Jesus himself once said that as Christians we must take up our cross and deny ourselves. This means that we as Christians will be closely related to everything that requires us to make sacrifices. Apart from that, we are also invited to deny ourselves and renew ourselves from our old selves, our sinful selves, and repent to return to the Father because of the consequences of sin according to the Bible which can harm us in many ways. As Christians it turns out that we also indirectly have some tasks that we should do such as some of the duties of Christians as the salt and light of the world that I want to share with you, as follows.
1. Spread love
The first task we should do as salt and light in the world is to spread love to our neighbors. Of course we still remember the existence of the law of love in the Bible where Jesus himself taught us to love and forgive one another. In fact, we are also invited to forgive our enemies and pray for them.
The love that we want to show and share with others can start from small things like smiling at other people when we pass each other even though the person is a stranger. Wouldn't we feel more comfortable if we met someone who greeted us with a smile that radiated humility. Then, why don't we try to do the same?
2. Warn someone wrong
The task of Christians as the second salt and light of the world is to rebuke or warn someone who makes a mistake. But what needs to be remembered is that this warning is not a warning where we instead corner and blame someone who did something wrong, but we are more towards advising him. Say that no matter how big a mistake he has made as long as he sincerely forgives sins in Christianity, then God will touch him and change his life.
Most people will only immediately judge and corner someone who misbehaves without thinking first if he is in the position of someone he blames. So, it would be better if we could give good advice and it would be even better if this could be done face to face from heart to heart. This method is also more effective than using any violence to change someone's life for the better. God Himself said that it is good for us if we always repay evil with good.
3. Willing to sacrifice
Being a follower of Christ will certainly make us have an example that is also willing to sacrifice, namely Jesus Christ himself. Jesus loved humans very much and because He wanted to restore God's relationship with humans and destroy death, He volunteered Himself to be crucified. And because of that, as followers of Christ, when we are faced with a condition where other people really need us, we must be willing to sacrifice and help that person. Because in essence humans are social beings who need each other.
Willing to sacrifice is also not only applied when we want to help others, but we must also first be willing to make sacrifices when we want to fight for something. Just a concrete example, we want to be a successful person, without sacrifice whether it's time, cost, and mind, of course, success will not come to us by itself. So we have to get out of our comfort zone and learn new things and struggle to get something we want. Or also for example we want to repair our relationship with God which was damaged by sin, so we as Christians will try to learn several ways of Christian fasting and apply them.
4. Don't riot
Not creating riots or divisions is one of the duties of Christians as salt and light of the world which is also important. If we can't make other people feel happy, then by not bothering that person is actually more than enough. Keep yourself away from anything that can create or give rise to riots or divisions.
Riots and divisions do not require big triggers, triggers for problems such as riots and big divisions are often caused by our own words. Therefore God gave us two ears and one mouth so that we would listen before speaking. It's also good if we can think about what we are going to say, whether what we are going to say will hurt other people or not. The tongue is a knife in humans and if not used properly, the tongue can hurt anyone.
5. Caring about others
One of the true Christian characters is our desire to care about others. Caring for others means we don't act selfishly and only think about ourselves. Many of us, because we think too much about the goals or desires we want to achieve, unconsciously ignore other people. And what's worse is when we are only selfish and come to others only when we need their help to help us achieve the goals we want to achieve.
This kind of attitude should be avoided. It's good for us to humbly want to listen to others and consider the opinions of others for the designs we make. Instead, when we care about other people, we don't expect anything in return from that person. Because the good reward will come from God himself. Remember that life in this world is only temporary and we live in this world only to prepare for the future and eternal life in heaven. So, if you remember - remember this then you will understand and be reminded again that everything we do in the world is not to amaze other people but to make God's heart happy.
6. Don't judge others
The most important thing in the Christian's duty as the salt and light of the world is that we should not arbitrarily judge others. If someone or several people are wrong and involved in a commotion, then we should try to advise them well and not corner them. If we feel that we still like to judge others, it means we still don't really understand what it means to fear God.
Even Jesus himself did not judge and threw stones at prostitutes who were caught by the public who wanted to be judged. He instead forgave and gave the prostitute a chance to repent. Only Jesus who has the power still wants to forgive and not judge the prostitute, do we who are not comparable to Jesus feel that we have great power so that we can judge our neighbors as we please?
7. Live according to God's will
The Lord Jesus came into the world to invite us all back to the Father. So that we can be together with the Father again, we are taught to live according to the will of the Father. We can find the will of the Father and learn and follow it by reading the scriptures. As salt and light of the world, we should be able to radiate God's love by being role models for those around us. And in that way, other people around us can see the radiance of God's love and God's glory in us. Maybe other people will see us as someone who never gives up, is grateful for everything, and remains steadfast in facing all the obstacles that exist in our lives.
That way, other people will also see that we have full trust in God and put all our life plans in Him who arranges everything to be more beautiful in His time. To be a good role model, we need to imitate Jesus and be accompanied by increasing our knowledge by regularly reading reflections and scriptures. And that way we can live according to God's will and carry out the duties of Christians as salt and light in the world by setting an example for others so that those around us can see the glory and love of God for humans through us.
So those are some of the duties of Christians as salt and light in the world that I can share with you. I hope that some of the things I have said can help make you aware of the duties and responsibilities that we have as Christians. To help grow your faith and trust in God, you can also read some short Christian reflections that we have provided on this website. Thank you for the free time you gave us, Lord Jesus bless.