I've been thinking of the summer "lectionary." My confirmation verse was Matthew 5-- about "your little light shine"/bushel basket. I found it a childhood dilemma... one message to show your light (your gifts) to the world... yet (as Garrison Keillor so sagely nails it) "Don't call attention to yourself."--Jan Kurtz
Yes, it is a classic dilemma of the well-behaved midwestern child. Someone once told me that a Scandinavian proverb goes, the tall stalks of wheat are cut back. So don't get above yourself. Nobody likes a show off.
Dana Carvey based his "Church Lady" persona on the ladies from his childhood church in Montana, who kept children like him in check, by responding to anything that smacked of self-satisfaction with, "Well. Isn't that special." We all have our inner Church Lady, I suppose.
But when I think of this verse, especially at this time of year, I think of the sunflowers that bloom in the fields of western Minnesota and the Dakotas, and in our gardens all over the Midwest. Great big brown faces edged with yellow petals, follow the sun all day as it courses through the sky. I ask you, can a sunflower stop being shiny? Heck no! Do we judge the sunflower for drawing attention to itself? Not if we are sane and well-adjusted!
If, like the sunflower, we keep our face turned toward the light of God, how can we keep from shining? When we spend time each day in the presence of God, when we make the effort to be mindful of all that we have received from God, the light shines. Unselfconsciously. You can't help it, you shine.
Still, it's probably a good idea to balance, "Let your light shine," with "beware of practicing your piety before strangers, in order to be seen by them." Don't serve at the soup kitchen for the photo op. Serve at the soup kitchen so that people can eat, and thank God (not you) for the bread.
Let your light shine! Let your salt season the bread! Let people see God's love reflected in you.
