A Light to the Nations – A Messianic Prophecy

“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.  For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the Lord will arise upon you, and His glory will be seen upon you.  And nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.” – Isaiah 60:1-3 (ESV).

This prophecy has a two-fold emphasis.  The Messiah, who is the Light to all nations will come. Then, because He has come, God will put His light and beauty upon the people, attracting the nations to the Light of Christ.  Isaiah is foreseeing the glory of all of God’s people being united under the Light.  The bright future of God’s people calls for faith and action.  We cannot stand dormant in the Light.  “The Lord will arise upon you, and His glory will be seen in you” (v. 2) indicates that God will make a clear distinction between His own people and those who still remain in darkness, those who have not acknowledged Him.

The fulfillment of this prophecy was spoken by Simeon when Mary and Joseph took the baby Jesus to the temple in Jerusalem when he was forty days old.  There old Simeon blessed Jesus and said, “”Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace according to Your word; for my eyes have seen Your salvation that You have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to Your people Israel” (Luke 2:29-32, ESV).  Imagine the joy of old Simeon in seeing and holding the Son of God!  He had been promised the privilege of doing so before his death, and the occasion of Jewish purification of Mary and child was the occasion that linked the prophecy to the event Simeon was experiencing.  This is another example of how God fulfills what He promises.

Jesus Himself said, “I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life”  (John 8:12, ESV).  He furthermore told us to be lights for Him:  “You are the light of the world.  A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.  Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:14-16, ESV).  To be light is to wield positive influence.  We speak of coming to the light of the truth.  A single candle can banish the darkness in a room.  Likewise, a Christian life, lived under the direction, influence and power of the Lord Jesus Christ can make an untold difference in lighting others to Him for salvation. This is every Christian’s calling:  to come to the Light and to reflect His light.

Prayer.  Lord, Christmas was filled with light.  The star shone to lead Wise Men to Jesus at Bethlehem.  “The glory of the Lord” that surrounded the shepherds as they heard the announcement by the angels of the Savior’s birth must have been surrounded by great light.  And Jesus, the Light of the world, tells us, “You are the light of the world!”  Let us arise, shine, for our light is come!”  Amen.

Light in the Darkness – A Messianic Prophecy

“For there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish, in the former time He brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time He has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.  The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined.”-Isaiah 9:1-2 (ESV).

We go back to Isaiah 8:22 to read the context and understand the spiritual darkness of the time right before the announcement of the coming of the Messiah who will bring light and truth: “And they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish.  And they will be thrust into thick darkness.”  In the midst of this spiritual gloom comes a light of great hope.  Naming areas of the Israelite nation—Zebulun, Naphtali, Jordan and Galilee ‘of the nations’—Isaiah the prophet reminds them that a great light is coming to them.  He projects his thoughts from the present “gloom” to the time when they can expect deliverance and light from the promised Messiah.  The land of Zebulun was in the northern region of the Promised Land, the first of the land to come under attack by foreign invaders. Isaiah’s prophecy foresaw how the Messiah would launch His worldwide mission from “Galilee of the nations.”  And, indeed, in the fullness of time, when Messiah did appear on the earth, and when He gave His ‘marching orders’ to His band of disciples, He gave them the Great Commission to “go into all the world” from a mountain in Galilee.  This reflected, also, the light of His truth that He had come to redeem people everywhere who will turn to Him in repentance and faith.  That is the nature of the Light of the World, the Messiah, who sheds abroad His light and His truth “to those who dwelt in…deep darkness; on them has the light shined.”  And, thankfully, that includes you and me who have come to the truth of His light.  A significant aspect of this Messianic prophecy is that Isaiah uses the past tense verb.  He is so confident and assured of the Messiah’s coming that even as he wrote eight centuries before the Messiah came to earth, he could write as though it was a certain and accomplished mission.  The prophetic vision sees the future as already fulfilled.

And speaking of fulfillment of this prophecy, what passages in the New Testament corroborate the testimony of Isaiah’s vision?  As Jesus began His earthly ministry, Matthew quotes almost verbatim these verses from Isaiah in Matthew 4:15-16.  Moreover, Jesus was preaching, teaching and healing in the area of Capernaum, Zebulun and Naphtali, “so that what was spoken of by the prophet might be fulfilled” (see Mt. 4:12-14).  When Mary and Joseph took the baby Jesus up to Jerusalem to the Temple at the time of His purification, old Simeon, a devout and righteous man, upon beholding the Baby, said of Him in a revelatory utterance:  “for my eyes have seen Your salvation that You have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel” (Luke 2:30-32). We must add, too, one of the great “I am” statements of the Lord about Himself:  “Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows Me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12, ESV).  In making this declaration about Himself, Jesus linked His coming to earth and His purpose in coming to Isaiah’s prophecy.  He broke through the gloom of hopelessness, despair and spiritual darkness to bring the light of salvation.  Many other Old Testament prophecies also declare Him as the Light.

Prayer.  Thanks be to God that the light still shines in the gloom of spiritual darkness, drawing people to Jesus, the Light of the world.  Thank You, Lord, that the light has shined into my heart.  Amen.

Jesus: The Light of the World

“Again Jesus spoke to them saying, ‘I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” –John 8:12 (ESV)  “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” –John 1: 4-5 “The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.  He was in the world and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him.  He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him.  But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” –John 1:9-13 (ESV).[Read John 8:12-20]

The occasion of Jesus announcing that He is the light of the world came during the annual Festival of Tabernacles when the Jewish people and leaders were assembled at the Temple in Jerusalem. The festival was observed for eight days, about this time of year.  It commemorated a joyful celebration of the harvest but also remembered the time when the people dwelt in tents or tabernacles during the years of wilderness wanderings.  God had delivered them from those hardships.  Every night during the days of the Festival, the priests would light four large candelabra in the court of the women and these gave much light.  They reminded the people that God had led them with a pillar of fire by night and a glowing cloud by day that had shown God’s direction, protection and provision.  They would sing and dance, repeating assurances of God’s presence:  “The Lord is my light and my salvation” (Psalm 27:1) or “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you” (Isaiah 60:1). In the midst of the celebration of lights, Jesus stood and said, “I am the light of the world!”  The learned Jews among them should have known that Light was one of the names given to the Messiah.  That was seen in the prophecy of Daniel 2:22: “light dwells with Him” and in Malachi 4:2: “But for you who revere My name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings.”  Unfortunately, the Pharisees hearing Jesus argued with Him and told Him that they did not believe His testimony, that it was not true.  Regardless of what the Jewish leaders believed, they were standing there, observing and hearing the very Light of the World as He sought to enlighten them. What a pity that they would not hear the truth that the Light had been with God since the creation of the world.  John would write about the Light at the beginning of his gospel.  Even at that moment that true Light stood and taught among them.

Following the discourse with the Jewish leaders, Jesus went outside the Temple courtyard and soon found a man blind from birth.  He told His disciples in the presence of the blind man, “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5).  He then proceeded to restore sight to the blind man, bringing the poor man from darkness to light.  A discourse ensued between the healed blind man and the Jews, but the man told the Lord he believed in him, praised Jesus for restoring his sight and worshiped Him.  He had experienced the miracle of Light performed by the one Who is the Light of the world.

James Hudson Taylor lived in Brighton, England.  He got a burden for the lost of China, and arranged for a loan from his bank to start the China Inland Mission in June of 1865.  The mission work was hard and tedious, but Taylor persisted in his mission “to open the eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison, and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness”(Isaiah 42:7).  And Jesus, the Light of the World, calls each of us  (as he did James Hudson Taylor) who have come to His light to be light-bearers wherever we are:  “Ye are the light of the world,”  Jesus said as He called us.  And our privilege is to follow Him and let our lights shine where He has stationed us.  “Therefore, let your light so shine!” Let us reflect the glory of the Father through the Light of His Son.   (Matthew 5:14-16).

Love Each Other

“Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.  Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in Him is no cause for stumbling.   But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.” –I John 2:9-11 (ESV).

In the gospel of John and in the three epistles of John, the beloved disciple, author of all three writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wanted his readers to see the importance of love and how it operates in a Chrsitian’s life.  It was John who gave us that beloved verse, the most-memorized verse of the Christian’s repertoire of verses:  “”For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16, KJV).  In his epistle, John emphasizes three major aspects of love:  (1) We are to love our brother (each other), a proof that we have fellowship with God (I John 2:7-11).  (2)  Love is a proof that we are sons (and daughters) of God (I John 3:10-14).  And (3) God is love (I John 4:7-16), the very bedrock of why we love because love is the very nature of God.  Today we will explore briefly John’s teaching of our love each for the other.

John uses the term “in the light” to describe the condition that exists in the Christian after he believes in the Lord Jesus Christ and accepts Him as Savior.  We come “from darkness into light.”  And because we walk in the light of our Lord Jesus Christ, who said “I am the Light of the world” (John 8:12), we will have love for one another.  If hatred is in our hearts, we are still walking in darkness—meaning in sin.  Someone has aptly stated the position we should take in love for our brethren:  “We love the sinner but hate the sin.”  Jesus taught love for each other in so many ways.  In familiar parables we see the love for each other manifest.  One parable in particular that demonstrates love is that of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:35-37). 

In I John 2:5 we read: “Whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected.” And that love of each other manifests itself in our genuine love for our fellowman.  If we see someone erring, we lovingly try to guide that one back into right ways.  If we see persons hungry, we want to help to feed them.  Just yesterday I talked to a fellow Christian who gives portions of two days each week to working in a local soup kitchen that reaches out with a noon meal to people in our area who are hungry.  In this is love made manifest.  This series of devotionals on love began with the thought, “We are commanded to love” (John 13:34-35).  Loving others is a way of life for the Christian.  I want to say it extends beyond following a commandment (which we should do) but it is serving others with a heart-felt compassion and with a commitment both to God and to others.  It is love behaving admirably and exercising all the fruits of the Spirit.  Love is walking a mile in the shoes of another.  Love is going two miles when compelled to go one. Love is making a difference in the world where you and I live daily.  Love is shedding abroad the light of Christ in a dark world.  And we are light-bearers because of our love for Christ and for each other.