Sermons

To the Jews, the perception had grown that Jerusalem was the center of the universe, or the light of the world. If they had listened to the prophet Isaiah, they would have remembered that the promised Messiah would be, "...as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations..." (Isaiah 41: 6). Jesus is the light of the world. The people then lived in darkness, as people do today, and they liked it. Today, those who follow Jesus will walk in light. This has a special meaning for us, as through salvation we move from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. Having moved into this kingdom, we become the light of the world. Yet, we have to commit to walking in the light, or all that is good and right and true. By this, we expose the darkness, and darkness cannot overcome Jesus, who is true light. Darkness flees from the light. We know that there is danger in the darkness, where there is evil and wickedness. We must avoid this darkness and expose it using the light of God. Light points to the Messiah. It is important to understand the difference between morals and ethics. Ethics is a system of boundaries between right and wrong that brings safety and contentment. Morals is what we are doing with ethics. The opposite of moral living is immorality, or not doing what God says, and God's ethics never change. We are called to be set apart in our handling of morality. We are to do God's bidding in reflecting God's light. His light rescues, as a lighthouse rescues errant ships from destruction. We are to warn those we know of dangers. In the words of Sinclair Ferguson, we are to be fishers of men and not frogmen, who are content to live contentedly under the water. We are to present challenges to those we know to embrace the new life. The reflected light of God in us gives guidance to those around us. Even when we make mistakes and confess them before others, it encourages them to confess. We should reflect the glory of God in everything we do. There are three final questions: Are others seeing God glorified in what we say? In how we are living? And in how we treat other people? In all, we must let the light of Christ shine through us.