. . . that you may declare the praises of him . . .
1 Peter 2:9; Matthew 5:13-16

The fourth of July is only a week away. I'll be in Canada, with all of those people who were on the losing side of the revolutionary war. I think some of them are still somewhat bitter about it. I have some theories about the revolutionary war that I want to share with you.

When I was young I developed a brillianlty simple theory for why the Colonies won the Revolutionary War. It was completely obvious to me that it all had to do with those bright Red Coats. You know the story -- Paul Revere rides out of Boston to warn all of the militant farmers that the British were coming. And at first the Colonists try to take the British head on -- but being smart Americans, they quickly figured out that it makes alot more sense to hide behind trees and shoot at those bright red coats from relative safety. So while the British kept their stiff upper lip, and marched in disciplined, orderly fashion back to Boston, the Colonists waged guerrilla warfare and picked them off. So the British lost North America because they insisted on marching out in the open in those bright red coats. And if the British had not been quite so dumb -- if they had just taken off the red coats and blended into the countryside -- we would all be in Canada now. Their visibility killed them.

I have bad news for you this morning. It sounds very unpatriotic to say this -- but God calls the church of God to be like the Red Coats. God calls his people to be visible. He calls us to be a conspicuous community -- not to blend into the countryside, but to stand out boldly. It is scary, it is dangerous, and it seems crazy -- but that is our uniform, that is our calling, a visible community -- and also a vulnerable -- community.

In Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus makes two simple statements about the community of his disciples: You are salt, and you are light. These are simple statements of fact -- a reality about his disciples. He does not say you must try to become salt, you should become light. He does not say you will be salt if you act salty, and you will be light if you brighten up. He says, simply and directly, you ARE salt and you ARE light. Being salt and light is simply a characteristic of being a follower of Jesus. If you are Jesus follower you ARE salt and you ARE light. You ARE different and you ARE visible. It is who you ARE. You cannot be a follower of Jesus without being visible. Lights shine. Salt is salty. Christians are visible. Dark light, unsalty salt and invisible Christians are all absurdities. "A city on a hill cannot be hidden and no one in their right mind lights a lamp and puts it under a basket." It is in the nature of Christians to be visible.

Now if we look at 1 Peter 2:9 we find it says something very similar: "You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness and into his wonderful light.

That's not a great translation. The NASB translates it "that you may proclaim the excellencies." The idea is that we are called to be living advertisements -- walking billboards -- displaying the awesome character of God who brought you out of darkness and into his wonderful light. God calls us to be visible. And that is exactly what missions is: making God's character visible.

And the point I want us to get here is that our visibility -- our MISSION to display God's character flows directly out of who we are. We are a chosen people-- that we may proclaim his excellencies. We are a royal priesthood-- that we may proclaim his excellencies. We are a holy nation -- that we may proclaim his excellencies. They all go together. It's a package deal. And we can't have one without the others. Chosenness, Priesthood and Holiness cannot be separated from our mission to proclaim God's excellencies.

So if we take holiness as a specific example, what this means is that I can't be holy without proclaiming God's excellencies. I can't be holy without being a billboard. And the reason is that holiness is impossible to hide.

This is easy to illustrate: Last week we talked about holiness, and I ended with an imagination game. I asked you to imagine that you were all wearing pure white robes -- and that those pure white robes were a symbol of your holiness before God. And the point was that holiness motivates purity -- that if you are dressed in pure, clean white robes, you are going to be very careful. You will stay away from mustard and strawberries and you will probably try to find someone else to check your oil. And similarly, if you are conscious that you are holy -- set apart by God, you will be very careful about how you live.

Now imagine that we actually did this -- that we literally walked out of here with white robes on? Believe me, people in Sout Hadley would KNOW about Stony Brook Community Church -- we would become a spectacle in the community. Word would spread very quickly that some really weird stuff was going on in this building. We would not need a sign. We would not need an advertising program.

You can't hide white robes. They stand out. And you can't hide holiness. I think we get this idea that holiness somehow separates us from the world. That to be really holy we would need to be cloistered away in some monastery somewhere so that we could wear the white robes and not get them dirty. But the opposite is true. God tells us to wear our holiness out into the world. To be living advertisements of the character of God.

So the first way that we "proclaim the excellences of him who called us" is just by BEING Christian in the world. Jesus said, "let your light so shine before me that they may see your good deeds and glorify my father."

We see the same thing in 1 Peter 2:11-12: "Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God in the day he visits."

If we simply live out our calling to be holy and to be like Jesus then we will be a conspicuous community. We will be as conspicuous as if we were wearing white robes around. And God will be glorified because we are displaying his character.

This often happens in simple ways. Moving, for example. Moving is the mark of our church -- we should probably replace our logo with a moving truck. But do your realize that for us, moving is also a mark of our holiness? When a good portion of our congregation shows up week after week after week on Saturday mornings to help someone move, we don't think of ourselves as doing something very holy. And we may not feel like we proclaiming God's character. It just feels like pretty ordinary, hard work. But in fact it is a visible sign of our holiness -- being set apart by God. By helping each other in such practical ways we are publicly advertising that God has set us apart as a community and that he has called us to love each other and help each other in sacrificial ways. Next time you put on your moving clothes, treat them with respect -- they are your white robes of holiness.

And their are hundreds of other small ways that we proclaim the excellencies of him who called us:

--When you refuse to rob your employer by being lazy
--When you give to someone in need
--When you refuse to repay an angry word with anger
--When you stand up for someone who is weak and vulnerable
--When you refuse to bow down to the altar of materialism
--When you care for the sick, the lonely, the prisoner

These things are the marks of our holiness -- our set apartness. And they will attract attention whether we like it or not, because righteousness cannot help but attract attention. Jesus had no marketing consultants, no advertising budget -- he was always going off into the desert, away from people. Yet people flocked to him. Why? Because holiness cannot be hidden. Righteousness is conspicuous.

A simple commitment to righteous living is the loudest and sweetest praise. It displays the good and righteous character of God. When I am generous, I call attention to the generosity of God. And when I serve others, I call attention to the love of God. When I keep myself away from the things of the world, I call attention to the purity of God. But what good is it to proclaim God's generosity if I am stingy? Or his love if I am a gossip?

To be a visible community, we don't need a sign outside of our meeting place -- although I have nothing against that. Being a conspicuous community begins just by living out our calling as chosen people, royal priests and a holy nation.

"Proclaiming the excellencies of him who called us . . ." bubbles up out of our holiness -- it is just the overflow of who we ARE as followers of Jesus.

There's an even more obvious way that we "proclaim the excellencies of him who called us . . ." --- in worship.

You can't hide holiness -- you also can't hide authentic worship. Authentic worship just bursts up like a geyser. There's no point trying to keep it down, or keep it quiet -- it won't be suppressed.

My girls, Ruth Anne & Sarah, are starting camp this week. On Saturday I'll go to pick them up. And for several days, perhaps weeks after that they will talk about almost nothing else but what happened to them at camp. I will know every camp song, every joke, every game. It will be impossible to keep them quiet. If we tell them, that's enough, we've heard enough of those camp songs for now, they will still be humming them under their breath.

That, people, is a picture of real worship. They have been so sold on the wonders of life at camp that you can't keep them quiet about it. Authentic worship is like a volcano erupting, or a spring welling up inside you. It can't be kept down --

And it can't be invisible! It can't be hidden.

To be a Christian community is to be a conspicuous community -- to loudly proclaim God's character through a righteousness that cannot be hidden and through worship that cannot be kept quiet. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.

But there's another side to the story. Remember the Red Coats? Visibility means vulnerability. People will take potshots at you. A visible Christian community will bring anger, opposition, ridicule. "For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To one we are the smell of death; to the other the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task." 2 Cor. 2:14-16.

Proclaiming the excellencies of him who called you will not make you popular. To the world, we smell like death. It is not a very nice metaphor. I have recent experience of this. My car smelled like death the other day. I had just been up to visit David Ouimette in Northampton and I came out to my car and I realized that it really smelled bad. I had been fishing on Monday with Sarah and Stephen and my Dad, and it turned out that a container of night crawlers had been left in the car. It was terrible.

You have to realize that as a disciple of Christ, you will smell like that to people in the world. No matter how much you try to mask it, you will be an offense to them. The smell of death is too strong to mask with perfume. Ultimately, our visibility as Christians is the visibility of the Cross.
And the cross drives a wedge between people -- to some it is life, to others it is death.

But either way, it is visible. A cross was intended as a very public, very visible means of execution. Crosses were erected where everyone could see -- so that no one could miss it. And when we celebrate communion we are, in a sense, raising the cross -- making sure that it stays visible. We are saying Look! Look at the cross. Look at what happened there! Look at what God did for me. At the cross Jesus took me from darkness to light. He took me from life to death. And so in celebrating communion we are advertising the excellencies of him who called us. We are proclaiming his goodness.