“I AM the Light of the world”
(John 8:12)
is the second of seven
“I AM”
declarations of Jesus, recorded only in
John’s gospel, that point to
His unique
DIVINE identity
and
PURPOSE
In declaring Himself to be the
Light
of the world,
JESUS was claiming that He is the
exclusive SOURCE
of
spiritual LIGHT
No other
SOURCE of spiritual
TRUTH
is
available to mankind.
There are two types of LIGHT in the world.
We can perceive one, or both, or neither!
When we are B0RN into this world, we
perceive physical light,
and by it we
learn of our Creator’s handiwork
in the
things we SEE
However, although that light is good,
there is another
Light,
a
Light so important that the
Son of God
had to come in order to
both
declare and impart it to men
John 8:12 records,
“
When Jesus spoke
again to the people, He said, ‘
I am the Light of the World.
Whoever follows me will never
walk in darkness
but have
the LIGHT of LIFE.’
” The metaphor used by the Lord in this verse speaks
of the
light of His
TRUTH,
the
LIGHT of His WORD,
the
LIGHT of eternal LIFE
Those who perceive
the
TRUE LIGHT
will never
walk in
spiritual darkness.
We take a candle
into a
room to dispel the darkness.
Likewise,
The
LIGHT
of
Jesus CHRIST
has to be taken into the darkness of sin that
engulfs the hearts
and
lives of those
who are not following Him
That’s the condition behind
having this Light—that
we
follow Him.
If we do not follow Him,
we will not have this light,
this
Truth
,
This eternal Life
Physical light is necessary for physical life.
The earth would certainly change very rapidly
if there were no longer any sunlight.
A forest full of trees with very thick canopies of
foliage high above has very little plant life on the
ground except for moss or lichen,
which needs little sunlight. Plants will never move
away from the light—they are said to be
positively phototropic,
drawn to the LIGHT.
In the same way,
spiritual light
is
necessary for spiritual life,
and this can be a good test of our
standing in Christ
The believer will always
tend toward spiritual things;
he will always tend
toward fellowship, prayer, the Word of God,
and so on.
The unbeliever always does the opposite
(John 1:5; 3:19–20)
because light exposes his
evil,
and he hates the light.
Indeed, no man can come into the
true spiritual
light of Jesus Christ,
unless he is enabled
(John 6:37).
Following Jesus is the condition of two promises in John 8:12.
First, His followers will never walk in darkness,
which is a reference to the ASSURANCE of SALVATION
we ENJOY.
As TRUE followers of the LIGHT, we will never follow the
ways of sin, never live in a state of continually sinning
(1 John 1:5–7).
Rather, we REPENT of our sin in order to stay close to the
Light of the world.
The second PROMISE is that we will reflect the Light of Life.
Just as He came as the Light of the world,
He commands us to be “LIGHTS,” too.
In Matthew 5:14–16 we see believers depicted as the light of the world.
Just as the moon has no light of its own, reflecting the light of the sun, so are believers to reflect the
LIGHT of CHRIST
so that all can see it in us. The Light is evident to others by the
good deeds we do in faith and through the power of the
HOLY SPIRIT
The emphasis here is maintaining a credible and obvious
WITNESS in the world, a witness that shows us to be
FAITHFUL, God-honoring, trustworthy, SINCERE, earnest, and
honest in all that we do. Also, we should always be
READY to give an account of the HOPE that we have
(1 Peter 3:15),
for the GOSPEL LIGHT we have is not to be COVERED,
but made obvious for all to see and benefit from,
that they, too, may leave the darkness
and COME into the LIGHT.
The precise phrase river of life does not appear in the Bible.
However, Revelation 22:1–2
does refer to “the RIVER of the WATER of LIFE, as
CLEAR as RYSTAL,
FLOWING from the THRONE of God and of the LAMB.”
The apostle John, in his
VISION of the NEW Jerusalem,
describes the RIVER as flowing
“down the middle of the great street of the city.”
The “WATER IF LIFE” referred to here
does not have to be considered physical water as we know it.
Rather, the water flowing from the throne is
probably symbolic of the water of
ETERNAL LIFE,
crystal CLEAR to reflect the GLORY of GOD in a
dazzling, never-ending stream.
The fact that the stream emanates from the throne tells us that
ETERNAL LIFE FLOWS from
God to His people.
Water is a common
symbolic representation of ETERNAL LIFE
in Scripture. Isaiah refers to DRAWING WATER
from the
“WELLS of SALVATION”
WITH JOY
(Isaiah 12:3).
The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah rebuked the Israelites for abandoning God’s “spring of living water” and digging for themselves their own cisterns which could not hold water (Jeremiah 2:13). The Israelites had forsaken the living God, who alone provides eternal life, to chase after false idols, worldliness, and works-based religions. Men do the same today, refusing the water of life only Christ provides for a parched and dusty life of materialism and self-indulgence.
Jesus ENCOURAGED the SAMARITAN WOMAN
at the WELL
to take from Him the WATER of (ETERNAL) LIFE
so that she would NEVER AGAIN THIRST SPIRITUALLY
(John 4:13–14).
Those who BELIEVE in Him, Jesus goes on to SAY in John 7:38,
will have STREAMS of LIVING WATER FLOWING from THEM.
Water is an appropriate and easily UNDERSTOOD symbol for LIFE
Just as physical water is necessary to SUSTAIN physical life on earth,
LIVING water from the SAVIOR is necessary to
SUSTAIN eternal LIFE with Him. JESUS is
both the
Bread of Life (John 6:35)
and the
source of living water,
sustaining
His people FOREVER
The Gospel
of
Our Salvation
The good news
of the
glory of Christ
“If our GOSPEL be hid,
it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the gospel of the GLORY of CHRIST, who is the IMAGE of God,
should SHINE unto them.” (2 Cor. 4:3-4.)
Reader, ponder these words --
“the
GOSPEL of the GLORY of CHRIST,”
for it should not be read the
glorious gospel
of
Christ.”
Glorious, indeed, is the good news of Christ,
but the SPIRIT of God,
in the text before us, addresses our minds rather
to the subject than the
quality of
the GOOD NEWS
There is DIVINE
good news
for man in the fact
that
the once-CRUCIFIED
Christ is a man in GLORY.
The light
of
His GLORY on earth
When our Lord was upon earth
He “was
the LIGHT of the world.”
Every act and deed of
His, GRACE or truth,
gentleness or reproof, was the
SHINING out of the DIVINE character.
He was both “
the image of God” and “the LIGHT of the world.”
Suppose we take a torch into a cavern; its light reveals the character and contents of the cave, makes manifest that which, before the entrance of the torch, was hidden in darkness.
Such was the Lord's shining way through this world;
it detected everything. But man “loved darkness rather than
LIGHT,”
and understood not
His perfections. “
The LIGHT shineth in darkness;
and the
darkness COMPREHEND it NOT.”
(John 1:5.)
“The world 'at large' knew Him not;”
the circle of His
ancient people “received Him not.” (v. 10, 11.)
The darkness did not mingle with the light;
the LIGHT did not modify the darkness.
By
Jesus the Light,
the
image of the invisible God,
is the
character of God expressed to man.
By KNOWING the SON we
KNOW the FATHER. “
No man hath seen God at any time;
the only begotten Son,
which is in the bosom of the Father,
He hath declared Him.” (John 1:18.)
Man learns God in the person of His SON. Therefore,
to reject the Son,
is to reject the Father who sent Him.
Receiving the SON, God gives us the
privilege of becoming His children
. (John 1:12-13.)
From the Person of CHRIST
the
glory of God SHINES out.
We understand the CROSS, we
know pardon and peace,
we PERCEIVE the character of the throne of God
in its
HOLINESS and JUSTICE,
and we know, too, that
God is love.
The effulgence and
rays of His character
reached
man through the Son.
Even as the
LIGHT EMANATES from and
surrounds the sun,
so Christ is the
brightness of God's GLORY
(Heb. 1:3), and as we see not the sun itself, but its effulgence, we see not God
SAVE through Him who expresses
to us
who and what God
is
A glorified Christ in heaven.
At length the darkness sought to
put out the LIGHT and
drive it from the world.
And with what result?
The
Light is no longer beaming from this earth;
Jesus is in heaven;
He is in the GLORY of God as a Man.
There, the MAN,
Christ Jesus, bears upon His Person the
MARKS of man's rejection, while the fact of
HUS PRESENCE there ATTEST God's ESTIMATE
of HIS WORK upon EARTH.
The light of His words and works
led man,
in his darkness, to crucify Him;
the LIGHT of His Person,
now on high,
expresses to man the brightness of
God's GLORY
and His grace
to the CHIEF of sinners.
The Lord
REVEALED Himself
to SAUL as
Jesus of Nazareth,
GLORIFIED at God's right hand
in HEAVEN,
and with Him,
as He is, every man must have to do.
The christian KNOWS not CHRIST after the FLESH,
but in
RESURRECTION- GLORY.
Christ is not the Man of SUFFERINGS upon earth;
He is not the DYING One upon the CROSS;
He is not the slain One in the sepulchre where,
eighteen hundred years ago,
the shining angels said to the women,
“He is not here, He is RISEN.”
No, He is the RISEN Man, the Ascended Man,
the One whom the chosen few
beheld ascend from Olivet.
And whither went He?
To HEAVEN!
But to what part of heaven?
The SON of GOD, the
brightness of God's glory,
the
EXPRESS IMAGE of His Person,
“when He had, by HIMSELF,
PURGED our SINS,
SAT down on the RIGHT HAND
of the
MAJESTY on HIGH.”
It was from that
GLORY He announced Himself to Saul,
“I AM
Jesus of Nazareth,”
the
self-same Jesus, who had
walked in humiliation and in rejection
upon this EARTH.
And THIS is a MESSAGE DISTINCT from
everything
PREVIOUSLY GIVEN by God to MAN.
The GOSPEL
of
His GLORY
PROPHETS had
predicted
His COMING,
and the yet FUTURE day of His GLORY upon earth, when, under
His sceptre, RIGHTEOUSNESS should be
established and PEACE should REIGN.
The ANGELIC HOSTS had PRAISED God, and
PROCLAIMED peace on earth and
GOOD PLEASURE concerning man when
He was born the Babe in Bethlehem.
He HIMSELF, when here, had
PREACHED ETERNAL LIFE
to ALL that BELIEVE on Him; and His APOSTLES, after
His RESURRECTION, had published forgiveness of sins THROUGH FAITH in His NAME. But the
SPECIAL GOOD NEWS of the Man
rejected and despised on earth,
linking His own with HIMSELF in HEAVEN,
was RESERVED to be made KNOWN to man, until His own
lips announced that GOSPEL from the GLORY ANOBE .
Man's difficulty.
Human eye could gaze upon the lowly Babe of Bethlehem, could look upon the Man of Sorrows, and, even now, man can allow his imagination to paint an ideal — chisel a careworn countenance — carve a crucifix; but His ascension-glory is beyond the perception and grasp of mere humanity. His enemies fell to the ground as dead in the presence of the light of it. The radiance of which was brighter than that of the noonday eastern sun. They “saw, indeed, the light, and were afraid,” and Saul
was BLINDED by “the GLORY of that L9GHT,” the moral
PERFECTION of which, however, by the
POWER of the HOLY GHOST
SHINED into his HEART “
to give the light of the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
Satan's effort to hide Christ from man.
The enemy, “the god of this world,” gained a
seeming VICTORY at the CROSS.
His power of darkness allied with man's will cast out of the world the
only One who could tell man who and what God is.
And NOW the GLORY of GOD, in the
FACE of Jesus CHRIST,
is HIDDEN from the CHIEF PART of the EARTH --
DARKNESS is U-ON the FACE of HUMANITY.
By far the greater portion of the world is heathen or Mahomedan,
and only in a very small part of that which is
Christendom is the WORD of GOD
so much as read, and within those NARROWING LIMITS
but very few BELIEVE.
Save within the hearts of God's H8DDEN people, there exists upon
the earth the most vague idea of God.
The fact of a RISEN and GLORIFIED JESUS does
NOT ENTER into the CALCULATION of the popularized
christianity of OUR DAY.
Thus has “The GOD of this
WORLD BLINDED the MINDS
of them that BELIEVE NOT.”
But the strongholds of Satan become weakness in the presence of Jesus, once crucified, now glorified. Where He has gone Satan's power cannot follow, and when a man
believes CHRIST, and apprehends where
He is, he TRIUMPHS in the VICTORY of his Lord.
Thenceforth to him infidelity and superstition
are the CREATURES of that darkness which the god of THIS world RULES,
and by which he sways the minds of those who do not believe.
The christian's faith is beyond the darkness, fixed on Him who is in glory, and from whom glory shines.
The GLORY of CHRIST, GOOD NEWS.
By the GOSPEL we have not only the tidings of
FORGIVENESS of sins, peace with God, and
NEW LIFE in CHRIST, but we have also the
MESSAGE of GLORY for ourselves.
The ministry of the LAW, engraven in STONES
which MOSES brought with him from the MOUNT,
was accompanied with surroundings of GLORY.
The face of Moses SHONE as he came down from Sinai with the
tables of the law in his hands and the
REFLECTION of GODS GLORY upon his countenance.
Then Moses put a veil upon his face, to HIDE the
GLORY from a TREMBLING people under the law;
for Israel could not read the meaning of the reflections of GLORY upon Moses' face, because the tables of the law were in his hands. It is impossible to receive grace from a law-giver, and until grace be known by man,
the glory of God is terrible
to him.
It is only as believers in
Christ CRUCIFIED
that
we can know
Christ GLORIFIED
The
holiest is opened
to
FAITHS VISION
through the rent
veil of HIS FLESH
His
GRACE in DYING
for
us has made
His
GLORY our JOY
There is no Veil before
the face of
The Ascended Jesus.
It is
All Love, Grace, Glory
Not a cloud upon His face, not a shadow of doubt should remain in the hearts of His own. We know that He would not be the glorified Man on high had He not been the crucified Man below.
We see Him, but not holding the tables of the
law in His hands,
and bidding us
do this and live
we see
Him with hands once pierced
for our sins, and
the
glory of God shining from
His face,
telling
us that all is done,
that
our sins are gone,
and that
God is magnified
We know that He who was forsaken for us is the new measure of our acceptance — “We are accepted in the Beloved.” Thus is the glory of Christ good news to His people.
The glory of Christ
gives His people
the
christian HOPE
God had a great PURPOSE
in making man.
He made him in His own image,
and set him over
The WORKS of His hands
The image is now sorely
marred
by sin, man is grievously unlike God.
But God has not departed from
His purpose, and what sin
has spoiled upon earth,
grace will establish
in glory.
What has been permitted to
fail in the first creation,
will be
built up in perfection
in the NEW
In Due TIME
God's people will
be made
like to the
GLORIFIED Christ on high.
As they have borne sin's stamp and sin's suffering here, so shall they bear His image, who has died for sin, and risen out of death and sorrow there. “As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” (1 Cor. 15:49.)
How this end will be effected.
Resurrection is the mighty power of God. The lesson which we learn yearly, in the bare grain becoming the fruitful ear of corn, will be fulfilled in the bodies of God's people by the Lord Himself. “Our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall change our vile body” (or, body of humiliation), “that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself.” (Phil. 3:20-21.)
When will this be elected?
The day, the hour, we know not. But when the Lord comes,
His own will RISE,
and those of His who are living will be CHANGED. “
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,
in a moment, in the
TWINKLING of an EYE,
at the LAST TRUMP: for the trumpet shall SOUND, and the
dead shall be RAISED incorruptible, and we shall be CHANGED.”
(1 Cor. 15:51-52.) And this is the HIGHEST christian HOPE.
The HOPE of the REDEMPTION of our bodies on that
DAY of GLORY
(Rom. 8:21);
The Hope
of
Being Conformed
to
Christ's
image and likeness,
of being
in body, soul, and spirit pure
like Himself
Practical results.
This hope
is a
purifying hope
. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God,
and it doth not yet appear what we shall
be: but we know that, when He shall appear,
we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is.
And every man that hath this HOPE in
Him purifieth himself,
even as He is PURE.
” (1 John 2:2-3.)
Holiness produced
Moreover, the occupation
of the
heart with CHRIST
where He is,
produces holiness
within the christian.
“We all, with open face beholding
as in a
glass the glory of the Lord,
are
changed into the same image
from
GLORY to GLORY,
even as by the SPIRIT of the LORD.”
(2 Cor. 3:18.)
We see an unveiled face
of the
glorified Christ
in the
PRESENCE of GOD.
Faith SEES it, and present holiness
FOLLOWS,
for we ARE changed.
The change is progressive, it is “from glory to glory;” there is no standing still — “not as though I had already attained, or either were already perfect.” The light of a glorified Christ poured into the soul by God the Spirit produces holiness, even as the fruit is surely, though imperceptibly, ripened by the sun's rays. As it grows, it is changed to sweetness by the light. There is no effort in this work, but a great result. “Beholding … we are changed.” We hinder holiness by looking to the earth, to self, to one another.
There is but little holiness where
Christ is not all.
ENERGY given.
Acquaintance
with
Christ
in the
Glory is the Great energizing
principle
of the
christian FAITH
Christ in glory beamed
like the
light of a
beacon before His servant,
Paul.
It GUIDED and DREW him
on in his
troublous course on earth.
It LED him
with unwearied FORCE
to “
Press toward the Mark
for the
prize of the
High Calling
of God in Christ Jesus.”
(Phil. 3:14.)
He SAW
before him the BRIGHTNESS
of a
GLORIFIED JESUS,
and he
LONGED to be like HIM on HIGH.
The PRIZE of
RESURRECTION BLESSINGS
GLISTENED
before his soul.
He panted for the day when he should be
EXACTLY like CHRIST,
and in the POWER of that prospect he counted what
he once so DEARLY PRIZED as dung,
and was ready, even should it be by the means of
martyrdom, to be with Christ,
whose IMAGE he would shortly BEAR. Reader!
the FORCE of his EXAMPLE APPEALS to US, while
his TEARS, as he TELLS of those “who mind earthly things,”
warn us; for we are either running in the race as was Paul,
or we are
turning to the world — there is no neutral ground.