Timeless Light Overcomes Darkness (Advent 5, 2016)

Enter your home at night and what’s the first thing you do? Turn on the light. When it’s dark, we stumble over things, bump into furniture, and usually something bad happens…we break things or get some really nasty bruises. Or encounter a spider. (I’m not a big fan of spiders.) When it comes to seeing threats in our midst, Light makes all the difference. It overcomes darkness. Turn it on!

Isaiah 9: 2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.

timeless-light-overcomes-darkness The prophet Isaiah was talking to and about the Jewish people, but it is a picture that applies to all of us, no matter what age we live in or what age we are.

The Gospel message of Light invading and conquering sin’s darkness is Timeless.

What is God’s answer to gloom of sin’s darkness?

He sends His Son Jesus whose birth we celebrate at Christmas and this reality is what we ought to prepare our hearts for in anticipation during Advent. It’s more important than a shopping list since Santa isn’t real and frankly, we’ve all been naughty.

Since we’ll end up hurt if we walk around in darkness or the land of the shadow of death (a very sobering picture of man’s mortality on earth), God turns on the Light of Christ.

Reflect today on the way Isaiah 9:2 sets a pattern for John 8:12 and makes the Gospel a message for all time. How it’s Timeless. John 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Read John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it…9 The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God– 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. 14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.