Enjoy the Light!

Isaiah 9:1-6

I don’t know about you, but I find that it’s a very rare thing for me to be in total and complete darkness. Usually, even like this, there’s a pretty good amount of ambient light around, right? It’s not total complete. Maybe if it was at night, this would be, but still there’d be streetlights out and around. There was one time in my life where I was in absolute total complete darkness. I may have shared this with you before. We took some of the youth in Tennessee caving, and when we got way back into the back of the cave somewhere, I don’t know where I was just following the lead of the leader, when we were back in the back of the cave somewhere, I asked all of the kids to turn off their lights, their headlamps, and it was crazy how dark it was. I took and put my hand in front of my face, and I could not see it at all. I knew it was there because I knew what I was doing with my hand, but the darkness was just thick. It was oppressive. It was just, “Wow!” And that’s a picture for our spiritual life by nature. By nature, we humans are born into this world walking in spiritual darkness. What would that mean? It means that we don’t know who Jesus is. We don’t know by nature that God is love. That we don’t know that there is a Bible that we can count on. We don’t know that there’s forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. We don’t know that on the day we die, if we believe in Jesus, we’re going to heaven. We don’t have any of that darkness. What does that bring? That spiritual darkness brings a sense of distress and despair and fear and guilt and hopelessness. And as you’re hearing those things, one of the things that we should be thinking is, “Well, wait! There are times when I feel fear and I feel guilt and I feel dread or a sense of hopelessness or helplessness. Does that mean I’m still walking in spiritual darkness?” No, not necessarily. But it is a powerful reminder that, yes, that’s who we are by nature. And that left to our own desserts and left to our own ways, we would end up in hell forever. And it’s a great reminder for us that if we don’t stay connected to the word of God regularly and often, that those feelings of despair and helplessness and stress and guilt and pain, that those things will eventually overwhelm us and cut us off from God. Darkness. It’s no fun at all. Back to my kids in the cave. As you may have already guessed, I did a devotional thought, something about Jesus being the light of the world. I don’t remember what it was. But I talked through thoughts like what we just talked through. Don’t remember it exactly. This is 15 years ago, at least, I guess. And then I asked one of the young men to turn on one lamp. Go ahead, Alex. And it was amazing how just that one little light made a huge difference. All of a sudden, what had been complete and total darkness, you could make out shapes. Well, you couldn’t see details, but you could make out shapes. And you could kind of see rough edges. And that’s kind of the way it was for the people in the Old Testament. That they lived with prophecies such as the one we just read. And they lived with pictures of the coming Savior, like the lights which were kept lit in the temple all night long. As a reminder that God was always with him. Zebulun, Naftali, the land of Galilee, was considered a land of darkness. At Jesus’ time, the key city on the Sea of Galilee was a city called Tiberius. It was a Roman city, named after a Roman emperor in the heart of Galilee. One of the other chief cities of the region of Galilee was a place called Caesarea Philippi. It was built by Herod Philip. He’s one of Herod the Great’s descendants. And it was named after the Caesar, hence Caesarea, and named after Philip himself, hence Philippi. What was Caesarea Philippi’s claim to fame? Their claim to fame was that they had a huge compound dedicated to the god Pan. Pan is a Greek god that means everything. So basically to worship Pan, you kind of could worship whatever you wanted. But Pan was particularly considered to be the god of the sheep herders and the goat herders. What darkness! What spiritual awfulness! And this was where? This was within the boundaries of the land of the people who were supposed to be the people of God. This was within the boundaries of the people whose God was supposed to be the Lord. And we’ve got shrines to the god Pan. Oh, and then Jesus came. Jesus came to that land of Galilee. And Jesus came doing things like saying, “I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep know me and I give them eternal life.” Jesus came to that region of Galilee and turned water into wine. And he healed the paralyzed man. And he fed the five thousand and later he fed the four thousand. And he said, “I am the bread of life. He who lives and believes in me will never die.” It was light bursting into the darkness. And as Jesus’ life went along, Jesus eventually took on the worst darkness of all, the darkness of death. He walked through the valley of the shadow of death. The Hebrew word that’s used in our text is the same Hebrew word that’s used in Psalm 23. The people living in shadows says in our text, that’s the same word for living in the shadow of death, the valley of the shadow of death in Psalm 23. The ultimate shadow is the shadow of death, is it not? And Jesus took it head on, but he took it head on the way nobody else in the world could ever take it on. That he took all sin upon himself, he took all darkness upon himself. And he died on that dark day we call good, good Friday. But the darkness lost. And Jesus came bursting forth out of the tomb and brought the complete light of salvation to the world and brought the complete light of salvation to you. For many people in this world, life is just sort of this wandering aimlessness through this dark place. What’s the point? What’s the purpose? Is it really the one who dies with the most toys wins? But you still die. Is that it? Is it just eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die? Is that what life is about? Is that it? Not for you. Because you know who you are, that you are the children of the heavenly father. You know that you have incredible purpose in this life. That’s to come to know Jesus as your savior. And then to share Jesus with others by your words and your actions and your attitudes. You know that life does have purpose because it’s God’s wonderful time of grace when he’s bringing people to faith in Jesus that they can someday end up with him in heaven. For you, life is not a pointless wandering through darkness. For you, life is a walk with Jesus in the light. And for most people on this world, the deepest, darkest, the darkness of all is that darkness of death. But not for you. Why? Because you know that you have a savior who defeated death once and for all. You know that you have a savior who rose from the grave. And you know that that savior said to you and to me and to all believers, “I am the resurrection and the life and the one who believes in me, even though he dies, yet he will live. And the one who lives and believes in me will never die.” Because for you, death is not something that needs to be feared any longer. Because for you, death is the crossing over from this life to a life that’s way, way, way, way better. And so totally contrary to what the world thinks for you and for me, death is not something to be feared, but is actually something to be looked forward to and even embraced. No, not in a weird suicidal way, but in a way that says, “God is taking me home to be with him.” You live in the light. And no, that doesn’t mean that we’re going to be happy, happy, happy all the time, time, time. We still live in a world that’s filled with sinners like you and me. We still live in a world that’s got darkness all around us. And it shows itself in oh so many ways. And so yes, we’re going to have our moments. We’re going to have our times when we feel guilty or fearful or nervous or scared or depressed. Because we live on this side of eternity. But at the end of the day, brothers and sisters, you live in the daylight. You live in the light of God’s wonderful love because you know Jesus. And so my brothers and sisters, enjoy the light. Amen. And amen.