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John Stott: The Double Influence of the Christian
"You are the salt of the earth....You are the light of the world."—Jesus, Matthew 5:13-14
"So Jesus calls his disciples to exert a double influence on the secular community, a negative influence by arresting its decay and a positive influence by bringing light into its darkness. For it is one thing to stop the spread of evil; it is another to promote the spread of truth, beauty and goodness." —John R. W. Stott, The Message of the Sermon on The Mount
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Comments (3)
That's profound. I've never seen so much in that verse before.
Thanks for sharing.
Posted by Dave H | March 23, 2009 10:06 PM
Wow, the only part of that verse that I have ever heard explained was the second part. Nobody has ever explained the first part and in fact, most teaching that I have had over the years has actually skiffed over the first part,or else just made it out like both parts mean the same thing.
Posted by Irina H.F. | March 24, 2009 12:21 PM
Stotts comments are insightful. That motif can be found all through scripture, look at parables.
Often Christians get hung up in pursuing one or the other of the actions Matthew calls us to, to the detriment of the message.
Our very wise pastor when we lived in Hamilton memorably said to us "Christians must preach the gospel clearly enough so that it can either be accepted or rejected." He was criticising the common practice of making Christianity something so nice and palatable and luke warm so that it was not offensive to anyone. But I think his comments would cut the other way too against the practice of making Christianity into something to bash sinners with.
Posted by Madeleine | April 10, 2009 2:15 AM