Jack Hardaway
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Christians are sneaky people. Subversive. Covert.
On the surface we might appear to be polite, law abiding, good citizens.
But, if you cut through that thin veneer of civility, and get into our minds and hearts, and attend our gatherings, what you find are a bunch of people who want to change things, to rearrange things, to add spice and flavor to things, to bring light to the situation.
Don’t let the politeness fool you.
Christians are sneaky. We won’t stop or settle until everything has been transformed by the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We can’t leave well enough alone.
We always have this itch to make things “more better”.
Granted we’re not always sure what that means, or how to go about doing it.
We rarely agree about much, but that is hardly the point.
A love has entered the world through Jesus Christ, and everything that love touches is changed.
Christians see everything and everyone for what they are intended to be, blazing flames of God’s life-giving glory.
Christians are sneaky people.
Rather than spreading fear and destruction what we spread is love, lashing out with forgiveness, finding pleasure in building up the lives of others.
You are salt and light. We are salt and light.
We add something to the world.
Notice how Jesus challenges us. He tells us to be who we are.
Salt and light.
This isn’t a do more do better guilt trip message.
It is a revealing message. You are salt and light. Yes you.
You bring flavor, you bring healing, you bring life and preservation.
You bring light to darkness, a clear way, a safe way, the creatures and habits of darkness are banished by who you are.
That glory that the world was intended to reveal, you make it happen, you set it loose.
That splendor of God’s radiance that spreads like wild fire, that fire that makes everything alive rather than destroying it, that’s you, that is who you are, that is what you are.
So don’t buy the hype about Christians being orderly, polite, good citizens, because it only goes skin deep, it is only useful in serving an end.
Under the surface Christians are sneaky, they are up to something.
Everyone, everything they see they see in terms of God’s glory being revealed.
They see splendor and radiance being unleashed from everyone and everything.
Salt and light, everywhere.
We are told by all the angry people to only see a world of other angry people, mocking and scorning each other. But what we see is more than that.
We are told by all the angry people that we become better when we can find someone to call stupid, or ugly, or a traitor, that they are nothing. But we say something else.
We speak different words.
We tell people that they are salt and light, that they are love, that they are radiant and splendid, because we see God revealed in the world in each other, despite our efforts to cover it up.
It is a sneaky thing to tell someone that they are the salt of the earth, and the light of the world.
It was sneaky for Jesus to say it like that.
It is a contrary thing. It is disarming. It ruins perfectly good hatred.
Notice how Jesus does that.
I know two things. I know we disagree. And I know that you blaze with the glory of God.
That’s all I know. Salt and light. The credo, the creed.
Sneaky, sneaky people, changing things.
God is sneaky like that.
Jesus is sneaky like that.
Telling us to be who we are.
Radiant and splendid.