Without Light We Can Not See Clearly

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men. "You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.  Matthew 5:13-16

Matthew 5:13 tells us that if seasoning has no flavor, it has lost its value. If Christians don’t make an effort to affect the world around them, they are of little value to God. We are worthless if we are too much like the world. Christians should not blend in with everyone else, we need to affect others positively by letting our light shine. If the Holy Spirit lives within us, we want others to see what Christ is like by our words and our actions – by showing our light. We hide our light by going along with the crowd, by being quiet when we should speak and by not explaining our light to others.

In this day, it is most important that we speak openly about being a Christian. In his response to Justice Kennedy’s recent opinion on same sex marriage, Justice Samuel Alito said, “people can whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools.”

"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.”        Matthew 5:11

 

Many people today talk about how the Church is “in exile” and “at the margins.” We are being pushed to maintain our beliefs as long as we don’t carry them with us in public. But we have a higher authority in Christ who said, “You are the light of the world.” Our lights can not shine if they are hidden under a bowl. God has not given us a light to be hidden or a spirit of fear. God has given us the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16). We need not apologize for offering the light of Christ to this dark world. However, we do owe our most profound contrition to God if we do not show our light by sharing the gospel. We must not be timid in this. The secular world takes offense at the gospel, but we must not be intimidated by this world.

Instead of praying for our personal situation to improve, we need to pray for God to help us be the lights he wants us to be.

When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."      John 8:12

Christianity and the Supreme Court

Tolerant: showing willingness to allow the existence of opinions or behaviors that one does not necessarily agree with.

Jesus said the greatest commandments were to love God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself. I can treat others with kindness and respect and love them without agreeing with everything they do or believe. I can love my neighbors without sacrificing my beliefs. I can love them and be tolerant of them without agreeing with them. 

6 Little Stories

I received this in an email this morning and thought it was sooo precious! It reminded the sender of our Bible Study lesson last week.

Once some villagers decided to pray for rain, on the day of prayer all the people gathered but only one boy came with an umbrella.
 That's FAITH

When you throw a baby in the air, she laughs because she knows you will catch her. 

That's TRUST

Every night we go to bed, without any assurance of being alive the next morning but still we set the alarms to wake up.
 That's HOPE

We plan big things for tomorrow in spite of zero knowledge of the future.
That's CONFIDENCE

We see the world suffering, but still we get married.  That's LOVE

On an Old Man's shirt was written a cute sentence, 'I Am Not 72 Years Old…  I Am Still 16 with 56 years' Experience.'

That's ATTITUDE

 Do you live your life like the above 6 stories?

Thanks FBI Barb! 

Pretty On The Inside

My Grandma was quite fond of telling me, "It's pretty on the inside that counts."  Grandma Witt and I were very close when I was little. I was lucky enough to have her in my life until I was 13. I'm the youngest child of a youngest child, so Grandma was 67 years young when I was born. She was truly an inspiration, and the most Christ-like woman I've ever known, and that is saying a lot because I've been blessed to have many, many wonderful Christ-like women in my life.

This saying has been on my mind quite a bit lately, as I think of how obsessed our society is with physical appearance. Youth and beauty are exalted far beyond and above the place they should take in our lives. A supermarket tabloid proclaimed last week that a plus-sized supermodel was bullied as a teen, and Facebook adds shout to visit a website to see kids who grew up to be ugly adults, and botched face lifts on those who try to conquer father time and reclaim their lost outward beauty. Think about it, aging can actually improve our inner beauty.

According to InStyle Magazine, the average woman spends $15,000 on cosmetics during her lifetime! That's a lot of money and cosmetics only cover outward flaws!! Shouldn't we be much more concerned with our inward flaws?  What's on the inside is what matters to God. I'm not saying we should let ourselves go all natural and be totally unconcerned with our appearance, but wow! $15,000 is a lot of money, that could feed a lot of people in a third world country. I'm saying we should be more concerned with non-cosmetic changes, with what's on the inside.

1 Peter 3:3-4
Do not adorn yourselves outwardly by braiding your hair, and by wearing gold ornaments or fine clothing: rather, let your adornment be the inner self with the lasting beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in God's sight.

1 Timothy 4:8

For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.

Proverbs 31:30
Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last; but a woman who fears the LORD will be greatly praised.

I took a shower, I have clean hair and clothes that look nice. I think I will go without make up today. Of course, I'm only going to the Post Office...