I Am the Light

 Who do you say Jesus is? And so you'll notice as you leave these doors along this back wall, there are seven sections of the wainscotting, and each of these seven sections have a different I'm statement of Jesus. So I want you to notice something that on these proud pillars, these pillars that stand out, there's another symbol.

Do you see that? We all have the same symbol, the same picture. It's the picture of the burning bush, and that is to remind us that. We always think of the seven I Am statements in the shadow of the original I am statement in Exodus chapter three when Jesus revealed Moses, that he's who he's, or as his says in scripture, I'm always says, who on am.

And so a couple of weeks ago, pastor Mark talked about how Jesus is the bread of life, and this week we're looking at how Jesus and his proclamation. Says secondly, that I'm the light of the world, and so if you're willing to enable, would you stand with, as we read from John chapter eight, verse 12, God's word is given to us as a gift, which his grace and delight and men and women have died to have it translated into English so that we might be able to read it.

Please. Give your attention to it and don't take for granted how easily it's that we get to read these precious words of holy scripture.

Again, Jesus spoke to them saying, I'm the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, will have the light that light. Grass withers and the flowers. Spain for God's word stands forever. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks you to God. You may be seated

The Thursday morning, uh, ladies Bible study is going through a book, uh, by a man named Peter Cret. It's a book on heaven. And one of the exercises that he asks very early on in the book is, would you take one hour? And would you imagine that heaven, that you would most want

God limit?

What would it be like? You design heaven to meet your deepest needs

and. I want you and the ladies did this on Thursday morning and it took 20 minutes, and you just imagine the heaven that they would want. And then pre says, now I want you to give yourself that heaven and ask yourself, how quickly would it take you to be bored?

Now do it again. Pre says, and let's go a little deeper. Let's think about heaven in terms of relationship and friendship, not stop or activities. And then how quickly then would it take you to get bored? You'll be a millennia. Two millennia. He goes on to say that our hearts are too small

and God wants more than we want, and he wants us to want more than we want so that we can want what he is.

A couple of weeks ago, pastor Mark talked about how Jesus is the bread of life and how Christ himself meets our deepest want, our deepest hunger, our deepest longing of the heart. But friends, you know that the Holy Spirit, Jesus, the Son, God, the Holy Father, he wants more than you want because he wants you to want what he is.

Your heart's a heart too. Only does Jesus meet your deepest longing. But we learned this week that Jesus also is the solution to your spiritual blindness. If we are our people who are going to discover how, it's that we have hearts that really belong to the things that deeply satisfy us, you must first understand how to be, but we are able to be curative the blindness of our hearts.

So in John chapter eight, Jesus proclaims admits the piece of tabernacles in the light of the world. And whoever follows me will no longer walk in darkness, will have the light of life. And Jesus shows us three things. He shows us that first of all, he is the source of light. It is the source of light. In John chapter eight, we find ourselves in the context of this feast ofs.

You knew about this earlier in John chapter seven. Now the feast of, for those of you who are familiar with it, Israel had seven feasts. Seven, and this was the last of the seven feasts. And it was the time where every little boy in Israel learned for the first time how to make sports with their dad. The men, Israel would come to Jerusalem.

It was called ko. It would come to Jerusalem to celebrate Ko feast, the tabernacle, to commemorate the times when Israel walked in the wilderness without a commit, the tabernacle and tents. And so they would take branches and outside of Jerusalem we would build villages of tents. Where the men would live as he celebrated for an entire week, this commemoration of how God delivered them through the wilderness.

And how did he deliver them through the wilderness. Do you remember? Just as Ali read a little earlier, he delivered them through by following a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of what night.

And so when Jesus says that I'm the right of the world, we think about, you know, light like this. We think about the fact that Jesus is the, the light bulb of the world, but that's not how they would've thought about it. They would've thought about how Jesus is the fire. Jesus is the sun. Jesus is the one who leads the way, who shows us the truth, who guides, exposes, heals us just as fire did for those.

Early Jewish believers. So Peter Tabernacle, there were three things that were particularly memorable for those who came to Jerusalem. One was that you actually built the things you lived in. You remember that. The second was they would have what's called a ation ceremony now, and it's not what you're thinking ation, different kind of libation.

It. Libation would pour out water every night. They would take the water that they had to the day, give it to the priest, and he would pour out the water upon the. A symbol of how all of their sustenance is wholly dependent upon the Lord. Just like he supplied them day after day after day in the wilderness.

So also he'll provide the water for you tomorrow, and he would go to the pool of Salo. He would fill up their water jars for the next day and celebrate how God provides for us day by day, by day. And the third thing that was Mable about the Fe of Tabernacles in the period. Jerusalem was three of women occupation because of the victory led Al Judas Maces.

And at that time they made these giant menorahs, these giant lights, and they were up to 70 feet tall around that. And the mission that describes what it was like. When they would go in, they would light these lights every night of the piece of tabernacle. They would take young men that would had these long ladders and they would climb these ladders in the temple, treasure in the court of women outside of the temple, and they would light these massive lights at the close of the first festival day of the peace, the ish.

They went down to the court of women where they had made a great amendment and there were golden candlesticks there with four golden bowls on top of them. Four ladders to each candlestick. Their golden bulls were full of oil. That's how they lit things. And four, use of priestly stock and in their hands, jars of oil holding 120 logs, which they poured into all the bowls and, and they wicks from the worn out drawers and girdles of the.

With them, they set the candlesticks of light and there was not a courtyard in Jerusalem that did not reflect the light. Imagine that they're lighting these massive lights that are illuminating an entire city. How stunning that would've been for those two live their lives by candlelight to have these giant lights.

The entire town, you know, on the last night of the Temple of the peace of Tabernacles. We didn't like those menorahs the last night. It says in John picture eight is when Jesus meet this proclamation

in midst of the darkness of Jerusalem, Roman, just the whole weak in the light of the beauty of those lamps, that these are tabernacles. The that is when Jesus says in the light.

And every Jew would've recognized that Jesus and indeed us saying that he's the one who actually brings true light to Jerusalem. And isn't that exactly what scripture teaches us about the nature of who God is and how he's revealed himself? Like Godless fathers? Think about the story of scripture in Genesis chapter one.

What did Jesus, what did the Father, what did the Spirit who, where they were all there and did the darkness into the void, what did he say?

Exodus Chapter three, Moses stands before of burning bush. God reveals himself as light in the wilderness. Later in Exodus chapter 13 and the wilderness launderings are occurring, God reveals himself how as the core of fire. And then later when Aaron offers the first. Priest doctrine in Leviticus chapter nine, fire comes down from Heaven and consumes it, and then later you read in the Psalms How the Lord is My Right and My Salvation.

David says, your words are ramp into my feet and uh, right to my cast. And the prophets saw Dodge Radiance Magnificent Light. One brightness like ging metal and the appearance of fire all around and they're describing God. He reveals himself as light chapter three. His radiance was like for light. Ray from his says, I make you a light to the speaking of becoming Messiah.

Your Lord will be your everlasting. Testament ends in our English Bibles with Mal, where it says the son of righteousness one day rule rise with healing in its ways. Jesus, my friends, he's the source of right, and your Father and heaven wants you to want more than you. We want you to see that Jesus is the source of light.

He's one that illuminates your deepest desires and want. Why? Because he's the one who provides light for you when the Lord is creating the world. Remember in day three, he gives. The sun of the moon and the stars. He says the greater lights and the lesser lights, he doesn't name those lights. You know why he doesn't name the lights?

He just says the greater and lesser lights 'cause Egypt name lights.

And he wants me to recognize that we greater and there lesser lights, that I'm the true light. And I wonder what your lesser lights are. Like. We all have lights. That Joshua right at the source of knowledge. What is it for you? If we were to publicize your chant, GPT history, what would it say? What kind of questions have you really been asking lately and you know that the Lord wants you to take?

Oh, he wants you to come and recognize the truth of his word that gives you right and not answer every math problem for your eighth, your eighth grader, the Bible. It will give you wisdom because it points you to the one who is truly light, who asks us to worship the one who is truly light in what less.

Sir.

The thing that Jesus teaches us here is that not only is he our source, he teaches us subpoenas, our signal. He says that whoever follows me will not walk in darkness. As long as humans to learn about fire, the powers of fire, the comforts of fire, the the dangers of fire or the destruction of fire people have used fire to communicate and fire is an amazing thing, isn't it?

Right? Is an amazing thing. And it can be used for warmth and comfort. It can also be used for destruction. And if any of you know me or my family, well, you know that there's been a couple of fun episodes with fire involved in our life. My neighbor gave me the greatest compliment not long ago. She said, you know, if ministry doesn't work out for you, you're an amazing place builder.

And do you know why she said that? 'cause I almost burned down her fence. My backyard caught on fire once. Long story. And before I looked up, a lady had come to our back door and said, your backyard's on fire. Gets worse. Worse. I looked at my backyard and the alleyway behind my house, which there's just a chain fence caught on fire.

Enid, the dryness of last summer. And it took, it started moving toward the s behind us. And you wanna see somebody run, I guarantee. So we ran and put that fire out and caught the fences and my neighbors, it's, it was, you know, and, and you laughed.

But I know your story too,

you know, and, um, in our family, at least, at least two women in our family have caught their hair on fire, withs, um, language too. Um, and, um, fire an incredibly dangerous thing. The fire, you know, threat history been used as signals. Do you know why? If you've ever visited China, there are great, there are great towers on the Great Wall of China because those towers were designed to be places where they would like signals all the way down the line so that they would tell of coming, you know, England.

The towers that originally built on many of the castles of England and many of the hotels of England, they, they called them beacons. And there are great stories in the history of England where they would light the beacons on top of the hills, on top of the castles so that they could signal 20, 30, 40 miles away the next one so they could let them know that the French were coming

in. There are some mounds that archeologists have studied and. They're naturally made mounds, those mounts to the very top of those mounts, they'll find the greatest concentration of arrowheads up there because they spent a lot of time up there. Warriors did because they knew that when the enemy comes right, the be on the top of those mounds and would signal all the way across northeast Oklahoma, long before the land was settled.

The danger is coming. If you are Lord of the Ring. Yes. This is a Presbyterian sermon, so we gotta mention it. You know the beacons of Godo when they light that famous, beautiful scene Peter Jackson portrays in the film when they light the beacons of Gond door and then one through the distance malls and miles apart.

There was a woman whose name was Martha Gaston. Her husband died very early. He was only 21, and she was left harassed with her children. And he was the pyrotechnical director of the US Navy before the Civil War. And when he died, Martha Gaston was left penniless and all she had was her husband's notebook and she studied his notebook and she saw that he had some kind of invention that he was onto, but she couldn't quite figure it out.

But she was destitute. And so she took without any knowledge of industry, she took his notebook and she created what we now known as the signal flare, the Gaston flare. And for many, many years, in fact, people say that it was what helped the North Wind, the Civil War, the their ability for ships to be able to signal with different colors of lights, how they communicated.

And it wasn't until the thirties when they created the Mera radio that they stopped using lights. And the signal flare, the primary means of communication because Jesus is not only our source by, but he's also our signal. Wouldn't it be great if we had a way for Jesus to just signal us and say, what do we do?

What do we do? And what does he say to you? He says, whoever shadows me will not walk.

You all know what it's like when you were little and as people, do you know what it's like when you're sitting at your children's room and you always put that night light somewhere in that room and because the middle of the night when all of a sudden your light, your eyes adjust, you signal to your children, there's the door.

Now when you get outta your clothes in this place, you. Because there's a signal of light.

Jesus says that our light is to shine in the darkness.

You ought to be a lamp upon a city. You ought to be a beautiful picture of what might is in a dark, dark world. I wonder if you believe that. Of course, John three 16, when Jesus is talking, Nicodemus, there's another place where universe is later when Jesus is talking to me and he says, the light has come into the world, and whoever does what is true, Nicodemus comes to the light.

You know, one thing, if Christianity is just about how we are to follow the behavior of Jesus, but that is not what Christianity is about. There's a fruit of Christianity, but it is not the root. The root is that Jesus, who is a true light, has come to accomplish for us everything. We cannot accomplish a new defeat, darkness, and death once and for all by his death and resurrection for us.

In Acts chapter two, you see it symbol in this trust here in the giving of the Holy Spirit, Pentecost, how does, how does Luke describe what it's like? When the Holy Spirit comes, he says, upon them came tons of fire light no longer a separate mu no longer is just in the burning bush. Down the light. The fire has come to end blow you.

I wonder if it does.

You are the light of the world. Jesus says, in the greatest sermon ever preached a certain amount. Let your light shine before others. He says later in John chapter 12, you were to walk while you have the light. Believe in the light that you may become sons of light. In Roman chapter 12, he says, you're to cast off the deeds of darkness and you're to put all the armor of light.

Your whole life is to radiate with the light of Christ King as your and indwells you. You're to follow him wherever he leads. Ephesians five. We saw last year that you were once darkness, but now you're light and the Lord walk. Would you walk as children of the light? He's your source. He's your signal. In Philippians chapter two, just after the words that we confess in our confession of faith, Paul writes that we are to shine as lights in the world holding fast to the word of life.

In second, IANS chapter five. You are all children of light. You are children of the day. Therefore, let us be sober. Putting on the breastplate of faith.

In one Peter chapter two, he called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light, and God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. If we walk in the light, we have fellowship. With one another. Since Jesus is the source of our light, and its all the other lesser lights, it doesn't just illuminate the courtyards of Jerusalem, he illuminates God of power, his Holy Spirit, the courtyards of your heart.

Do you believe that? Not only, but he's our signal to direct us where we may go next. You wonder where we may go? You follow God's word because he is the light, and every passage of scripture speaks.

Jesus is the light of the world. He guides us. He exposes us, and he heals us. He's the source. He's the signal. And lastly, Jesus is our security. Notice what it says, but in Greek Allah. But we will have the light of love.

Doesn't say you might have the live of Life. Doesn't say you're good enough. You come to charity enough, you do have bible studies, you listen to the podcast, right? He says, no promise. You have the live of life. Would you arrest secure enough? You know, if you look in your Bibles, you'll see, uh, an interesting section just before this passage.

If you look at the verse, uh, 53 of chapter seven, all the way down. Verse 11 of chapter eight. There's a little notation in most of your Bibles. In all of your Bibles if you use the two back Bibles that says that this passage is not found in the earliest manuscripts. And indeed, it was a historical account, but it probably wasn't an original account to John's gospel.

It was probably added later. The early church fathers passed doubt upon it being there. The earliest, uh, most reliable manuscript of New Testament do not include that section in John. That's why there's the notation by the editors there. If you don't see it repeated in the early church until the almost the first century by Dem blind, it's nevertheless a true story, and I think that it was added later in the midst of John to illustrate this very poem of the story.

It's a woman who's caught in adultery. It says nothing by the way of the man just there to shame her, bring her out before the array. Might perhaps barely close. Out there in public, humiliated and ashamed, and they say to Jesus, they try to trap him and they say, what are we to do with her? They want her either to condemn an expose woman or they want him to disobey the law.

Either way, Jesus. And so Jesus says, you sin first to.

And the passage says that one by one, beginning with the oldest first they begin to walk away. And there she's with Jesus

in a dusty courtyard alone with her savior. And Jesus looks at her. He says, is there no one here to judge you? And she says, no, Lord, no one. And he says, well need to do it. GTO and sin. No.

Is just trying to communicate effect to you and to me that when we stand before Jesus and we expose to him our sin, it offers us with his grace. But if we hide our sin from him, then he'll expose us in his.

You either expose your sin to Jesus and you find that he covers you with his grace or you hide your sin from him, and you'll find that he'll expose you in judgment of your choice.

And right after this passage in John, Jesus healed the blind. And again, he. You did with woman who color adultery. The story says where he grew in sand and here he spits in the ground and he picks the mud and he wipes it on the man's eyes and he heals the man of his blindness. This is Jesus is saying to us, you wanna be healed of your blindness for judgment.

I came into the world that those who do not see may see those who see. Become blind. And some of the Pharisees near him heard these things and said to him, are we also blind? And Jesus said to them, if you were blind, you would have no guilt. But now that you say we see you and being blind because they saw with lesser whats, you know, Kelly, that the verse that you chose as a member here, um, you know right after that verse, you know, there's this amazing picture of the new heavens and new earth.

Where there's no sun in the new Jerusalem is there, there's no sun. Why? Because Jesus is the light that illuminates everything, and everything radiates from him. If we were to follow the, the track of, of of, of all the data, scientific discoveries, you know that there are suns and there we're stars that are millions of times bigger than our son, millions of times, bigger than our son, our son, to be world.

Brightness of these other stars and these suns, and yet Jesus, Jesus has, that's a lesser light to me In the new Jerusalem, there is no right because he's the source of light and his presence illuminates everything. He is the true pillow that walks around among us as the pillar of fire night to eliminate us in the darkness.

Ultimately is. Thirdly, he's our security. And if you expose your sin before Jesus, he will cover you with his grace. But if you hide your sin before him, he will expose you in judgment. Which would it be? Is Jesus the light of the world? He dies, he exposes.

At the start of the year, every one of us are always looking for some kind of security, some kind of way to begin the year. All right. What if this year Jesus would've said, I want you to use, I want you to look, I want you to see, I want you to find the light in me, and I want you to abide in me as fast falls the evening.

Evil died. Who? Darkness demons. And we're to pray Lord with me. Abide when other helpers and comfort and you know, they help of the helpless source signal security abide with me And the what filled of.

Flowing from manuals, veins, and sinners, plunge beneath that blood, lose all their guilty sayings. Would you expose your sin to him or would you find that he'll cover you with his grace, the darkness of your heart? He belongs to expose, but he already knows that he belongs to bring the right hand. He wants to help heal it.

He guides you. He exposes he heals. I wonder if you would take time this week. Exercise that I mentioned at the beginning that Peter Croft commence to those ladies on Thursday morning who are reading that book. I wonder if you would imagine an exercise where you can think of all the areas of your life that you are blind and you long for sight knowledge that you wish you had.

Areas of your life. You feel like you're just groping in the dark, you don't know what's next, and would you just write those in on, take whatever time you have, 20 minutes an hour if you can. And write 'em all down. And one by one by one construc them to heal is delight. Jesus. Would you take this anxiety I have about my child?

Jesus? Would you take this anxiety, this darkness I have about where I'm gonna go to college next year? Jesus. I have no idea what I'm gonna do in retirement, how I'm gonna afford it, what I'm gonna do to provide for my family. Would you take. Nor would you allow me go deeper, Jesus, this is how I've always covered my self in my own righteousness before you, because I'm really, if I'm honest, still trying to earn my favor with you.

Would you confess that? And if we expose our blindness to Jesus, he will always cover us with his grace. And if we hide ourselves in our own darkness, he will expose us in his judgment. There have been times that. Wrote in the problem of pain. My faith, we do not desire heaven. But more often he says, I find myself wandering in our heart of hearts if we have ever really desired anything else.

Jesus, the, the light of the world, he's our source of life. He's the signal and he's our. Gave life for you on the cross, and he rose again on the third day that we might extend the light to the world because we have been exposed and covered by Grace Hall.

Father, would you remind us again and again how you came to lead your people through your light? Thank you, father, that you gave roses the symbol of the burning bush, and we find in the 7:00 AM statements we're wrapped in the shadow of that burning bush. Because you Lord Jesus Christ, are the true I'm Would you be our right, not just this week, would you remind us how we are to confess all the lesser lights that we use?

Father, help us not to walk in own self-righteousness, but help us to walk freely confessing our need for grace. We are all the women we caught in adultery exposed before you. Only some of us recognize that some of us in this room don't. Would you help us, Lord, to hear your words, that you cover us with your grace?

Would you help us to run to this table and find in our communion with you the joy of your presence among us? Not by a pillar of fire now, but by our resurrected king who promises that one day when we are with him in the new heavens and new earth, he will illuminate everything because he is the source, the signal of he's our security of life.

We pray these things in Jesus name, amen.

Sermon transcript is computer generated.