteless salt, as he's saying, is you can make a sidewalk out of it.

That's sort of what he says. He says, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. Salt is not doing what it should be doing. And he says, there's the warning that I have for you.

That's the warning about this completely. Now, what I find interesting about that is that what he's implying here is that if we lose our unique qualities of salt, according to Jesus, we become tasteless and good for nothing. That's an interesting assessment.

He just told us two of the most wonderful things about it. We are the salt of the earth and we're the light of the world. And then he says, yeah, but if you become tasteless, you're good for nothing. See, in that sense, we're God's plan. The whole idea is how is God going to influence a sinful, dark world? Us.

We're the plan. He says, yeah, because you are the salt of the earth. If you're really beatitude people, he says, you will be salt to your culture.

You have to interact with the culture. The American church has not been very good at this. The American church has become more often than not a sequestered group of people. Everything about the idea of the church is how much can we do in these walls and not having to do with them out there? That's not a good thing. That's not what Jesus has in mind. Notice he also doesn't cause sugar.

And I think it's pretty interesting. The difference between sugar and salt is this. Salt irritates.

And if you don't believe me, next time you get a cut, don't worry about macurichrome or anything like that. Just put some salt on it. And you'll find out just how irritable it is. Salt can irritate you. Hence, that's why he told them, blessed are you when you're persecuted, because when you act as salt, you're going to be an irritant and you will be persecuted. That's OK. You see, he'd said it later in John. He says the world will hate you because it first hated me. What was Jesus? He was salt. He said that's what I want you to be just as well. I want you to be salt.

So then he moves on in verse 14. You're the light of the world. One of the definitions Webster uses for light is this. Something that enables you to see. What a simple definition of light.

Think about it. You'd have perfect eyes, but if you don't have light, what? You can't see anything. There's no value having sight if you don't have light. The only thing that gives it is light. In 1 John 1.5, he writes and says God is light. That the essence God is light. 1 Timothy 6.16, God dwells in unapproachable light. God is light.

Creation is dark. It's light is of God. Christ is called in John the light of the world. In Psalm 119, his word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path.

And then Paul goes in and says look, you got to be light. Hold your place there and go with me to Ephesians chapter 5 verse 8. Ephesians chapter 5 verse 8. The apostles, both Peter and Paul picked right up on this. They never forgot what Jesus said about light. So in chapter 5 of Ephesians, Paul is warning them about falsity, immorality and all that.

And he says in 7, therefore do not be partakers of them. And then he says this, for you were formerly darkness. Now what's interesting is he didn't say you were formerly in darkness. He said you were formerly darkness.

That's who you were. He said but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of the light.

So notice, he picks up what Jesus said. He didn't say you talk about the light, he's saying you are light. You were darkness, now you are light. He said live as children of the light. For the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth. Notice goodness and righteousness has to deal with how you live and truth is what you say.

Trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness. But instead even expose them.

For it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light.

There's everything. Our job is to expose what's dark. We're to shine light on things with truth but we're to be an example with our lives.

How exactly do we do this? Go with me now to 1 Peter chapter 2. And if you haven't felt good about yourself for the Son of God calling you salt and light, maybe now you will because Peter is going to tell you a whole bunch of other things about you.

That you'll say I know it's true but I just can't believe it. Peter writes this in verse 9. You are a chosen race. You are a royal priesthood. You are a holy nation. You are a people for God's own possession.

So that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light. How did that happen? For once you were not a people but now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy but now you've received mercy. Wow.

How does that work? You see, God called us out. We are a holy nation set apart by God. We are salt and we are light. When it comes to light, I think an analogy that kind of works is think of the sun. Without the sun, there's no life on earth. And in fact, if you read enough about it, if the sun weren't exactly the distance away and the angle of the earth axis exactly the angle of the earth axis, you can go on and on with this, there'd be no life here.

None. So don't ever believe that when they say, well, anywhere there's just a globe going around any kind of a star or sun, that'll be life. The amount of conditions that have to happen from an astronomical point of view are immense. But the sun gives us life. What's the moon do? Well, the moon gives us a little light.

Now, this is before electricity. The moon gives us a little light in the darkness. Is it the moon's own light?

I hope you're not shocked by this. The moon doesn't have light. OK, the moon doesn't generate any light. It's just a mirror. It just reflects light from the sun onto the earth. So the moon's job is to reflect not its own light, but the light from the sun into a darkness.

That describes us. You see, we are to reflect his light in the darkness. That's how this works.

That's just the analogy. Salt is a negative. It prevents something bad from happening. Light's a positive. It causes something good to happen to find our way in the darkness. Then he gives us some characteristics about the light, Matthew 5.

Notice verse 14. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. What's he saying about light? Can't miss it. Can't miss light. Doesn't matter. They actually built a lot of their cities on hills, not only because it was cooler in one way, more altitude, but so the people would find it at night easily.

No electricity again. So a city on a hill, you'd say, well, I know where this is at. It's on the hill. So he says, you can't miss it. In a sense, if he says that about us, what's it say? There are no Christians in the Secret Service. You're not.

You can't claim to be a Secret Service Christian. You should not be able to miss you. No matter where you are, you should be able to be seen. You should act as light does in darkness.

Secondly, he goes on and says this. He says, nor does anyone light a lamp. Put it under a basket, put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. In other words, light helps people see.

But it has to be. Has to be used as light. How many of you have ever bought a lamp that you really liked in a nice box, brought it home, carried it in your house, put it in the closet, in the box, and closed the door?

You see, it's almost funny to us, right? But that's a picture of a lot of Christians. They don't light. They don't want to light. They don't see it as light. Look, you're a lamp.

Your job is to produce light where you are. I'll give you one analogy I hear often. Christians will say things like this, oh, Pastor, you need to pray for me because you just can't believe where I work. They're unsaved. They're vulgar.

Their language is bad. I just pray that the Lord will provide another job for me. I'll be honest. I'll pray, but probably not about that.

I'll pray that you realize how strategic you are. I've heard people say, hey, together with my family, they're all lost, and I just want to get away from them. What do you think you're there for? You're there to be light. Who needs light? Darkness. So your job is to be light.

I don't know if I want to be comfortable with that. You shouldn't be, but you should be light. You should live in the light, and you should be able to speak in the light.

You see, that's the whole point. God loves us to be lights in darkness. The whole missions movement, worldwide missions movement, was what? They went to places that were completely spiritually dark. Many of them were executed, and they let their light shine. What's happening among the countless now, Muslim believers who have come to Christ, especially in places like Iran, they're going to let their light shine. They don't hide out. There's no hiding. They're going to proclaim it, and when you read their testimonies, most of them believe within two to three years they'll be dead. Eventually be known enough, and they'll be executed, and they say that's okay with me, but I'm not going to hide my light.

I'm not going to pretend like I just got to fit in. You see, you have to act like light, because you have to, in a sense, help people see what the truth is. Salt is given because our culture is rotting, and light is given simply because our culture is in the dark. That's why Jesus said we're both of these things. And then he goes on and he commands it. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who's in heaven.

Wow. By the way, this is a command that the Jews of Israel ignored completely. God told them in the Old Testament they're going to light the world. You see, the analogy was the same in the Old Testament. Did Jews go out and try to light their world?

Nope. They isolated. In fact, they didn't want anything to do with what they called Gentiles, what they called filthy goyim. We don't want anything to do with those people. So they never were a light in our world. You see, and that was the problem. They were to be the light. But we can make the same kind of mistake. You see, we say, well, it's so dark out there, I don't want to be any part of that.

Well, you'll never be salt and light if you're not. You see, God needs us in the world, but he doesn't need the world in us. And sadly enough, from most of the more neutral people and pollsters, they believe in the last 30 years in America, the world has had way more influence on the church than the church has had on the world.

We're picking up worldly practices, you see, and the world is not really reacting to us much at all. So what he ends up saying here is, I command you to do this. And notice, it's more than just our words, because here he says something that's really interesting to me. He says, in such a way that they may see your good works.

This wasn't just our words. This is how we live our life. You see, it's an interesting thing. If you're in the business world here, and by the way, you speak the truth and honor your word, you're unusual.

You're unusual. You know, it's interesting that the whole, they may respect it, but they say, wait, wait, I gave my word. If I give my word, that's it.

Once I say this is it, this is it. You see, just imagine if we were known, and I hope we are in many cases, as truth tellers. You see, because so much in our world, and you run into it all the time, someone says something to you, there's a misunderstanding, and then they'll act like they never said it, but you knew they did. That's the way of the world.

You know, and it's an interesting thing. And sometimes, I'm not picking on business here, but I know as a church when we deal with people in business, a lot of the people use words that give them room, and if you listen carefully to the word, we've gone through an insurance-adjusting situation, and the words were very carefully crafted, but they gave wiggle room. They weren't just straightforward words.

These words are designed to make sure you can't paint me into a corner. So he says, these will be your good works, and there's two Greek words that are used for good. The one word would be the quantity of our works. That's not the word Jesus uses. He uses kalos. Kalos means the quality of our works, the beauty of it. The word means beautiful or attractive, our beautiful, attractive works. I'll give you a classic example.

I've used it before. In Rome, at the time of the early church, Romans had a custom that if you, after you've had at least, if you had one daughter for sure, you wanted to have a son as an heir, but if you had a second daughter, all you did is take the baby from the mother after it's born, laid in the city dump, and let it die. Just let them all die. All the girls died. They didn't want any more. Guess what Christians did?

They had 24-hour surveillance on the city dump. They picked up the baby. They adopted him and cared for their own.

And you can read Roman historians that say, I just don't understand how they could do this. It's not even their child. That's letting your light shine. That's a pretty wonderful thing to do. You see, that's the degree of sacrifice that there actually can be in a case like this. And he says, look what happens to it. He goes on and says, and they will glorify your Father who is in heaven.

Wow. It's all for God's glory. The word is doxa. We get the word doxology. Doxology is we just sing praise to God for his attributes. That's God being glorified, and that's what this is. You will glorify the Father in heaven.

Also notice this. We don't have any right to brag about being light because it's only his light. You see, it's just reflective light from that point of view. So, God needs our light in the darkest places. Darkness cannot put out light.

Just think of that. You could have a small flashlight and go into a place as big as the Superdome. It's pitch black. Can all that darkness put the light out? Can darkness be put out by light, though?

Yes. And that's what he's saying. Darkness can't do it. So, Jesus says to you and to me, you are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. And that's what you really are. That's what you really are.

And the person that said it can't be wrong. How should that make you feel? You see, how should that make you feel?

I hope pretty good, pretty important. This is God speaking. This is not another person's assessment. This is God speaking about you.

What I really hope is it makes you motivated. See, I don't want to be tasteless, worthless, salt, good for nothing but for men who walk on. Son of God called me the salt of the earth and there I am being walked on by men because I'm tasteless. I don't want to hide my light. I want people to see my reflected light and come to my Savior. My life is just as important as my words.

See, that's such a wonderful thing. Our being salty can preserve God's judgment on this country. Our being salty, not them.

Please, this is one of my pet peeves. So many Christians are upset because unsaved people are living like unsaved people. I just can't believe what they're doing. Of course you can.

What would you expect them to do? You see, there's darkness out there. But we can preserve judgment based on the character in here. And our giving of light can result in people coming to Jesus Christ. And I know that's true because Jesus said it. The way you live and the words you say can bring people to me. And that's the solution.

So you are salt and you are light. Now act like it. Let's pray. Father, ironically there are so many of us that have such bad self-esteem. We don't feel special. We don't feel that we have anything to offer.

We feel that we could do better. But Jesus Christ our Lord has told us who we really are. The salt of the earth.

The light of the world. Father, what a magnanimous thing to say about each and every one of us. I pray Father we take this to heart. I pray we understand your assessment of us and the responsibility that you've given us. We are thankful that you have saved us through your son. But we are also thankful that you will now use us to bring others to Christ. Thankful, useful. That's our goal. We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. And you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website you will find not only today's broadcast but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org.

That's fbcnola.org. At our website you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for you can listen online or if you prefer you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word. ... ...