His life Our Light

How beautiful creation must have been. That explosive and wonder creative energy. The beauty of it all. out of nothing an explosion of color and activity. Of songs and scents.. Out of nothing came everything. the beauty of God at work orchestrating it all.

This image of the fifth day of Creation. Imagined by the Iranian painter Mahmoud Fashchian expresses the fantastic creative energy when the Word of God spoke life into it’s infinite array of being!

In the Gospel of John John reminds us of this moment. As his intorduction for his friend and teacher.. Jesus Christ. The subject of the Gospel. And he does so so that we can understand why Jesus is so amazing.

John is claiming that before anything else was Jesus was one with God! and He with God Created the Whole of the universe as we know it.

That shows us how Powerful Jesus is. We talked about that some last week.

But this week we will see how beautiful Jesus is.

Look at this painting. see all the swirling bubbling birds and fishes. and there in the middle of the painting the diverging colors blend into that fanastic Gold color. for me that is simply his artistic expression of Life. beautiful and riviting Life!

It makes me think about what John says next About jesus..

English Standard Version Chapter 1

4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

John has narrowed his focus.. now he is saying that Jesus, his friend and teacher. is not just the source of creation. But also the source of one profoundly important part of creation. Life…!

Life is not to be taken for granted, here. it is not the accidental product of creation.. Nor is it so common that it can be summed up as just creation.

John is saying that in Jesus was the life that shaped it All. And sustains us all.

The Hebrews saw it this way … God had created everything. Every physical structure and animal and Plant. and for every living thing God sustained them as well. His spirit persisting in them caused the ongoing miracle of Life.

English Standard Version Psalm 104

O LORD, how manifold are your works!

In wisdom have you made them all;

the earth is full of your creatures.

English Standard Version Psalm 104

When you hide your face, they are dismayed;

when you take away their breath, they die

and return to their dust.

30 When you send forth your Spirit, they are created,

and you renew the face of the ground.

how beautiful is that Life that we see and that John describes.. How precious to us all.

And jesus is the source of that life..

For humanity that life is not just an abstract energy.. nor is it a replication of complex chemical pathways and genetic material. Life is is a profoundly personal thing.

In the creation story God forms humanity in his image of clay and breathes his spirit into us. Our first breath was a kiss from our creator. We are meant to be near to him his breath our life his being our life.. his person our life.

To live was to be near God. To know was hear God. To be known was to be with God. for Humanity life with God, relationship with God was our source of knowing..

English Standard Version Chapter 1

In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

That is What john is saying here that the life that was in Jesus was the light of men.. Without light we don’t have guidance. We trip we fall we stub our toes and worse!

Christ’s life is that light of us.. that clarity and understanding. that guidance and wisdom.

Deithrch Bonhoeffer says that, “we were created to Know God.. and to live under his understanding.“

To be in relationship with God was to see the world through his eyes. his definition of right and wrong. beautiful and ugly. good and evil.

In the same way that our friends and spouses opinions rub off on us.. so to was a relationship with God supposed to influence the way humanity lived and loved.

And it makes sense. God is the one who created the world.. he shaped it beautifully for his purposes.

and he placed humanity in it.. He made it.. he made us.. He knows how we can live best to fit in it. To fit into the profound beauty of his plan.

Of course as a parent this something I understand. I feel like I know how things work.. ANd how they don’t and I am constantly trying to share those important bits of information and behavior with my children. Ultimately with the hope that they will not Die and that they will prosper and enjoy fully the life that I gave them.

God wanted that for his creation as well. For Adam and Eve.

He gave them his life.

He Gave them his light, his wisdom and law..

And they turned their back on his life and his light.

And that was the fall. The profoundly creation wrenching moment when the pinnacles of God’s creation rejected him and called him a liar.

It was then that death, sin and suffering seemed to tear a hole in the beautiful tapestry of God’s creation.

it was then that the Darkness opposed the light and threatened to Consume all the good that God had given humanity.

And in a way the rest of the bible is the story of the how the light would combat the darkness and how God would overcome the evil at the heart of his creation.

After all the bible is the God inviting people to know him. And his life.. first Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Then Moses and the refugee tribes of Israel at mt. Sinai.

Now you might say that God gave them more light than life at the Mountian. After all he gave them his ten commandments.. literally the Law.

But we need to remember that he also had them build the tabernacle at mt. Sinai and gave them the model for sacrifices to cover their sins so that he could dwell in their midst. The story of Scripture is the story of God Coming to us when we were too blind and evil to run to him.

And John is saying here that the climax of the story has Come..

English Standard Version Chapter 1

5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Jesus came, the life of God became known like never before because God took on Human life to walk with a hateful Humanity

Jesus came faced everything that the darkness could throw at him.. the rage of herod who slaughtered a village of children to try and kill him. The crowds that wanted his gifts and entertainment but not him.

The distain and distrust of the preists and pharasee’s who were supposed to be living in the light.

but the darkness could not overcome him!

Even in that moment that we know is coming.. when Jesus humbles himself to be whipped, crucified and killed by evil men. Even in that moment when it seems that Darkeness has finally consumed the light. The light overcomes the Darkness.

And death and sin are instead in their moment of triumph soundly defeated and nothing not our sin, not even our deaths can separate us from God.

Through jesus the life of God enters the world to dwell in the hearts of men and women like never before. His holy spirit dwells within us.

New life fills us. a New light leads us and God is with us.. And friends the light will only shine brighter from now on!

Application

live in the light. confess and reject the darkness.

English Standard Version Chapter 1

6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin

celebrate the light with your life!

paul says,

English Standard Version Chapter 10

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God

our guide in that is not just the rules that we see on the page.. or the sermons that we hear..

or even our “common morality”

but

the one who lived perfectly. just a verse later paul says.

English Standard Version Chapter 11

Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

ANd we can do that because christ is nearer to us now. His spirit dwells within us his words resonate from pages of the bible. and from the songs of the saints and the prayers of his people.. We have eachother to spur each other onward in good deeds and to lift each other up as we fall.

You see we don’t just have the law of christ to Guide us.. we have the life of christ within and without to spur us on to life eternal.

FinallyJohn Said

English Standard Version Chapter 1

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

So hope in the light’s victory.. now and eternally!

English Standard Version Chapter 8

38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Friends, if you are in Christ.. no matter how dark it gets, how great your despair how awful your suffering.. This promise is true. Christ has won every victory that matters and the Darken will never overcome the light!

And Christ’s victory is our victory as well. For he has given us his life and adopted us as children of the father and given us an unfailing inheritance it Glory.

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