Light In The Darkness

Please stand for the reading of God's Word. We're going to read from the Gospel of John, chapter 1. We're going to skip around a little bit. We're going to read 6 through 9 and then 19 through 23. So, a man came, one sent from God, and his name was John. He came as a witness to testify about the light, so that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but he came to testify about the light. This was the true light that, coming into the world, enlightens every person. This is the testimony of John. Now we're going to 19. Yes, excellent. This is the testimony of John. When the Jews sent priests and Levites to him from Jerusalem to ask him, who are you? And he confessed and did not deny. And this is what he confessed. I am not the Christ. And so they asked him, what then? Are you Elijah? And he said to them, I am not. Are you the prophet? And he answered, no. Then they said to him, who are you?

Tell us, so that we may give an answer to those who send us. What do you say about yourself? And he said, I am the voice of one calling out in the wilderness, make the way of the Lord straight, as Isaiah the prophet said. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated. Father, I ask that you be gracious with the Holy Spirit this morning, that I might speak your words, and that the words could be heard by all who hear. And I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. So, as I read these two passages, I was struck by how clear John understood what his purpose was, what his mission was. We'll get into the text, but what he was sent, he was a man sent from God, and he knew that. And I really appreciated this morning, we got here in time to hear Daniel's Sunday school class, and he started off, and I was a little worried that he was going to give my sermon, because he...

He started off saying, our lives are for a purpose, and we will give an account. And that's essentially what I want to talk to you about today, what I think God's Word is saying here in these passages we're looking at. So do you know who you are and what your purpose in life is? And are you ready to give an answer to someone who might ask you a question about that? Or even more than that, start interrogating you. So I think there are certainly areas in life where we do know what our purpose is. If you're employed, you probably have a job description that has duties or responsibilities. Your employer might even have a mission statement. So the mission statement is something that a bunch of executives got together in a corporate retreat and crafted some words together to be something short and catchy with the idea to motivate.

the employees to do their work diligently, to motivate investors to invest, to motivate buyers to buy or trust the company. But if you're not employed, if you're a student, particularly somebody in high school or in college maybe, what's the question that everybody asks you? Where do you want to be when you grow up? Or what are you going to do after you graduate? Right? Right? Okay. So the expectation is that you have some sort of a vision, some sort of a goal, some sort of, you know, this is where I'm going. This is what my purpose is. And if you know what your purpose is, then you know what your duties or your responsibilities are. If you're a student, you're studying.

submitting your essays. I originally went to school before they had all this online education stuff. These days, I go on and I've got this checklist of everything that I'm supposed to do for the next, well, three years. And so I know what the expectations are for me. As an employee, you know, you've got your job description, you've got your boss, you've got, you know, people that know, and you're expected to know what your duty is. So, but we're here. in church on Sunday. So how does that translate? How does that fit into the mission, the purpose of your life? So as Pastor Dave said, I was, I am a lawyer during the day. I do the pastor's college at night. When my wife and I, when I graduated from law school, we moved to Kansas and I started a practice there. And I went to this seminar on how to get your practice started.

And the first thing that they told me was, I don't care what you believe, you find the biggest church in your community and you start going there because those people are going to be your community, your connection, your clients, your referrals. So that's one reason to end up in church, right? I mean, one reason to end up in church is to build your brand, your market, yourself. I hope by the time I finish, you'll see that, and I hope no one's here for that purpose, but if you are, that that is not why we're here. And we're going to look at John's life and what John was doing as an example of what the true purpose that should extend through all of our life is. So in our text today, we're looking at the ministry of John the Baptist. And I'm going to open my Bible so I have it.

Here we see John had a specific mission given to him by God. And we're also going to see that John carried it out with humility, bringing glory to God and not to himself. And then my hope is that you'll see that our purpose is not so very different from John's. And then just as a quick note, because as I was putting this together, we're in the gospel of John, and I'm talking about John the Baptist a lot. So I'll try and say... John the Baptist, if I'm talking about John the Baptist, and I'll try and say the author or the apostle John if I'm trying to speak of who wrote the book. So, who wrote the gospel? And then just another point of introduction. Before our reading today in verse 6, there's this glorious and cosmic introduction to who Jesus is.

probably you're all familiar with. But it goes, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And this is important for understanding how John gets introduced to us. He was in the beginning with God, and then in him, the Word, was life, and the light was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. So this is important context for our verses because John, the apostle, the author, has our head thinking about these things that are bigger than us, right? I mean, they're cosmic, in the beginning, light and life, okay? Then we get to John, and how is John introduced? John is a man. There came a man, right? A man, just a man like you might be a man, I'm a man.

Men are pretty common, pretty plain. This is in contrast with who Jesus was, who the Word is. The Word is light and life, who created all things. John the Baptist, just a man. This is in stark comparison with Jesus, who we know is fully God and fully man, right? I mean, so we have this, just from the very start, we have this contrast between the man that we're going to be reading about versus the Word of God. But John was not... listless or apathetic. I mean, he wasn't just like a ho-hum man. He was a man who was sent from God. So what does it mean to be sent from God? The Gospel of Luke goes into more detail on John's being sent by God. This is Luke 1, 12 through 17. There we read that an angel of the Lord appeared to John's father, Zechariah. And he told Zechariah that John will be great before the Lord and will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother's womb.

And then the angel continues. He will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah. Continuing to get the full mission statement, the angel goes on. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the Lord a people prepared. So this is the message. This is the sending. This is the commissioning of John before he's even born. He's still in his mother's womb. Now, even the name John. Okay, so we say there came a man sent from God whose name was John. So his name was John, right? And if you're familiar with John's story from the other Gospels, this is a big deal. The name John means acceptable to God or God is gracious. So even his name points to God's glory, God's greatness, God's primacy.

And in fact, everything about John's, John the Baptist, life and his mission makes him secondary and God and Jesus primary. John's ministry doesn't happen in the city center. He's out in the wilderness. John, he's not hosting revivals with bright lights and music. His clothing and food are basic and rudimentary. He's not fashionable. He's not impressive. Even John's death comes at the request of a dancing girl. John's role is simply to point to the glory of God that came to man in Jesus and magnify Jesus. So looking back at verse 6 here, we see John came as a witness. His whole life was a testimony that Jesus Christ is the light of the world, that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Jesus is, again, with this light, he's the bright and morning star. He's, in verse 9, he's the true light which coming into the world enlightens every man. So John, he keeps saying something, someone brighter and more important than John was coming. And John's job was to prepare the way for Jesus. So just like the comparison between Jesus is the word who was God and John being man, the author of the gospel makes sure we know that Jesus is the one who's the light and that John was not the light. Again, he's pointing in that direction. He is not. He's just presenting someone who is. And in fact, the story is not about John the Baptist. And just like the story is not about you or me, John paves the way in humility.

showing us this humble response to who Jesus is. And this isn't to disparage John the Baptist's ministry. Jesus himself says about John that among those born of women, there's not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist. So we know that he was a great, impressive, mission-focused man. But still, he knew what his purpose was. His purpose was to magnify and glorify Jesus. In fact, not only did John know, but everyone knew. So as we transition into the next set of verses here, 19 through 23, John's ministry caught the attention of the religious leaders, right? He was so dutiful, so committed to his mission and his purpose that the local religious leaders sent a committee to investigate who he thought he was. Now, that's generally not a good thing when the local leaders send...

group, a fact-finding committee, to go question you. I had the opportunity a few years ago, back again, we just moved from Kansas, so all my stories are going to be Kansas-focused, because that's where my brain is, that's what I think about. The Kansas legislator was debating a pro-life constitutional amendment, and so I decided to sign up to testify in support of this legislation, and I thought, you know, I was going in, I knew it was going to be contentious, right, because we're talking about pro-life, abortion. I mean, that's just, that's a contentious issue. But do you have a guess who it was that grabbed my arm and walked me out of the committee room to interrogate me? Because it wasn't the pro-abortion side. It was Kansans for Life. And I was surprised at this, because I got there, and they didn't like the tone of my testimony.

I think they didn't like that I was a man, too, because they had a slate of women doctors who were testifying in support of this bill. And so they wanted to know why I was there, what I was planning to say. And when they found out that I was saying words like repent and religious words, that did not fit the narrative. That did not fit the tone they were trying to get. And there's something unsettling about when people who you think should be on your side want to know what you're doing and are questioning your motives and are disapproving. And sometimes that's good, but it's unsettling when you get there. And that's basically what we see here with John the Baptist and the Jewish leaders. The leaders came, they had come to terms with the Roman authorities, right? So they were living their semi-quiet life.

with authority to keep practicing their religious practices. And then here comes John the Baptist, and he's in the wilderness. He's baptizing. He's preaching this message of repent. The kingdom of God is at hand. And all of a sudden, they want to investigate and to get more information about what he's doing, where he's pulling people. The Gospel of Matthew gives us a few more details on why the priests and Levites came out. Matthew says, Then Jerusalem was going out to him and all Judea and the district around the Jordan, and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River as they confessed their sins. So we see there's a big response to what John's doing. And one way to see John the Baptist is he's essentially a first century influencer. I kind of hate that term, but people from all over were seeking John the Baptist out, going to the wilderness to be baptized and confessing their sins. His message was simple, right? Repent.

repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And this simple message makes sense, right? I mean, this is what, going back to our corporate mission statement idea, that's what, you know, you want something short and punchy. You want something that's actionable. You can respond to it. So, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. But, consider John's response to the questions from the Levites and priests in verse 19. Because unlike today's social media influencers, He's not leveraging his popularity for likes and building his brand and maybe cheap hotel rooms, whatever you get as an influencer. He's not building his brand. Instead, he's got this unwavering duty. He's serving the mission that God's angel delivered to his parents. He's pointing and he's living as a witness to the coming Christ. He's preparing a way for Jesus and his ministry, right?

So John doesn't back down. This is how I envision, you know, I hear in my head, you know, who are you? They ask. Well, I tell you who I'm not, is essentially John's response. And they persist. What then? Are you Elijah? I am not. Are you the prophet? No. Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself? So it seems to me that the priests and Levites are getting... desperate at this moment, right? I mean, they're invoking the authority that they have from the people who sent them to say, just like we're burdened to serve these guys, you are too. So give us an answer. They call on their authority, the ones they need to give an answer to. But John doesn't back down. He's not afraid of continuing in his purpose, in his mission. He quotes Isaiah 40. He says, I am a voice of one crying in the wilderness. Make straight the way of the Lord, as Isaiah the prophet said.

So John makes it clear that the long-expected coming kingdom of God is here. And just as Isaiah pronounced, the glory of the Lord will appear, here, so Isaiah was in the past looking forward. He's saying, the glory of the Lord is coming. John's saying, look around you. The glory of the Lord is here. Now, we have the duty to say, Jesus, the glory of the Lord, came to earth, and we have more of the story, right? He died. and was buried and resurrected. Isaiah, John the Baptist, and us all have that same duty. We're just looking at the picture from different perspectives, right? From the past, from the present, from the future. Glorifying God is our mission. So let's apply that to ourselves. Let's consider how that duty translates from John the Baptist with Jesus present. How does that translate to us today? So you might say, Well, how do you know this is your God-assigned mission? How can you make the claim that this is what our purpose is? And, I mean, again, I'm going to go back to what Daniel was saying during Sunday school. Our lives are for a purpose, and every one of us will give an account. Believer or unbeliever, we're going to give an account for what we did with our life. And so I'd ask you, if you have a Bible, open it to Psalm 148, because we'll read the psalm there. Every man, woman, and child has duties to God.

Just because we were created by God, we have the responsibility, the obligation to exist as God created us, to give glory to God and to worship him. So we'll look at Psalm 148 and see how it's talked about there. Here's Psalm 148. The whole creation invoked to praise the Lord. So it's not just us. It's the whole creation. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise him in the heights. Praise him, all his angels. Praise him, all his hosts. Praise him, sun and moon, all the stars of light. Praise him, highest heavens and the waters that are above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the Lord. And this next line, for he commanded and they were created. Why are we praising him? Because he created us. He set this into motion. He's the one who created all things. He also established them forever and ever. He has made a decree which will not pass away. Praise the Lord from the earth, sea monsters and all the deeps.

fire and hail, snow and clouds, stormy wind, fulfilling his word, mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, beasts and all cattle, creeping things, even the creeping things, winged fowl, kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all judges of the earth, both young men and virgins, old men and children. Let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is exalted. His glory is above earth and heaven, and he has lifted up a horn for his people. Praise for all his godly ones, even for the sons of Israel, a people near to him. Praise the Lord. That's pretty comprehensive, right? I mean, if you're getting creeping things and sea monsters, you know, this is a comprehensive list. Everything that's created has a duty to praise the Lord. Young men, virgins, old men.

We hear the same obligation to worship and bring glory to God according to our design during Jesus' triumphal entry in Luke 19. Here, the multitudes gather around Jesus calling out, blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven and glory in the highest. What's the response? Everybody excited about that? They're not. The Pharisees, they call on Jesus to rebuke his people, rebuke the people giving him praise. And Jesus responded, if these become silent, even the stones will cry out. So again, we see this. This is a comprehensive call. This is a comprehensive duty to worship God, to bring praise to his name. So we see this duty to praise God in the Old Testament. We see it in the Gospels. The other thing that I was reminded of was the Westminster Shorter Catechism. The first question, what is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. This is a duty that we have as men, as created beings. It's created

sons of Adam, daughters of Eve, to work in a C.S. Lewis quote in there. But, okay, so that's our duty. But you can't glorify God, the true light, if you're in the darkness, right? I mean, if you have darkness, if you're in the darkness, if your eyes have been blinded, if your mind has been dulled, if your conscience has been seared, you're not bringing glory to God. You're not doing your duty. Let's look back at our text. John, 1 verse 7. Remember that John the Baptist came to testify about the light. And in verse 9, we read that Jesus is the true light. John's not the light. Jesus is the true light coming to the world. And if we read a little bit earlier than that even, we'd read that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not comprehend it. So we have darkness with some light. This light shines in the darkness, but the darkness doesn't comprehend it. And then Jesus comes and he brings the true light.

So before Jesus came, there was some sense, some measure that there was light. And the light is some sort of reasoning and understanding, but it's dulled, it's corrupted by sin. But there's still this rudimentary kind of imprint of religion and conscience that we might have. With sin's corruption, man's natural state is he's blinded to the true source of that light. Now, I grew up in a suburb outside of Detroit. It's probably not... too dissimilar to this area here, where, you know, there's always this background light. Like, there's no darkness, right? I mean, there's always street lights or car lights or LEDs are in everything. Then we moved to Kansas, and we didn't move to, like, Kansas City. We moved to rural Kansas. There were probably more cows than people in our county. And I experienced a new level of darkness, right?

I remember several nights we had a dog out back, and we had cows and pigs and things like that. So we were out in the country. And the dog would bark, and maybe we had new chickens or something. And so I'd have to get out and investigate why the dog was barking. And stepping out into the rural Kansas backyard, it was dark. No flashlight was enough to illumine the whole area. I mean, it was your little tunnel of light, tunnel of vision. And then everything else was darkness. And that's pretty intense, right? I mean, going out in the darkness and fighting unknown creatures. And so I remember lying in bed afterwards after whatever possum that I had to conquer. And then settling back in. There's vulnerability out there in the darkness, right? I mean, if you can't see, if you don't know, you're just exposed to who knows what.

When we're in that vulnerable state, that state of disobedience, of blindness, we can't testify to God's goodness if we're not bathed in his light, if we don't have our eyes open. I was also reminded that, you may have seen it in the news recently, that William Shatner, TV's Captain Kirk, you guys know who that is. Pastor Dave warned me that this is a younger crowd, so I'm like, I kind of remember Star Trek, but I'm not sure that, you know. Everybody remember. So he's 90 years old, and he went out to space. He went on one of Jeff Bezos' rocket ships and went up to space. The trip is short, but he's 90 years old, and he went up to space. And when he came back down, it was really interesting hearing what he said. He said, this is a quote from him, to see the moon come and whip by, now you're staring into blackness.

That's the thing. The covering of blue, this blanket, the atmosphere, right? This covering of blue, this blanket, this comforter of blue that we have around us, we think, oh, that's blue sky. And then all of a sudden, you shoot through it, and you whip off the sheet, and you're looking into blackness, into black nothingness. And as you look down, there's your blue down there with the black up there. There is Mother Earth in comfort, and there is, is there death? I don't know. Is that the way death is? I just thought it was really striking to hear him compare and contrast light and darkness. Life, I mean, okay, so you use Mother Earth, but life and death, the darkness is death. I mean, think about it. The glorious parts of space, the parts that we focus on, the stars, the moon, the blue blanket of earth, right? That's all the light, either things that are emitting light or reflecting light. This is just kind of,

This is part of us. We appreciate the things that are glorious are the light. So the question is, have you seen the true light? Or are you in that hopeless position that sees darkness and death outside of Mother Earth? Because, I mean, you know if you're employed that if your boss walked up to you and asked you what your duty was and you didn't know or you weren't doing it, what happens? I mean, maybe in today's job market, you're not going to get fired. But generally, if you're not doing what you're supposed to do, if you're not on task, if you're not on mission, if you're not serving the purpose, you don't have a job anymore. And maybe if you're a student, you know, the essay was due a couple days ago, and you didn't get turned in for whatever reason. You know, you might fail, right? I mean, you've got a due date, you've got a duty, you've got a responsibility.

Now, the good news is, thinking about our duty to God and to glorify him and praise him, is that our God is gracious and slow to anger. So today, I mean, this is the message that John the Baptist gave. There is still time. Repent and believe. As Jesus says later in the Gospel of John, chapter 8, verse 12, I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life. And this is our hope, right? Our hope is that Jesus is the light of our life. He's the light that gives us life. And John's testimony was that Jesus, the glory of God, was there. He announced the coming one was standing right among them. They didn't see it. They didn't know it. The light, the true light was there. And their job was to see him, to know him, to follow him. John was calling all people to turn away from darkness and toward the light, to recognize that Jesus

The one worthy of glory and honor was there. But again, you can't glorify God if you don't know his glory. You can't testify to the light if you're in the darkness. And today, so today, you know, that was then, right? Jesus was standing among them. We don't have that today. Today, we have the light that is brought by the church, by the word of God, right? The light shines through believers. This is the light that is shining. We have the privilege of living 2,000 years after Jesus was born, right? And we know more of the story than John the Baptist knew. We've seen the work that God has done through his church, through believers. We've seen, we've heard reports of, you know, we have the gospels of the testimony of Jesus' resurrection, of his coming back from the grave, of his conquering death.

Today we can look back at centuries of God's work, his light shining in dark places. I think of all the dark places, the places around the world that were dark at the time that Jesus was born, and now there's light there. So will you react to the light like John the Baptist did and like the people that were being baptized in light of John's testimony? I mean, he didn't spend his life in luxury and entertainment and diversions. He was busy testifying to Christ. preparing the way for Christ and his ministry. He was doing his duty. He was following through with the purpose that he had received. So we probably can't say that an angel gave our parents some sort of particular mission statement or purpose, right? But if this call, if this demand to praise God goes to all creation, then it applies to you and it applies to me. So if you repent and believe, praise God.

The truth of Jesus, him being the true light, is in you. And here's what we read in Ephesians 5 regarding this. You were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of the light, for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth, trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them, for it is disgraceful even to speak of things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. And for this reason it says, awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you. So even as believers, we have this continuing duty, right? Even if the light is in us, We've received the light, we've repented, we've believed, and the light is in us. We have a duty to walk as children of the light, to try to learn what is pleasing to God, and to do them. So our mission statement isn't all that different, right? It is still to bring praise and honor to God. It's just that now, instead of being in the darkness, we could do it from the light, from a position of being enlightened, having the light of the Lord.

And did you hear that? This struck me as I read it. Walk as children of the light. This is Ephesians 5 if you want to turn there. Walk as children of the light for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth. Isn't that kind of striking? The fruit of the light. I mean, it makes sense in a way, right? I mean, you're not going to get fruit growing without light shining on it. I mean, fruit trees, that's the magic of a fruit tree, right? You take a seed and dirt and water, light. And all of a sudden you're getting apples, you're getting oranges, you're getting lemons, you're getting all this variety of fruit and flavor that all comes from the same stuff. So we go forward as believers trying to learn what is pleasing to God. So again, here we're reminded of our purpose, of our mission statement. Christians remain duty-bound to glorify God and bring praise to his name. And that duty is even more than the rest of creation, right?

Christians must persevere and stay focused on learning and doing what is pleasing to God. If the light is in us, it should have an effect on us. It should produce fruit. The light should overflow in the fruit of goodness and righteousness and truth. And so you might say, well, either the light's in me or not, it's kind of separate from me. And there's a sense that I might agree with you. God's light is going to accomplish God's purpose. But Paul and Timothy in Philippians don't shy away from warning believers about growing lazy. And they write, this is Philippians 3, 13. But the one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal of the prize of the upward call of God and Jesus Christ. And they continue. Brothers, join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.

For many, of whom I have often told you, and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. And this is what happens to them. Their end is destruction. Their God is their belly. They glory in shame and with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body. by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. So if you've been a believer for long, you know how easy it is to start to slide back to a position that when we're hungry, we eat. When we're bored, we entertain ourselves. We stress and leverage what God has blessed us with to become wealthy and secure. We worry about what the government might do next, which slippery slope we're on now. And we live to satisfy and secure ourselves, and we forget about the mission that we have.

I mean, that's the easy thing to do. We fail to keep our eyes on those who walk according to the example of faith that go before us. So at the end of the day, I kind of have two questions. One is the light of Christ in you. Have you seen the glory of God in Jesus Christ? If not, today is a day of grace. Remember your duty. Put your attention on things that are necessary. Repent and believe. Praise his holy name. Bring him glory in your life. Believe on Jesus and repent of your sins and be reconciled. And for the Christians, today is an opportunity to remind your brothers in Christ of our duty. It's too easy to lose focus on our mission, to be satisfied with this life, to let our bellies become our gods. And I was thinking about this as I drove because it was a wet drive and I-69 is closed, and so we were taking kind of back roads. And, you know, it's easy when you're on like a nice street.

Kansas country road to kind of, you know, daydream and maybe check your phone and do the things you need to do. Until you hear, you know, the brr-brr-brr of the rumble strip on the side of the road, right? There's a reason they put the rumble strip and then they put a shoulder and then they put a guardrail and then there's, you know, the edge. That should be how we treat each other, right? I mean, that's what the... At some level, that's what the church is. It's that rumble strip. It's that Christian brother who's looking out for you, who knows your life, and who keeps you encouraged, keeps you directed to paths that are pleasing to God. In Hebrews 3.13, we read, Encourage each other daily while it's still called the day, so that none of you fall to sin's deception. Take courage. Stay on task. Watch out for your brothers. Hold on to your confidence that Jesus is the Savior of the world, who has overcome sin and death.

In Christ, his righteousness is yours. Let's pray.