MATTHEW 5:13-16
"You are the salt of the earth" v13; and in v14, "You are the light of the world".
Upon reading these verses, I realised it's a great deal harder to find God's hand in the New Testament than the old - for me personally, that is; and that because I have revelations from days gone by that cling to NT passages, whereas with the OT I have fewer revelations and can read each passages as it's written rather than with all the scribbled in notes and highlighted revelations and parables given for my own life that are invisibly etched in between each line of the NT.
This one, for example, had my mind running to personal revelation, which gladly jumped up shouting "HERE I AM! REMEMBER ME!" while waving both hands in the air and offering to do a cartwheel just to keep my attention. It was, and is, quite distracting. That's not to discredit personal revelation. After all, that's why I'm here, that's what I'm looking for; but I didn't realise until now just how much I'm missing in the NT by not seeing the word new every day.
The Bible is the Living Word. It can speak to you where you are at, offering new hope, life, joy, confidence, emotional healing and so on, every time you read it. You can receive nothing from one passage during 'this' stage of your life, then read the exact same passage during 'that' stage of your life and be totally blown away by what it says to you on a deep, personal, intimate level. And the next time you read it, it can bring fresh revelation (the divine or supernatural disclosure to humans of something relating to human existence...) and relieve and release you in another area of your life. But I only just realised that I was reading the NT through the eyes of old revelation rather than looking for fresh meat, or manna, as it were.
"The salt of the earth" and "The light of the world" had me blocked. I kept hearing and seeing the old revelations and I couldn't see anything new in this passage. That had me pull back from blogging. I wanted something new. I wanted to see God's hand afresh in this passage, before moving on. Returning to it, a couple of days on, it came to me, "What do these two things have in common?"
This is what I jotted down on paper while looking for an answerm while trying to leave old revelation where it was needed:
Salt intensifies flavour. It flavours. Too much salt, however, tastes terrible and, as you can imagine, would cause you to gag or vomit, if nothing else, if taken in large quantities. "He must become greater; I must become less..." (John 3:30)
Like a moth to an open flame, we're drawn to light. But a flashing, bright light can cause damage to the naked eye and would have a person turning away; it could cause blindness. An injured eye seeks darkness (think about that when you evangelise; be gentle). We are a reflection of Jesus - THE Light of the world - (Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12) - we are not the star attraction, but a light that helps shines a path to God. (Stars are suns, far from our earth, but not the main sun for our planet; Tis the same with us and THE SON.)
Looking over this, looking for God's hand, I see both items are to be used by His hands.
* We are the salt: God does the sprinkling.
* We are the light, the city on a hill: God does the placing. He plants the city; He brings the light.
* A light, or a lamp, is carefully placed where it is needed. Again, God does the placing.
* Those who follow Christ will be in God's hand and will do His purpose upon the earth.
The trick then, is to remain in His hand, is it not?
Upon reading these verses, I realised it's a great deal harder to find God's hand in the New Testament than the old - for me personally, that is; and that because I have revelations from days gone by that cling to NT passages, whereas with the OT I have fewer revelations and can read each passages as it's written rather than with all the scribbled in notes and highlighted revelations and parables given for my own life that are invisibly etched in between each line of the NT.
This one, for example, had my mind running to personal revelation, which gladly jumped up shouting "HERE I AM! REMEMBER ME!" while waving both hands in the air and offering to do a cartwheel just to keep my attention. It was, and is, quite distracting. That's not to discredit personal revelation. After all, that's why I'm here, that's what I'm looking for; but I didn't realise until now just how much I'm missing in the NT by not seeing the word new every day.
The Bible is the Living Word. It can speak to you where you are at, offering new hope, life, joy, confidence, emotional healing and so on, every time you read it. You can receive nothing from one passage during 'this' stage of your life, then read the exact same passage during 'that' stage of your life and be totally blown away by what it says to you on a deep, personal, intimate level. And the next time you read it, it can bring fresh revelation (the divine or supernatural disclosure to humans of something relating to human existence...) and relieve and release you in another area of your life. But I only just realised that I was reading the NT through the eyes of old revelation rather than looking for fresh meat, or manna, as it were.
"The salt of the earth" and "The light of the world" had me blocked. I kept hearing and seeing the old revelations and I couldn't see anything new in this passage. That had me pull back from blogging. I wanted something new. I wanted to see God's hand afresh in this passage, before moving on. Returning to it, a couple of days on, it came to me, "What do these two things have in common?"
This is what I jotted down on paper while looking for an answerm while trying to leave old revelation where it was needed:
Salt intensifies flavour. It flavours. Too much salt, however, tastes terrible and, as you can imagine, would cause you to gag or vomit, if nothing else, if taken in large quantities. "He must become greater; I must become less..." (John 3:30)
Like a moth to an open flame, we're drawn to light. But a flashing, bright light can cause damage to the naked eye and would have a person turning away; it could cause blindness. An injured eye seeks darkness (think about that when you evangelise; be gentle). We are a reflection of Jesus - THE Light of the world - (Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12) - we are not the star attraction, but a light that helps shines a path to God. (Stars are suns, far from our earth, but not the main sun for our planet; Tis the same with us and THE SON.)
Looking over this, looking for God's hand, I see both items are to be used by His hands.
* We are the salt: God does the sprinkling.
* We are the light, the city on a hill: God does the placing. He plants the city; He brings the light.
* A light, or a lamp, is carefully placed where it is needed. Again, God does the placing.
* Those who follow Christ will be in God's hand and will do His purpose upon the earth.
The trick then, is to remain in His hand, is it not?
~*~
1 Peter 1:23
~*~
For you have been born again,
not of perishable seed,
but of imperishable,
through the living and enduring word of God.
~*~
~*~*~*~