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Walking in the light
Last week we studied about the purposes of the Holy
Spirit, and we learned that when we trust and allow Him
to guide us, then we Hill never be separated from God’s
presence. The Holy Spirit is the guiding light that
keeps us in God’s path. This is why today we are going
study about the light; that light that God sent to the
world so that we would never again have to wonder in
darkness. I want us to examine this theme today because
there are a large number of people that fail to fully
understand this concept. There are many that do not
grasp the significance of what walking in the light
means. It is for this reason that today we are going to
study about the light of this world. Today we are going
to explore three great truths about the light of this
world that will help us in our daily walk. We will
learn that we can not give light unless we have light;
the light reveals, and where there is light there can be
no darkness. With this in mind let’s now turn to
today’s scriptures.
John 8:12
- Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, I am the
light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in
darkness, but have the light of life
In this verse that we have just read, Jesus makes a very
powerful statement; He revealed to this group of
Pharisees that He is the light of the world. This
statement and great truth was immediately rejected by
them. They responded by saying “…You bear witness of
Yourself; Your witness is not true.” What did they
want accomplish by saying this? What they did is not
too dissimilar as to what the world often does when it
comes to believers. What they attempted to do was to
discredit and ridicule Jesus. Why did they need to
accomplish this? In order to fully understand the
reason, it will be necessary to travel to that time and
examine what they were about. In the time that Jesus
physically walked the earth there were two very
influential and powerful religious groups. There were
the Pharisees and the Sadducees. We are not going to
cover both groups today, rather we will concentrate on
the Pharisees. The Pharisees believed in a personal
God and in the scriptures as the Word of God, but the
problem was that they often added to the scriptures.
They added rules and regulations, rituals and
ceremonies, in this manner imposing restrictions on the
people. This is something that is very well reflected
in the words of our Lord as we find in
Matthew 23:13 when we
read “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven
against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do
you allow those who are entering to go in.” This
behavior led them to two grave errors. The first error
was that they were leading the people to believe that
through good behavior and rituals, they World be
acceptable to God. The second error was that they were
leading the people toward a religion of social respect,
an external religion. In other words, is a person was
socially respected and did all things correctly, then
that person was judged as acceptable to God. But the
problem was that they did not practiced what they
preached. They professed one thing, but practiced
something different. It is for this same reason that we
see that Jesus had very strong words for them and called
them hypocrites. Their problem was that they did not do
things for the glory of God; they did things in order to
be socially recognized. This leads us to the first
truth that Jesus reveals to us about the light. The
first truth is that you can’t give what you don’t have.
Allow me to illustrate it this way. Let’s say that
right now I know that there is a person out there that
is going through some very difficult financial times.
Let’s say that I know that this person does not have a
single cent with which to cover his needs. Let’s now
say that I walk up to this person and ask him to give me
twenty dollars. Will this person be able to give me
what I have asked of him? Of course not, we all know
that regardless of how willing our heart may be, we
simply can’t give what we don’t have. This is exactly
what happened here with Jesus and the Pharisees, they
could not give Him what they did not have. They could
not give Him a genuine love for God. In actuality, this
is one of the most serious problems that confront the
body of Christ today. There are many that profess to
walk in the light, but the sad reality is that they are
still lost in the darkness. I say this because when we
examine our Lord’s messages with detail, we will quickly
realize that the main theme of His teachings is love.
Look carefully at how this is clearly stated in
Matthew 22:37-39 when we
read “Jesus said to him, You shall love the LORD your
God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with
all your mind. 38This is the first and great
commandment. 39And the second is like it:
‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” But the
sad reality is that love is something that is often
missing in the life of many believers. Perhaps some of
you are thinking that what I am saying does not make any
sense, after all, all of us here love our families,
correct? All of us here love our sons and daughters,
husbands and wife, and the rest of our family members,
but it is not about this love that I want to speak to
you about today. Today I want to bring to your
attention the lack of love and great indifference that
exists with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Today I
want to talk about the lack of love and indifference
that exists for the Lord’s work. Today I want to speak
about the lack of love and indifference that exists for
all of those souls out there that are lost in this world
of darkness. Why does this indifference or lack of love
abound? It abounds because the genuine love of God has
grown cold in the heart of many. Jesus said it best in
Matthew 24:12 when we
read “Because of the increase of wickedness, the love
of most will grow cold.” It is because of this
coldness of heart that it is uncommon to see how many
attend church services week after week, but leave the
services in the very same condition as when they
entered. But if you have felt that way or feel that
way right now, I have great news for you. The light of
this world is here to light your path and guide you out
of the darkness.
It is impossible to say that we live in Christ if we do
not feel and share His love. Look carefully at how this
is clearly stated in 1 John 4:8
when we read “He who does not love does not know God,
for God is love.” It is impossible to say that we
walk in the light, if we do not love the same way that
Christ loves us. This is something clearly reflected in
1 John 2:9 when we read
“He who says he is in the light, and hates his
brother, is in darkness until now.” The Pharisees
could not understand and would not accept what Christ
was saying, they could not understand or accept His
message because they genuinely did not love God, they
loved themselves. But as Christians we can not be like
them, we have to be imitators of Christ at all times.
As faithful Christians we can not allow our enemy to
reenter our life to shut off the light that God has
given us. Look carefully at what the Lords tells us in
Matthew 5:14 when we
read “You are the light of the world. A city that is
set on a hill cannot be hidden.” We can’t allow
ourselves to be guided back from where we were
delivered. I am sure that all of us here remember from
where the Lord rescued us. I am sure that all of us
here can remember being lost in the darkness of this
world, lost in the sufferings, and preoccupations
thinking that there was no way out. But then something
wonderful happened, someone spoke to us about Jesus.
Someone allowed the light that they had within to shine
in our world of darkness, and our celestial Father
glorified himself in our life. It was as we find in
Matthew 5:16 when we
read “Let your light so shine before men, that they
may see your good works and glorify your Father in
heaven.” That light that person that spoke to us
about Christ shone, and it was exactly what we needed.
Brethren and that shinning light is exactly what this
world needs. The world needs to know that there is
hope, and that there is a solution. The world needs to
know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and
that his name is Jesus. “I am the light of the
world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but
have the light of life.” It is time to strengthen
your love for God. Brethren, we must allow that lights
that shines within us to show in everything that we do.
It is time to bring the light of the world to all of
those who are still lost in darkness, or to those that
may have strayed from the path. It is time to allow
this light to reveal to all people that there is a
solution; and this brings us to the second point. The
light reveals.
In John 1:3-5 we are
told “All things were made through Him, and without
Him nothing was made that was made. 4In Him
was life, and the life was the light of men. 5And
the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did
not comprehend it.” Tell the person next to you,
the light reveals. If we think about this for a brief
moment, we will see that what we have just said is a
great truth. Allow me to explain it in a different
way. Let’s ask ourselves, what is the first thing that
we do when the lights suddenly go out or it gets dark?
The first thing we do is try to turn on a light, it
might be a candle or flashlight, but the first thing
that we try to do is turn on a light. Why do we do
it? We do it because we want to be able to see what
happened that made the lights turn off to begin with,
but we also do it because we want o see that which
surrounds us. In other words, we turn on the light to
receive a revelation. Brethren, the light of this world
brings revelation to our life. When we accept Jesus
Christ as our Lord and Savior, and we allow Him to work
in us through the Holy Spirit, then we will receive a
revelation of his purpose in our life. Jesus told the
Pharisees that He had come to reveal the Father to
them. These people thought they knew Him well but in
fact they did not. Many today think the same way, many
think they know God well, but the truth of the matter is
that they do not. I say this because when we know the
Father we know His will, and that leads us to conduct
our life according to Him at all times. When we allow
the light to shine in our life, we receive a revelation
of all of those things that displease God. When we
allow the light to shine at all times, our path through
this life will always be clearly lighted. When we
allow the light to shine within us, then we will receive
liberation. Look carefully at how this is very well
reflected in Acts 12:6-7
when we read “And when Herod was about to bring him
out, that night Peter was sleeping, bound with two
chains between two soldiers; and the guards before the
door were keeping the prison. 7Now behold, an
angel of the Lord stood by him, and a light shone in the
prison; and he struck Peter on the side and raised him
up, saying, “Arise quickly!” And his chains fell off his
hands.” When the light reveals the will of the
Father, the chains shatter, and the loads are lifted.
The light reveals to us the road that we must follow.
The light reveals to us the path that we must take.
When we allow our life to be lighted by Christ, never
again will we be in darkness. This brings me to the
third point; where there is light there can be no
darkness.
In 1 John 1:5 we read “This
is the message we have heard from Him and announce to
you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness
at all.” One of the most wonderful things about the
light is that the darkest it gets, the brighter the
light shines. Let’s think about this for a brief
moment. If right at this moment we were to light a
candle in thins brightly illuminated place, the candle’s
light would not be too potent. The same would happen if
we were to bring a candle or flashlight outside in the
daylight, the light given by both of these things would
not illuminate anything very well, correct? But if we
were to conduct the same experiment during a dark night,
in a night when you can’t even see the moon and the
stars. The result would be completely different, the
light of a simple candle would be seen at a great
distance, the reflection of a small light will traverse
all through the darkness, and the darkness will have to
vanish from its path. This is the most wonderful thing
about the light; darkness has to flee from its
presence. It is for this reason that God sent His son
to the world. God sent His only begotten Son to this
world of darkness so that darkness would have to flee
from us. Look at how this is very well reflected in
2 Corinthians 4:6 when
we read “For God, who said, "Light shall shine out of
darkness," is the One who has shone in our hearts to
give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in
the face of Christ.” And also in
Colossians 1:12-14 when
we read “giving thanks to the Father, who has
qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints
in Light. 13For He rescued us from the domain
of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His
beloved Son, 14in whom we have redemption,
the forgiveness of sins.” When we make a genuine
compromise with Christ and we allow ourselves to be
filled with the Holy Spirit, then the principalities and
the powers of darkness can not affect us. They can’t
affect us because when the light shines darkness must
vanish. As the people of God that we are, we must seek
to make this light shine in us at all times. We must
make a genuine compromise with God so that His light
will shine brightly in our life at all times; causing
all of those things that make us stumble and on
occasions fall vanish. During another stage in our life
we ere very different, during another stage in out life
we walked according to the world, but now we must walk
in the light, we must walk and behave as what we are,
children of God. It is as the scriptures tell us in
Ephesians 5:8 when we
read “…for you were formerly darkness, but now you
are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light.”
In conclusion.
As children of God we must allow the light of the world
to glow within us at all times. This means that when
they look at us, they will see the love of Christ
reflected in everything that we are. This means that
the world will see us for who we really are, a people
selected by God, a people that proclaims His power,
mercy, and grace at all times. Who are we, and what must
the world see? The answer is found in the scriptures in
1 Peter 2:9 when we read
“…but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a
holy nation, a people for god's own possession, so that
you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called
you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” Let
us walk in the light that brightens this world, let’s
walk in Christ at all times. We were delivered from the
darkness and His light illuminates our path. When
darkness of this world attempts to cover us, when things
may appear to be the darkest, let us never forget that
do not belong to this world, we are not sons of
darkness, we are sons of light. Let’s never forget what
we find in 1 Thessalonians 5:5
when we read “…for you are all sons of light and sons
of day We are not of night nor of darkness.” Let’s
always be on guard never allowing the enemy to trap us
in darkness; let us walk always in the light and we will
always be victorious.
© Jose R. Hernandez |
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