Light …
Whitney Houston sang a legendary version of Joseph Brooks song: You Light Up My Life:
Yes, it was written with the longing for romance in mind, but could also be envisioned as a longing, which mere affection could never fill.
Common realities are seldom considered in much depth. Flip a switch and the light goes on, or the car starts, or the microwave starts buzzing.
Light is usually an issue only when it is absent or very strong, otherwise, it is seldom considered beyond its being available when we need it for our utilitarian purposes.
Science is still trying to get its collective head around whether light is a wave form or particulate in nature, or, possibly both! Prisms help us understand the complexity of light, breaking it into a panorama of colours!
With our increasingly sophisticated equipment we can see “light” where it was not previously visible.
In the 1970’s, German physics researcher Dr. Fritz-Albert Popp discovered that each cell in our bodies emits a measurable amount of light. Interestingly, he stated, “we know today that man, essentially, is a being of light … we are still on the threshold of fully understanding the complex relationship between light and life, but we can now say emphatically, that the function of our entire metabolism is dependent on light.”
Dogs are very wary of some individuals, snarling from a distance, while others they gravitate to with tail a-wag. What do they sense that we don’t seem to understand? Could it be that we exude an aura which dogs “see”, to detect and respond accordingly? There seems to be significant data to collaborate this conjecture.
Light is a theme in Scripture from beginning to end: “And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.” … “And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.” (Genesis 1:3; Revelation 22:5)
“God is light,” writes the Apostle John in 1 John 1:5, and so is His Son. Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)
Rarely, if ever, have I heard sermons on this phrase! Salvation - for sure! “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life!”
The Creator speaks of light with nuances which go far beyond that Whitney sang of in her song. “God is light!” If we fast forward to the early chapters of Genesis during this primal days of creation, we find God communicating with the first humanity as it were - face-to-face. But if God is light, could we safely surmise or deduce that those with whom he shared, were also light beings? Time to ponder, I think!
Jesus reflects on God’s statement with an inclusion of all who are his followers: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
Perhaps you recall waking to the frantic calls of a child afraid of the dark; or, you may have walked through the “valley of the shadow of death” with its accompanying darkness; or, financial losses have left you destitute with no hope for tomorrow; or, a foreclosure has left you with no place to call home; or, a spouse has unexpectedly declared that your relationship/marriage has no future with you …
Darkness’s demise materializes shrouded in sundry skeletal forms - all with equally profound consequences.
We ask, How could Jesus say that his followers “would never walk in darkness”? We’ve all been there, we’ve experienced it, we’ve tasted it, we’ve seen it eyeball-to-eyeball! We want to push those memories from us as far as the east is from the west!
But on top of that profound declaration, he goes on to say that those same followers, “will have the light of life”. Yes, I want it!
Once again we are back in the Garden of Eden facing the two proverbial trees - one of categorical “good and evil” the other of “life”.
As we stare at the choice before us, could we be getting a glimpse of the archetypical forces of life and death. Freewill allows us the choice. Consequences follow our decision.
May I be bold? In our minds we want the life of God, the light of God to be ours, but so often we live in the context of the other tree - right versus wrong. As Jesus stated, we can’t have it both ways - darkness and light - they are mutually exclusive!
“And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”” (Genesis 2:16, 17)
Paul writes to the believers in Salonica:
“God is light, and it is His plan that believers shine forth His light, becoming more like Christ every day. “You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness” (1 Thessalonians 5:5)
Peter writes,
“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, [kingly-priests] a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.” (1 Peter 2:9)
There is a similar verse in Exodus but with a significant difference - the verbal tense:
“ … if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, [then] you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’”(Exodus 19:5, 6a)
In the transition from “shadow” (anticipation) to “substance” a dramatic change has taken place - what was dependent on obedience has been fulfilled by the totally obedience One! Consequently, we are kingly-priests, a chosen race, his possession with a spiritual mandate:
Proclaim the One who said he was, “the light of the world” and has commissioned us by stating “you are the light of the world”.( John 8:12; Matthew 5:14-16)
“Jesus is telling his (Melchizedekian) priesthood to be “a new revelation of Light in the world, not a message of shadows.” We were not created to be light and then be put under a basket. … we were created to light up the whole house, in other words, to shine in the entire world.”
Paul appears to concur by writing, “These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.”(Colossians 2:17)
“Therefore to cling to the prophetic shadow is to obscure the spiritual reality of which those things were a prefigurement. “The reality” or the substance belongs to Christ. In him, the things to come have appeared.” (EBC Abridged)
Perhaps Whitney and Joseph were using our common experience to speak of this deeper reality - Jesus, You Light Up My Life!
“Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works
and glorify your Father in heaven.”