(John 1:5)
�And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.�
One of the older, and more beautiful, homes in this town has a tradition of decorating for the Christmas season. They put out what amounts to large white paper sacks to line the walkway up to their door. I haven�t gone to examine these decorations, but I suspect they are like many others which are displayed around town. The sacks either have small electric lights or candles set in sand in their base. These decorations are called �luminaries.�
In the first phrase of our text verse this week, Jesus is described as a Luminary placed in this world of sin - �And the light...�
The temptation is always there for the preacher to refer to the Transfiguration of Jesus (see Luke 9:28-36) when speaking of Jesus as �The Light of the World.� This incident was a physical display of the Glory which was Jesus� by right of His essential Godhead.
What may be more meaningful to us, as physical human beings of time, may be the fact that He voluntarily laid aside this glory in an event known, theologically, as the Kenosis. Philippians 2:7 informs us that Jesus, �...made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men...�
Note that even in His Kenosis He did not empty Himself of His essential Godhead. He remained Who He was. He simply took upon himself the form of a man. In this form He became fully human while remaining fully Divine.
I was going to use the illustration of an actor to explain this event. But, that would be untrue. An actor is an actor. He never actually becomes the character he is playing in the stage production; he goes home after the play to remain the same person he was when the play began. Such was not the case with Jesus.
A better illustration may be the military experience. I was a civilian before I went into the military. As a civilian I had certain personality and physical traits which were the make up of who I was. These did not change when I went into the military. Yet, the moment I took the oath of induction I ceased to be a civilian. I was the same person; but, I was now a soldier.
After about four years I once again became a civilian but I still retained some of those traits which had made me a soldier. My training had �retooled� some things within me. I am still not exactly as I was as a civilian before my military service.
Through these experience I was, remained, and continue to be a human.
This is not a complete illustration. There are holes in it. But, I would hope that it helps us to see that Jesus was God before He stepped into human history as a man. He remained God even though He took upon Himself the form of humanity and became one of us. Now, that He has ascended to the Father, He remains God. That is the essence of His being. He, was, is, and always will be, fully God. He is also fully human as our perfect substitute for sin.
Even while under His voluntary Kenosis, Jesus displayed the brilliance of the Godhead.
Jesus displayed the understanding of God about the hearts of men. When Nicodemus (John 3:1-21) came to speak with Jesus, he spoke very politely to him. Jesus responded to Nicodemus with the words, �Ye must be born again.� Jesus knew that the heart need of Nicodemus was to find salvation.
When Jesus spoke to the woman at the well in Samaria (John 4:4-42), he told her that he offered her a water which would quench her spiritual thirst. He understood her heart need was to obtain salvation.
When Philip brought Nathanael to Jesus (John 1:43-51), Jesus responded by telling Nathanael where he had been and what type of person he was. Nathanael was struck by the correctness of these observations about himself. Jesus used this to respond to the heart need of Nathanael: Nathanael had a heart need to find salvation.
It is the same with people today. They may not always understand, as Nicodemus did not understand at first, that salvation does not come through religious works and observances. Salvation comes through a response to the Person of Jesus Christ.
It is the same with people today. They may not even understand their need. They may not even be searching for spiritual values. The woman at the well just showed up to get some water for her daily physical needs. Jesus touched her soul when he spoke about her life and actions. Jesus knew that her deepest need was not another drink of well water. Her deepest need was not to discuss her view of religion. Her deepest need was something that she had never considered. Her deepest need was to respond to the salvation offered through Jesus Christ.
It is the same with people today. Nathanael was not a bad person. Even Jesus said of him, �Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!� (John 1:47) Humanly speaking Nathanael was not a bad man. But Jesus understood that Nathanael was a man who was lost spiritually. Nathanael needed to respond to that salvation which came through a relationship with Jesus Christ.
Many times in the New Testament accounts of the life of Jesus we see Him display the power of God. The dead were raised to life. The infirm were cured of their diseases. Jesus, Himself, rose from the dead after three days in the tomb.
One time Jesus was sleeping in a boat while He and the disciples were crossing the sea. It was during a severe storm. The disciples, �...awoke him, saying, Master, master, we perish. Then he arose, and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water: and they ceased, and there was a calm.� (Matthew 8:24)
Notice how great was this miracle. Not only did He calm the wind, he also calmed the waves. It is a great miracle that He calmed the wind. Still, I have seen the wind suddenly cease and a calm come upon the earth. But, the waves that were in motion were also calmed. Instantly! Try to stop the motion of the water in a small basin after you�ve tossed a coin into it. Every time you try to stop the motion you will cause the motion to increase. Jesus stilled the waves.
Is it any wonder that the disciples, in verse 25, asked, �What manner of man is this! for he commandeth even the winds and water, and they obey him.� The answer to their question is that He was (is still!) the God Man.
Hebrews 1:3 says, of Jesus, �Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.�
Even though Jesus had laid aside the outward glory which was His by right as God, He nonetheless continued to exhibit that glory through His life and actions upon this earth.
Jesus also displayed the Father to those on the earth. He was more than a simple representative of God on earth. He was the resplendence of God on earth.
Jesus once defended Himself to the religious leaders by appealing to the works which He performed. He said, �...for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works I do...� (John 5:36)
When God created man, man was in communion with God. Man could walk and talk with God in the Garden. When sin entered the picture that relationship between God and man was severed. Sin separates!
Jesus came to do the work of God. His death on the cross was not an unhappy ending to His life. His death was a planned outcome of that work which He desired to do. He died to eradicate the barrier between man and God. His death offered to man a way to spiritually reconnect that broken line of communication. We can be brought near the throne of grace through the throes of Jesus.
Not only was this the work of God, it also provided the very effect which God desired. Mankind no longer had to be in bondage to sin. Satan could no longer control the souls of men away from an audience with God. As I write this sermon there is a woman camped outside the ranch of President Bush down in Texas. She wants an audience with him. She wants to talk with him about her lost son. Standing between President Bush and this woman is an army of secret service guards.
In the spiritual sense, we stood far outside the residence of God. We, most often, did not even realize that we needed an audience with Him to cure our sin caused ills. We couldn�t name the ache which was within our souls. God knew. He sacrificed His Own Son so that we might gain that audience with Him. He offered us a solace which we might not have even understood was our need.
But, this was our greatest need. He answered our plea when we were so without understanding as to not even be able to vocalize that need.
One time Jesus stood before a worship crowd at a Sabbath meeting. He quoted from Isaiah 61:1, when He said, �The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.� (Luke 4:18-19)
Jesus came to this earth with a purpose. His purpose was to do the will of the Father. In that He achieved the means of our salvation.
Those luminaries I spoke of earlier are much easier to see at night. During the day light they will not be noticed. At night they shine forth.
Jesus was Luminescence in the night of mankind�s sin. �...shineth in darkness...�
Through the ages of mankind, through the generations upon generations, through religious observance and military fiasco, the entire human race had been in bondage to sin.
Empire followed empire. Culture followed culture. Seer and king, prophet and bureaucrat, beggar and poet, all labored under the same burden of sin. All attempted to show mankind a better way of life. Many attempted to place their own lives as superior to those under them; even these - for the most part - envisioned a civilization which would benefit from their guidance. Still the burden of sin separated men from that which their creation had prepared for them, a fellowship with the Father.
Most did not understand that they needed the God of love. They would perform ritual after sacrament to appease the gods of the weather, of the field, of life itself. They would subject themselves, and their children, to hideous tortures in the hope that these sacrifices would gain the favor of a god, more often gods, who demanded greater and greater pain from the creature. They imagined a deity which saw them as simple play things and objects of servitude.
Into this world came the Man, Christ Jesus. He, Himself, would be the sacrifice that cleansed men from the sin nature. For the most part, mankind had no real knowledge that it was this sin which had separated them from God. How could they? They were blinded in the darkness of this same sin and could not see the Light of the World.
In the Truth which Jesus preached to the world there was a Light given to show man the real way to the Real God. No longer were the terms god and demon seen as nearly synonymous. God was shown to not desire the pain or depravation of mankind as an oblation to satisfy his anger and caprice.
God, Jesus showed men this, was One Who only desired that man approach Him through the sacrifice that Jesus would make on the Cross of Calvary. Sacrifice, Jesus showed men this, was not the action of a man made toward God. Sacrifice was the action that God made on behalf of man.
The essence of darkness gave way to the Truth of the Light that was in Jesus Christ.
The disciple Philip once asked of Jesus, �...shew us the Father...� (John 14:8)
Jesus answered Philip, �Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?� (John 14:9)
Have you ever awakened in a hotel room late at night? It may be a place you have never been before. Almost all of these seem different in some way. But, they all have one thing in common; they each have a table next to the bed on which there is a light.
We need that light in a strange room, sometimes in a familiar room!, late at night when it is dark. We don�t know where to place our feet so as not to hurt our toes in the darkness!
When it comes to finding the way to fellowship with God, Jesus IS that Light.
Jesus said, in John 14:6, �...I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.� He is the Lantern which leads us on the path to God. He is even more than that; He is the very conveyance which takes us to God.
Jesus is the Way. He is not the pointer toward that way. He, Himself, is the Way.
I�ve been riding the city bus quite a bit lately. If I want to go somewhere I don�t wait for the bus and then jump in my car to follow it. I get on the bus and the bus takes me to my destination. The bus isn�t there to tell me how to get somewhere. It is there to take me someplace.
Jesus did not die on the cross to show us how to appease God. He, Himself, died on the cross to appease God, to pay for the sins which we have committed - and will commit. He is not ready to show us the way to God; He is here to be our Way to God.
Sadly, most of the world has never accepted this sacrifice of Jesus as a means of Salvation.
The world at large still stands in Lifelessness toward the love and salvation of Jesus Christ. �...and the darkness comprehended it not.�
Even His Own people, in the natural, did not accept Him as Who He was.
Paul had this to say about the natural kinfolk of Jesus, �What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there in circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.� (Romans 3:1-2)
The Jewish leadership of the day, the people of The Book, those who were the scribes and religious professionals, did not understand His mission on this earth even though those very Scriptures over which they poured hours of devotion spoke of Him.
When they heard His Sermon on the Mount they could not see that He was prepared to offer them the kingdom of whose principles He spoke.
Even when He made His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on what we call �Palm Sunday� (Matthew 21:1-11), they failed to see that this was in fulfillment of the prophecy of Zechariah 9:9. This from the Book they claimed to revere and study!
At the cross they jeered Him. They could not see that this, also, was prophesied in their own Scripture in Isaiah 53:1-6, Psalm 22, and many other places.
So blinded were they by the night of sins darkness that they were not even led to accept Him after His glorious resurrection.
But, before we think too highly of ourselves, how many of us have failed to accept all these truths about the Love and Sacrifice of God for our own sins?
It is not the race of the rejections that is important. The only important thing we can say about the race of those who have failed to accept the work of Jesus upon the cross is that it is the human race! All of us stand in need of His redeeming power.
It is the world at large which still fails to accept Him.
We, mankind in general, looks at the teaching of Jesus and claim it to be repressive. �It is such a narrow way He taught,� we lament. The key to my front door is awfully narrow. It is no more than an eighth of an inch wide. But, it is the only key which will open that door!
Rather than to demean His teaching, we need to accept His sacrifice. He died so that we might live! That is truth. It may be a narrow truth; but, it is still the truth. Two and two still equals four even though we know a whole lot of other numbers. It may be a narrow view; that does not detract from the correctness of it!
The problem is not that His teaching is regarded in an unfavorable light in this day of �situational ethics.� The problem is that the ethics of the day fail to consider the situation in which they find themselves.
The sacrifice of Jesus Christ at Calvary is scorned as �old fashioned.� Men say that it is from another era. Men say that it is just one way of many.
Jesus said that He is The Way. Remember?
If we do indeed serve a God of eternity, we would not expect that His pronouncements would change over time. His way would remain His way even while all of us on this terrestrial ball might change.
He still stands at to door of your life asking entrance. (see Revelation 3:20) Why not accept Him as your savior? Do it today. He died physically on the cross so that you could live spiritually
in eternity.
Accept the Gift of His love!