Introduction: Welcome to Calvary Albuquerque. We pursue the God who is passionately pursuing a lost world; we do this with one another, through worship, by the Word, to the world.
Skip Heitzig: I brought with me a flashlight. It's a pretty, little, fun flashlight that I've had for some time. And there's a lot of things one can do with a flashlight. I can make, like, funny faces. I do this for my kids, grandkids. I can do that and entertain them, or I could do this. It's pretty bright, isn't it? If I kept doing this, you'd be, like, so annoyed at me if I just did this all night. That wouldn't be productive. Or it shines pretty brightly; I couldn't use this to direct a person in a dark room out of the dark room and into a place of safety and security.
That's the theme that we've been working off of the last couple of weeks---this whole idea of darkness versus light, darkness versus light. And it's appropriate, especially at Christmastime, because the Bible tells us when the angels came, announced to the shepherd the birth of the Savior, it says, "The glory of the Lord shone roundabout them." Or when the magi came seeking Jesus, they were following a star, this body bearing and emitting light, guiding them toward where Jesus was born.
If you were with us a couple Sundays ago, we remember that Simeon in the temple held up the baby Jesus. And he said, "I can die a happy man now, Lord. My eyes have seen your salvation, a light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel." And then this last Sunday, just a couple days ago, we saw how Matthew in chapter 4, quoting the prophet Isaiah, says, "Those who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and those who dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them the light has dawned."
So, even in our studies the last few weeks, it's as if we have been sitting in the darkness throughout the night, until finally we come to Christmas Eve and we celebrate the fact that "The Light Has Come." Jesus has come. Hope has come. And we celebrate that tonight. [applause] Speaking about the light is appropriate, that's why you find it in so many Christmas carols even: "Silent night, holy night, all is calm, all is bright." "O Little Town of Bethlehem," there's that phrase tucked in it that says, "In thy dark streets shineth the everlasting Light."
Another Christmas carol: "Angels from the realm of glory, yonder shines the Infant light." Jesus is depicted as the bright light that shines through the darkness. As you came into the church tonight, you saw the courtyard lit up. There's lights in the trees. We have some of those luminarias, las luminarias, or farolitos. Los farolitos, verda? Okay, it's okay. [laughter] Well, you know, that's sort of like indigenous to New Mexico, but we didn't invent those things. They actually came from the sixteenth century in Spain.
And the whole idea was we put them in front of homes, we put them in front of churches back then to show people that we believe; we really believe Jesus is the light of the world. And we're inviting the presence of God into our very homes and into our church services. And then there's the Christmas tree you may have passed in the foyer as you came in all lit up. And now I may be addressing a few here tonight who are like really, really, really more spiritual than the rest of us, and you say, "I don't believe in Christmas trees. That's, like, pagan revelry."
Okay, whatever. You're wrong, actually. It was Martin Luther who first came up with this idea of bringing evergreen trees into one's home. He was walking one night, this great church leader, this reformer, and he noticed the moon shimmering on an evergreen tree and it gave him an idea. He cut one down, brought it home, put it in his house, put candles on it, brought his children around the tree.
Seeing those lights flickering and lighting up the green branches, he told them, "Children, this is to be a reminder to you that if Jesus would not have come into this world, this world would be in eternal darkness." Jesus Christ is the light of the world; "The Light Has Come." Now I want to consider with you a verse of Scripture. I'm going to read to you a few verses, but we're going to consider one verse in the few minutes that we're together remaining tonight. It's really from the gospel of John. It's the beginning of the gospel.
And what I like about John is John takes us back to where Christmas really began. You know, Matthew begins with the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Mark skips the birth altogether and goes right to the baptism of Jesus at the Jordan River. The gospel writer Luke takes us to the angelic apparitions before the priest Zacharias and then Joseph and Mary. But John, John takes us back to the real beginning of Christmas before Bethlehem, before the conception, before the pregnancy, before time, before space---all the way back to "In the beginning God."
All the way back to this: "In the beginning," John 1:1 says, "the Word already existed. He was with God, and he was God. He was in the beginning with God. He created everything there is. Nothing exists that he did not make. Life itself was in him and this life gives light to everyone. The light shines through the darkness and the darkness can never extinguish it. God sent John the Baptist to tell everyone about the light so that everyone might believe because of his testimony. John himself was not the light; he was only a witness to the light."
And here's the verse, "The one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was going to come into the world." Sometimes at Christmas we; well, we get a little shortsighted. We look at the scene and we forget the unseen. We see Joseph and Mary cuddling that little baby in their arms, all the wonder and amazement of having a baby. But when you realize who this baby was, the amazement and the wonder is increased a hundredfold. This was the Word of God. This is the one that had life in himself.
This is the only person who ever existed before he was born. That's Jesus Christ. "The Light Has Come." One of the things I'm hoping and praying for us is that this year you would let Jesus get a little bigger than he has been to you. You might have issues, problems, medical problems, financial problems; they seem so large to you. And I'm not minimizing them. They may be enormous, but your God is bigger. Jesus Christ is bigger than any fear, any problem, any issue you're dealing with. [applause]
In C. S. Lewis' book The Chronicles of Narnia toward the end Lucy sees Aslan, you know, that big lion, if you remember the story, who represents Christ. Lucy sees Aslan again. And as she gazes up at Aslan the lion, Aslan says, "Welcome, child." And Lucy says, "Aslan, you're bigger." "That's because you're older, little one," said Aslan. "You mean it's not because you are?" asked Lucy. "I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger." I think that's true.
I think when we grow, spiritually we grow, the evidence of that growth is that Jesus Christ isn't just a little baby in a manger that we celebrate once a year. "Hey, pull out those Christmas songs." He's grown up. He grew up and He said things and He claimed things. And then He died on a cross, and then He rose from the dead, and He's alive right now, and He will come back. That's why we celebrate at Christmas. [cheers and applause] So that verse, once again, "The one who is the true light," said John, "who gives light to everyone, was going to come into the world."
I just want to break that verse up for a few moments and consider three things. First of all, this light is reliable. He's reliable. John said, "This is the true light," which implies if there's a true light, there must be false lights, and there are. The world has been filled with false hope and false light and false promises. And every year, generation after generation, it seems to get darker and darker, not brighter and brighter.
If somebody asks me to paint the history of the world; I'm not a good artist, so bear with me here. I think if I was asked to paint a picture of world history, what I would do is ask for the blackest paint possible, the kind that is matte black that does not reflect any light but absorbs all light. And I would cover a humongous piece of canvas with just all black and I'd hang it up. That's world history. And then I would take the whitest-of-white paint that I could find and beginning in a corner I would draw a sliver of light going through, penetrating all the way through from top to bottom till it whitens out and douses the entire bottom corner with light.
Light invades the darkness. Our history is a dark record. I know there's a period of history that historians will call the Dark Ages, that period of European medieval history from like 476 on to about 800 when there was violence in Europe and terrorism and war. Um, last time I checked, that's still going on. Last time I checked, that hasn't stopped. Every age of man has been dark. In fact, did you know that this last century has seen more people killed by violence and war than all of the previous centuries combined?
The world we live in is a dark world. This is the true light. Back in the nineteen hundreds, especially in this country, there was a widespread optimism that life was getting better. We even thought, some even thought, utopia was right around the corner. "We're going to bring in the golden age." Social evolutionists were telling us we're getting better, we're becoming smarter, we're getting more enlightened. We actually believed all of that. You might ask, "Well, what happened to that thinking?"
I'll tell you what happened to it. World War I happened to it; World War II happened to it; the Vietnam War happened to it; the AIDS epidemic happened to it; nuclear proliferation happened to it; September 11, 2001 happened to it and on and on the record goes. Just when we think we have become enlightened, we see we're plunged into darkness. Everyone wants enlightenment. I was once on a quest for personal enlightenment. I took drugs thinking I could become enlightened. I will tell you I saw things, I saw lights, but I wasn't enlightened.
One night on an LSD trip I saw three lights come out of heaven and I thought, "I'm enlightened." No, you're on drugs. This is your brain on drugs. It plunged me further into darkness. So, I tried spiritualism, astral projection, spirit writing; so many things that I thought promised me enlightenment, but only feeling empty and dark. See, all of those systems and experimentations, they were like flashlights, and when you need them the battery dies on us. It won't get you out of the dark.
Jesus said, however, "I'm the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." This light is reliable. A second thing to note from that verse is that this light is helpful. For the text says, "The one who is the true light who gives light to everyone." Think about that. God gives light to everyone. I believe God plants innately in every human being the knowledge of himself. He plants that even in its little nascent state.
We have what's called general revelation. We see it in creation. We feel it in our conscience. You're conscience tells you there's a God. You have to get that educated away or taught-by-somebody away. Adrian Rogers a few years ago said that they gave a lie detector test to some people in Atlanta, Georgia. And one of the questions on the test was, "Do you believe in God?" And when many people answered, "No, I don't," it registered on the machine, "You're a liar." It's as if there's something in all of us that says, "There must be something greater than what I've already experienced."
And so Jesus came into the world and he showed us the light. And Jesus said, "If you've seen me, you've seen the Father." And when he came, his light was brighter than all others. He gave us not only an incredible example, but he influenced the world. He really enlightened the world. Compare Jesus; Jesus only taught---what?---three, three and a half years. Plato taught for 40 years; Aristotle taught for 40 years; Socrates for 50 years; 130 combined years of the great luminaries of the Grecian Empire. And, yet, Jesus Christ has influenced history and societies around the world more than all of them put together.
Jesus painted no picture. You can't buy an original by Jesus Christ: "This painting was painted by Jesus." He painted no picture and yet the great artists throughout time have often used as their subject matter for their great works of art, Jesus. Biblical stories; Jesus was no poet. He left no works of literature, and yet people like Dante, Milton, and countless others were inspired by Him. Jesus composed no music. It would have been cool if He did. I'd buy all His records. But people like Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Handel; all wrote so many compositions using Jesus Christ as their inspiration. This light is helpful.
A third thing to note is that this light is available. For it says, "This one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was going to come into the world." And as we keep reading through in the text, it says, "And the Word became flesh and he dwelt among us." This refers now to the incarnation. See, God didn't just stay in heaven and shine his little light down onto you like this. "Hi, I'm God."
No. Jesus came from heaven into this earth, to this darkness, leaving the third heaven, bypassing the galaxies, finding this one little, blue-green, tan globe called the earth, into the backwaters of the Roman Empire, into a little town of Bethlehem, into the womb of a virgin. We talk about it, but it's, it's unfathomable. Philip Yancey writes, "One night in the cold, in the dark, among the wrinkled hills of Bethlehem . . . God, who knows no before or after, entered time and space. God, who knows no boundaries, took on the shocking confines of a baby's skin, and the ominous restraints of mortality."
Why did he do it? Why did he come? Two reasons, several, but two reasons I want to touch on: to show how dark it really is here without Him; and number two, to lead us out of darkness. Mankind, before Jesus came, had a relative goodness. We always love to compare ourselves with ourselves. We often hold on to a certain form of self-righteousness: "Well, I feel I'm better than that person is." We often do this. We do it constantly. But then Jesus came with his perfect life doing what he did, saying what he said. And suddenly that light was so perfect and so brilliant and so bright that we look at ourselves, and we go, "Ooh, not so much."
He shows us all up. But he doesn't do that just to show us all up. He says, "Take my hand, I will lead you out of your darkness, and I will take you to my Father's house. There is light at the end of your tunnel." Jesus said, "I am the light of the world." That implies the world is dark and it also implies there's a way out of darkness. And the reason we get together every year and we sing what we sing, and we celebrate, and we have such joy is we really believe this. This is hope. We believe there's a future and a hope.
One rabbi by the name of Rabbi Hugo Grin, when he was a little boy was in a Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz, one of the worst of the worst, around him was death, destruction. The Jews were being slaughtered by the Nazis systematically in the ovens, in the showers, and by exposure. But this rabbi, when he was a child, his family in Auschwitz, his father got them together one night to celebrate, to celebrate one of the days of the Festival of Lights in Judaism called Hanukkah. He got them all together huddled in the barracks.
And those who were Jews during that time in Auschwitz would hold on to relics of their religion, but they didn't want the Nazi guards to find out, so they did it secretly. On this night Hugo Gryn's father took a pat of butter, one last piece of food he had left, one little pat of butter, and he took a thread of his garment off to make a wick, put it into the butter to light it as a candle to celebrate the Festival of Lights in their tradition. As he lit the match and he was lighting the thread into the pat of butter, little Hugo said, "Father, Father, no! Don't do it. This is our last bit of food. How will we survive?"
His father said, "Son, we can survive for a few days without any food, but we cannot survive one second without hope and faith. This is the fire of hope. Never let it go out, here or anywhere else." When we gather at Christmastime like this, we celebrate not just the birth of a baby, but the coming into the world of the preexisting One, the eternal One, who came from eternity past into this world, died, rose from the dead, conquering death, and will come again, and is alive right now. His light will never go out. [cheers and applause]. "The Light Has Come."
If your faith and your hope is in Jesus Christ, the light will never go out. Life can get pretty gnarly, some bad things can happen. They happen to all human beings, eventually. We're all going to die. As one person said, "We all die of our last disease," whatever that might be. Family members get sick and die. People get in accidents. Life happens like that. But we have hope and it is real. Jesus penetrated our darkness and leads us out. "The Light Has Come." Jesus has come. Hope has come. Let's pray together before we close this service.
Father, we do indeed celebrate. We have a reason to celebrate. Of all people on planet earth Christians should sing the loudest. You put a song in our hearts. And if there's not one in our hearts, I pray that we would right now exam our hearts to see what's really inside, what our hope is in, what our trust is in, where our future really lies. Lord, bring us to that place, a place of enlightenment, of hope. Thank you for Jesus. Not one among many, but one who is singular and unique and stands out of all in history as the unique Son of God.
Your Word says that you love the world so much that you sent from heaven your one and only Son, that whoever would lean on him, trust in him would never perish, would not eternally die out. Their wick would never flame out, but they would have everlasting, eternal life. It's the life of Jesus that is the light of all men. I pray, Father, for those who are here tonight who don't really know you personally, or they do and their eyes have gotten on other things and they're weary and broken. I pray you'd lift them up. I pray you would encourage them, enlighten them. May their room become brighter than ever before.
If you don't know the Lord personally, right where you're seated, you can invite him in. It can be as simple as you turning your heart toward him. There's nothing you have to do. There's no pilgrimage you have to go on. There's no painful excursion you need to make. He did all the work for you. He suffered all the pain for you. All you have to do is agree to his terms. You have to admit that you're a sinner. You might say, "Doesn't he already know that?" Yeah, but he likes to hear you admit it.
So right where you're seated, you could say: Lord, I know, I admit I need you. I'm a sinner. Forgive me. I believe you sent Jesus, the Light of the World into this world. I believe He died on a cross, and that He rose from the dead, and I choose tonight to put my trust in Him. I turn from my past. I turn from my sin. I turn in my brokenness to you. Receive me as your child, in Jesus' name I ask, amen.
Closing: What binds us together is devotion to worshiping our heavenly Father, dedication to studying his Word, and determination to proclaim our eternal hope in Jesus Christ.
For more teachings from Calvary Albuquerque and Skip Heitzig visit calvaryabq.org.