PART ONE OF TWO
By Scott Hilgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
There can only be darkness if there is no light.
Matthew 5: 14-16“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
Jesus was describing in verses 14 and 15 how, when our faith is real, we can’t hide it. We know through our saving faith in Jesus that we become something new and that others will see it in us. They’ll see the mistakes we still make and some will call us hypocrites for them. When Jesus says a city on a hill can’t be hidden, he means we can’t hide that our faith has changed us and others can’t help but see it. He then uses the example of a lamp and how the light from the lamp serves a purpose so we wouldn’t light it and then hide it so no one else, including ourselves, benefits from that light.
But in verse 16, Jesus is encouraging us to be purposeful in letting others see how our faith has changed us through our actions. By doing good, others can see Christ in us and God is glorified.
Our actions and how we handle our mistakes or sinful moments show to others that we’ve changed and are different from how we were before. When we are saved, we don’t suddenly become perfect. We start a process called sanctification and through that process, we start becoming more like Jesus; we want to understand the Bible and live out what it teaches. Even is we make mistakes, the people who truly know us will know that we’re living life differently.
A lot of rodeo cowboys struggle with thinking they don’t measure up. Many enter the sport because it appeals to their feelings of being an outsider. For others, they want to prove to themselves or others they can make it in a difficult sport where, in almost every event, it’s your individual power, strength and ability that will take you to a paycheck.
Your identity before you were saved and the outsider nature that can be found in rodeo might feed the idea that you don’t live up to what you think the Christian standard is; ;that you need to get your life together or in a better place before you can talk to God or walk into a church. But when you are truly saved through a real faith in Jesus and a genuine repentance of sin and desire to be forgiven for it through Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross that took the punishment meant for our sin, God sees you as perfect. However much good or sin has been in your life before then, God sees us all as perfect when we’ve made Jesus the Lord and Savior of our lives.
That means, even the smallest act of kindness or helpfulness you are able to do brings light into this broken and sinful world.
No matter how you’ve lived your life or how others have made you feel about yourself, you have as much power as the best preachers and godliest people you know, to affect the world around you. Even when you feel at your worst, the smallest act, a kind word, can glorify God and bring light into someone else’s darkness.
Even the toughest cowboy or blackest sheep in the family has the power to drive away darkness when they have a saving faith in Jesus.
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