The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, February 8, 2026

Setting

These verses are part of Jesus’s long sermon often called The Sermon on the Mount. This takes place on a hillside in Galilee, probably outside of the city of Capernaum, a fishing village on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee where Matthew tells us Jesus made his home base after leaving Nazareth. In Jesus’s day, Capernaum was a small but busy fishing and trading village on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee, with maybe around 1,000–1,500 inhabitants. It sat right on the Sea (large lake) of Galilee, so many residents worked as fishermen, boatmen, or in related trades (net‑making, fish processing). Not only did good income and trade come from fishing, but Capernaum also sat on the Via Maris, a major trade route between Damascus and Egypt, which made it an active trade route, customs point, and market area despite its relatively modest size. Capernaum also functioned as a local administrative center with a customs station and a small military garrison for Roman soldiers who enforced Roman oversight through local, puppet rulers like Herod Antipas.

Housing for the residents of Capernaum was simple: clustered basalt-stone homes, mostly narrow streets meant for foot traffic, and no sophisticated sewage or drainage, indicating an ordinary working-class town rather than an elite Roman-improved city. Archaeological work uncovered a synagogue on the site in the first century (under the later grand limestone synagogue), which would have been the focal point for Sabbath worship and community gatherings. People would have to travel to Jerusalem (about a 5 day walk) to go to the bigger festivals and make required sacrifices in the Temple. Synagogues were for weekly worship and were led by a Rabbi. It would not have been uncommon for a Rabbi to teach outside of synagogue on the working days of the week. Since the town was pretty tightly packed and the individual homes tended to be small, it would have been common for a teacher to be seated outside of the city teaching his disciples gathered around while others congregate to listen in.

Literary and narrative setting

Our verses for today find Jesus engaging in a common practice of the day. The verses leading up to this Sunday’s pericope, Matthew 5:13-20, are the Beatitudes in Matthew 5:3–12. This Sunday’s verses continue Jesus’ description of what life in the kin-dom of heaven looks like. Matthew presents this as a structured sermon that runs from 5:1–7:29, with 5:13–20 forming the transition from blessings (Beatitudes) to specific ethical teachings (“You have heard… but I say to you…”). In 5:13–16, Jesus addresses his followers as “salt of the earth” and “light of the world,” telling them who they are, defining their vocation and public witness in the world. In the second part of our pericope for today, 5:17–20, Jesus clarifies his relationship to “the Law and the Prophets,” insisting he has come not to abolish but to fulfill them, and setting a standard of righteousness that “exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees” (those who would have been highly educated in religious law of the day).

Commentary

Last week, Micah urged us to true faithfulness to God by enacting justice, behaving with kindness, and conducting ourselves with humility. This week, Jesus stands on the shoulders of the prophet and expands God’s call for ethical living explaining that those who follow him are a light to the world. Jesus’s vision for humanity is one of co-creative vocation. When Jesus tells the disciples and those gathered to listen, “You are the salt of the earth… you are the light of the world,” he assigns our community a real and participatory role in God’s ongoing transformation of the world, not a merely passive one. Salt and light function to enhance, heal, and illuminate what already exists and bring about creative transformation. God works persuasively through us, through those who would listen to and follow Jesus.

Let me give you an example of how a community of followers of Jesus can make be salt and light even still today. This is the story of the co-creative vocation of Community United Church of Christ (CUCC) in Raleigh, North Carolina and how they became a designated “Creation Justice Church” and reshaped their congregational life around climate and environmental justice.​

In 2007, CUCC’s members discerned that the climate crisis was not just a societal issue but a gospel issue that affected “those with the fewest material resources and least able to prepare.” They voted to create a “Justice in a Changing Climate” (JCC) task force, charging it to help the whole church respond faithfully.​ The task force was intentionally made up of representatives from across congregational life—Stewardship, Property, Deacons, Welcoming and Fellowship, Religious Education, Do Justice, Community Outreach—so that climate concern would not be a niche project but woven through the community’s shared vocation.​

Over time, CUCC deepened its theology of creation, explicitly affirming that God calls humanity “to cherish the Earth and responsibly steward its resources,” naming themselves as “co‑workers with God” who strive “to mend what is broken and confront economic systems of oppression and injustice.”​ Creation justice moved into the center of their worship life. Their pastor, Rev. Dr. Brown, regularly preached on creation care, members offered children’s messages about water conservation, pollution, and caring for animals, and the congregation held multiple services focused on climate change and climate justice.​ In Lent 2023, they undertook a communal process of discernment. They hosted a three‑week “Creation Justice 101” series, reviewing CUCC’s history of climate work and asking, “Where should we go now?”​ Individuals wrote personal “creation covenants,” which were shared in worship over five weeks.​ One member wove these personal pledges into a single congregational Creation Justice Covenant, which was read monthly in worship along with potential actions so that people could imagine how their promises would shape real decisions.​

On November 12, 2023, the congregation voted unanimously to adopt the covenant, pledging to “cherish the earth with humility,” reduce their environmental footprint, advocate for creation justice, attend particularly to the most vulnerable, and adapt as they learned more.​ The JCC task force then led the whole church into concrete changes in how they used their property and resources, treating their church and buildings as a site where God’s healing work could be embodied.​ They analyzed their buildings’ energy use, improved insulation, installed programmable thermostats, replaced single‑pane with double‑pane windows, and converting to LED lighting.​

After raising funds they installed a solar array in 2015 that now provides about half of the main building’s electricity; they raised enough extra to seed solar projects for four other churches and nonprofits.​ It didn’t stop there. In 2022, they adopted a “Carbon Covenant for Our Buildings,” committing to cut their carbon footprint 50% from 2010 levels by 2030 and to reach carbon neutrality by 2050; they report they are already ahead of schedule with over 50% reduction.​ They shifted fellowship practices by initiating a composting service, using compostable or washable dishes, and opening their compost bin to neighbors, avoiding as much carbon through composting as they do through their solar array.​

Their work didn’t stop with their buildings. They recognized that climate change hits low‑income communities and people of color hardest, especially through energy costs, limited mobility, and land loss.​ In response, they launched ministries explicitly aimed at climate justice. They developed a pre‑weatherization ministry that prepares low‑income homes for government weatherization programs, lowering energy bills and carbon footprints for neighbors who could not afford upgrades on their own. Working with Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), in collaboration with RAFI‑USA and 8–10 congregations, they provided farmers of color with reliable markets and enough income to retain and improve their land, while supplying fresh food to churches and low‑income neighbors and building interchurch, interracial relationships.​ And, they advocated with utilities and local, state, and federal governments to change policies that perpetuate climate and economic injustice.​They also partnered with North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, Interfaith Creation Care of the Triangle, 350Triangle, and Citizens Climate Lobby, hosting prayer chains for the earth on a busy street, leading letter‑writing, vigils, educational events, and coaching other congregations on solar fundraising.​

For nearly two decades, CUCC has understood itself as “co‑workers with God,” letting worship, teaching, buildings, budgets, neighborhood relationships, and public advocacy become concrete ways of joining God’s creative and redemptive work for a threatened creation.​ Their work demonstrates our co‑creative vocation. Nothing happens by divine fiat alone: God’s call is met by individual ethical commitment, congregational discernment, votes, covenants, task forces, technical work, financial sacrifice, and sustained partnerships, so that together, God and this community, actually changed the conditions of life for the earth and for vulnerable neighbors.

The people of CUCC let their “light shine before others” so that they (others) “see your good works and give glory to your Father.” God’s character is known and mediated through concrete communal practices of justice and mercy. They practice what Jesus preached, God, whose glory is expressed in the flourishing of creatures and communities, is known as the community embodies a qualitatively different way of being in the world.

For all of the rich opportunities presented by today’s passage, I would encourage you dear preacher to remind our weary world, that we are not defeated by the forces of evil. We are light. We are salt. We are God’s. Love will win.

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Rev. Dr. Torbitzky received her doctorate from Claremont Graduate University, in Claremont, CA. She earned her Master of Divinity from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, and a bachelor’s degree from Truman State University.  She served congregations in Pittsburgh, PA; Ontario, CA; and De Soto, MO, before taking up the Chaplaincy at Lindenwood University where she  has served as faculty in the Philosophy and Religion Department and now serves as Assistant Provost. Her research focuses on the atonement theory and process theology. Torbitzky recently co-edited a volume on Open, Relational, and Process preaching and practice, Preaching the Uncontrolling Love of God.  She edits the Process and Faith lectionary commentary series.