Wednesday with the Wesleys

Indeed were we wholly to separate ourselves from sinners, how could we possibly answer that character which our Lord gives us in these very words? “Ye” (Christians, ye that are lowly, serious and meek; ye that hunger after righteousness, that love God and man, that do good to all, and therefore suffer evil; ye) “are the salt of the earth.” It is your very nature to season whatever is round about you.

It is the nature of the divine savour which is in you, to spread to whatsoever you touch; to diffuse itself, on every side, to all those among whom you are. This is the great reason why the providence of God has so mingled you together with other men, that whatever grace you have received of God may through you be communicated to others; that every holy temper, and word, and work of yours, may have an influence on lo them also. By this means a check will, in some measure, be given to the corruption which is in the world; and a small part, at least, saved from the general infection, and rendered holy and pure before God.

~ John Wesley (Discourse 4 on the Sermon on the Mount)