By Rev. Brian Wilkie
Rev. Brian Wilkie
Pastor of St. Andrew's Christian Community
Rockland, Ontario
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| Rev. Brian Wilkie |
Pastor of St. Andrew's Christian Community
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PODCAST LINK to CFRA broadcast - Sunday, January 14th, 2018:
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Broadcast Notes:
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Good Morning! I'm your host
today, Brian Wilkie of St. Andrew's Christian Church in Rockland. As we begin today, my prayer is that The Good
News of the Lord Jesus Christ would encourage and strengthen you today!
Light of the World
We’re at the beginning of the year from
the calendar point of view, and we’re in what churches celebrate as the season
of Epiphany the season that extends the Christmas theme of The Light of Christ
coming into the world. Of course it parallels the change that's happening in
the skies as the season (in the Northern Hemisphere) turns from the longest
night the days are getting longer now and there's more and more light in the
world.
So the church encouraged people by
developing a church calendar - people, as they saw the days getting brighter,
they would remember that it is truly Jesus who is the light of the world.
So I am going to read you a scripture
here that speaks about that identity of Jesus from the beginning of the Gospel
of John reading from chapter 1 verses 1 to 14. This is one of my favorite
passages as John describes the identity of our Savior and our Lord Jesus
Christ.
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.
6 There came a man who was sent
from God; his name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify
concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8 He
himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 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.
This is John's description of the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Word of God made flesh, dwelling with us. We will get a
further look at what it means for the light to come into the world in a few
moments but, first, would you listen to this old traditional hymn sung by one
of Canada's Great Christian singers of the past, George Beverly Shea, singing
Lead Kindly Light from his collection ‘I'd Rather Have Jesus’ please listen to
it with me.
I want to focus on the references to
Jesus as the light of the World in this passage, but to begin with John Speaks
about the Word. He speaks about the Word probably for at least two reasons. One
is that at the beginning of the Bible itself begins with a reference to a word, when
God speaks and he says, “let there be light,” and there was light.
God does his creation through his Word
and the Word goes out from him and the Word is God and the Word is from God.
Jesus is that word. Jesus is credited here with being the maker of all things.
All things were made by God in Jesus Christ there isn't one thing that has been
made that wasn't made by him. He is the maker of all: Angels, Heavens, both the
Heavenly realm that is beyond our universe and the realm of the stars and the
galaxies - all of these things are the work of God's Word Jesus Christ.
It is this Word, this eternal Son of God, who became Flesh, actually born. He
was carried him in the womb for 9 months and then he was born and he grew up.
The fullness of God was in him, though he was only a child. God’s person
indwelt Jesus, God's word indwelt Jesus. We have a complete and perfect
representation of God in him. He is the exact, express image of the Living God.
He is God himself. John uses, after speaking about Jesus as the word and the
maker of all things, he then speaks of him about the light. Because when
he speaks about the light coming into the world he's talking about a job that
Jesus has to do as well as the identity as God himself.
Jesus is come to enlighten people.
In this world there is Darkness. Oh, I
know, the darkness of shadow and the darkness of a basement, and the darkness
when the lights go out. But the darkness about which John speaks is the
darkness of evil, the darkness of sin. Included in that is the darkness
of ignorance - of not knowing your maker, not knowing the love of God,
not knowing your Redeemer. That ignorance is a kind of darkness is a very
common image in regular human literature but it's also very strongly an image
in the Bible. Being in darkness is not an enviable state. Darkness is what
Jesus has come to combat - the darkness of ignorance and the darkness of sin.
For people who have misunderstood God he comes to give the correct
understanding. For people who have turned away from God and ran into the
darkness away from the light he comes to bring light to them so they can
return. Jesus declares himself to be the light of the world in scripture over
and over again, even as he tells us that through him we become light in
the world
What is the darkness in your life?
Sometimes we don't even know we’re in darkness until light is shone on our
situation. Sometimes we may be in a situation and we don't know what's going
on, yet until somebody explains what's going on we might just think that
everything's normal.
I've been in situations where I would
feel as I sort of tension in a room and not know why. I was feeling that the
people were angry. There was something going on and I wasn't aware of it. Then
somebody would explain what had happened before I entered the room and in effect ‘the lights would go on.’
Jesus, when he shines light on our
lives, may reveal darkness that we weren't aware of; may reveal to us that
there is something wrong in our hearts; that we've been turning away from the
goodness of God and doing things our own way. These may be things that we
thought were best, but in the light of day, in the light of Jesus, we find the
lives we are living were not according to God's loving purposes. Now there are
people who don't want the light in their lives. The testimony of this scripture
says that Jesus came into the world and even though the world was made through
him the world didn't recognize him. He came to his own, but his own did not
receive him. This isn't simply a problem of not recognizing a face, this
is the problem of not accepting the authority of Jesus. The world didn't
recognize his authority and his being. The world wanted to do things their own
way. They didn't recognize, they didn't know, good from Evil. They had their
own definitions of what was good or bad. Jesus didn’t always support their
conclusions.
He told the Pharisees about how to
better observe the Sabbath by doing good on that day but they resented his
intrusion into their affairs. He told other people to let loose in their hold
on riches and wealth, but they were so attached to their prosperity that they
wouldn't give it up for the sake of righteousness. They wouldn't recognize that
their ways were darkness and the Jesus way was light. So he was rejected.
We're going to go into more detail
about people's response to the light after we listen to the next song. In this
song that singers are just calling out to Jesus to shine his light in the world
and so listen with me, will you, to the Marantha praise band singing Shine Jesus
Shine.
Even as Christians we might sing songs,
like Shine Jesus Shine or Lead Kindly Light, inviting the light of Jesus to
shine into the world and into our lives. But we, each, every Christian, knows
the feeling of having God's light shine onto a part of their life that is not
where God wants it to be; that sense of conviction of the uncomfortable
realization that there's something amiss in our lives. It take some courage,
some faith and trust in God to let him search you and try you and examine your
heart. Those words, “so search me and try me and see if there be any wicked way
in me” come from a Psalm, I believe Psalm 51 in which David is asking God to
shine the light into the dark places, to see if there's anything wrong.
Sometimes we may say that with
confidence, expecting that God won’t find anything. But God has a standard that
goes far beyond our own, so even when we've progressed in our faith a great
deal it is still sometimes troubling to find the light shining on a little
shadow in our hearts - a bit of resentment or bitterness; some anger or some
unforgiveness toward another person, or even to some distraction or some
appetite of ours that is overwhelming our desire to follow Jesus.
So it is good to sing a song like
Shine, Jesus, Shine and ask the light of God to search our souls, but do it
with some courage and conviction, ready to accept when the light of God
unearths something that you were trying to keep hidden, or even had your hidden
from yourself.
Light is a wonderful thing but we have
to be sure that we want to see what it reveals. Jesus is offering to come into
your life and shine his light. I know that there are sometimes things we want
to hold onto. The Bible speaks of people loving darkness instead of the light.
Letting Jesus work on our lives to take out that darkness actually does bring
new life and grace and peace into our lives. Sometimes things which we
treasure, we treasure thinking they're doing us good, but they don’t.
The light of Truth in the word of God
helps us to identify those things. As you read through Scriptures and you find
that God points out particular activities or attitudes and says, “Don’t do
these things!” Sometimes we don’t know exactly why, we don’t see what is the
harm in what we are doing. But when we trust God and obey him in these things
the light begins to show more and more in our lives.
When Jesus came into the world as light,
even though many did not receive him – even to the point of crying out to
crucify him because he was disturbing the world as they knew it, he accepted
that rejection, he went to the cross.
Instead of taking vengeance on all of
those who rejected him, he when to the cross to demonstrate and to show his
love but also break that barrier, to shine light into the darkness of sin by
showing his love and taking upon himself even the rejection that others had
thrown at him. That's the kind of light that Jesus is. That’s why he is
described in such wonderful, positive terms. He is the light of the world, he
is the bread of life. He is the savior and the Redeemer of the Earth. He is
goodness and life and that light is not Overcome by darkness in the world.
I've referred to it on the previous
broadcast and this broadcast, that this is the beginning of a new year. We are
looking at a world which is enduring some great darkness. The problems of
violence in this world have visited all corners of the earth. People may be
listening to this program, on the internet, in places that are wracked by war
and division, by tribal and racial violence. You may be listening to it in a
western country with a certain amount of prosperity around you but a growing
sense of unease and insecurities as people, so many people, seem to be taking
to violence and to unrest.
We think of our world as a dark place
sometimes. Yet it was very dark even when Jesus was here. He is not surprised,
shall we say, by the difficulties that we experience in the modern day. He’s
not surprised that technology is able to amplify the violent ambitions of of
different demagogues and tyrants. He's not surprised that people are letting
anger dictate their actions and bringing about terrible tragedies for others.
These are things that he experienced his own life, even from a baby fleeing
into Egypt to escape the horrible massacre that King Herod launched against
this new born king. Even to the point of death on the cross where in the light
of that darkness, that evil against himself, he cried out to his Father,
“Father forgive them, they do not know what they are doing.”
The light of the
World was not overcome. It will not be overcome. It cannot be overcome, for it
has overcome all things.
Jesus Christ has overcome the darkness
of sin and death. And he can overcome it in your life. There is addiction, no
attitude, no hurt so deep or so difficult or so challenging that it would be
able to overcome the light of Jesus Christ. His light can shine into every life,
no matter where you are and what your circumstances. He can deliver, He can
save, he can shine into your darkness.
I emphasize this because as the world
wants to tell us all about the all the bad things happening. The world seems to
want emphasize the bad direction, maybe to keep us glued to their news stations
and to their web pages. But there is good news in the world, good news has
already overcome all of this darkness, and it is Jesus the Light of the world
Today as we turn to him in prayer
i do pray that he will shine hope into your heart. Let us pray.
Almighty God, we give you thanks and praise that you have shone light
into Darkness. You understand the darkness, and you know how difficult it can
be. And so I pray for each person that is struggling with a great difficulty in
their lives, that your light will encourage strengthen them now. That they will
receive your light, that they will invite you into their lives, naming Jesus
Christ as their hope and their Savior, Lord grant the wonderful gift of
forgiveness of sins and grant them new life to experience the victory,
overcoming sin in their lives. Lord we ask for all this in the name of
Jesus Christ Our Lord Amen.
If you’ll indulge me as we end the
program, I want to have you listen to a hymn which is normally sung as a
Christmas Carol. I hope you haven’t heard too much of this - I don’t think you
can hear too much of this hymn, Joy to the World, and this time it is sung by
Francesca Battistelli.
God Bless each one of you today!
Thank you for tuning in. If you have been blessed and
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May you come to know Jesus Christ personally and profoundly.
May the Holy Spirit reside deeply within your heart, and may you feel our
heavenly Father surrounding you with his constant, abiding and accompanying
love. Good News In The Morning is produced in the Studios of News Talk Radio 580
CFRA.
Rev. Brian Wilkie
St.
Andrew's Christian Community, Rockland, Ontario
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To listen to the
above broadcast, click on the following link:
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