“You are the salt of the earth.” Matthew 5:13 NIV
“Start where you are; use what you’ve got; do what you can.”
My thoughts today are about “making a difference.”
It has been rightly said that a person’s contribution may not always get noticed until it is no longer being made. Salt is in almost every prepared food or snack that you eat. When it’s there you hardly notice; when it’s lacking you detect its absence.
Often you don’t know the difference you make until much later. Sometimes others won’t realize the difference that you are making until that is no longer happening. You are making a difference because you value contributing something beneficial, however small that may seem or unnoticed it may be, because you were doing so deliberately “as unto the Lord,” not for recognition or applause. If you are going to make a difference in this world, it won’t be by accident. Be purposeful, deliberate.
You will find that life is most meaningful and satisfying when you know that what you do somehow makes a difference. That’s what life is meant to be about – making a difference. What you contribute in your community, at your job, in your school, in your home and family, and in your friendships has the power to help others – make their lives better and more greatly fulfill yours.
Stop and think how that works everyday. Stop working so others will notice your contribution, and begin noticing and complimenting theirs. We take a lot of things for granted, therefore a lot of people for granted that improve our lives everyday. Someone picks up a piece of paper in a park or city street. What they did may seem hardly noteworthy; but what if nobody ever picked up trash? Imagine the mess!
While you wait around for your chance to make a big difference you might be missing the very opportunities that let you make any difference now, and greater differences later. If you don’t start where you are with what you could do, you probably won’t start at all. Start where you are; use what you’ve got; do what you can. That’s how you make a difference.
Jesus said that you and I are to be the salt of the earth. You are created, called, and gifted to make a contribution unique to your abilities, experience, personality and opportunities. Salt in isolation does not make a difference, but when allowed to interact with other things salt provides what is lacking and enhances what is already there.
Jesus taught that you and I as His followers are supposed to seed, salt, light and leaven. Common to all of those is the potential of making a profound improvement. As such, you can make the best contribution and the biggest difference when you are willing to be where you are most needed, doing what you were best designed by God to do.
My prayer for you today is: contribute what you are and what you have to others.