Light

God in His infinite wisdom reaches out to us who are of finite minds with His Word to give us understanding of Him and our relationship to Him in numerous ways. One of the most important is His use of the physical things of the universe to instruct us in spiritual things. Of all of these physical things, light is one of the most dramatic to man.

Light is used first in the moments of creation. In our minds eye we can move back to that time and imagine the dead planet on its journey through space, void of any form of life. We can feel the awe inspiring moment when the God of the Universe causes His spirit to move upon the face of the waters and he declares, “Let there be light.” Surely the whole earth must have shaken when the power of that proclamation was felt in the earth! The power of the Almighty had spoken. Were we there we would have likewise shaken at the Divine presence. But we would also have confidence. For He did not come to destroy but to save. He came not to tear down, but to build. He was setting in mind a divine plan in which all the earth was to be filled with His glory, as Isaiah recorded the promise of God, “for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.” As we imagine that moment in our minds eye, we are elated by the sudden change which was taking place upon that lifeless globe. The power of the Almighty was now at work in that which was dead, void of life. The presence of God in His spirit and through the work of the Elohim made a change to the earth. “And God saw the light, that it was good.”

Light was used in the day when the rains receded from the earth and God made the promise to Noah. The light shining through the mist provided the rainbow, the sign of the promise.

When God reached out to His people who were under bondage in Egypt He again uses light. After a long period of bondage in that land of death, the people of God were called to come out from their life of servitude. But He did not in the twinkling of an eye place them in the Land of Promise. Rather, after he had drawn them through the sea, he removed them to a wilderness, to try them and to teach them His ways, to transform them from being slaves in Egypt into His people, kings and priests. There they were in this wilderness, without water, without any visible means of sustaining their existence. Some yearned to return to the former things, to their slave masters. But He was there. And they were to learn that His grace was sufficient for them. As each night fell upon them in that desolate land, they knew that God was there, for they could not help but to have their eyes attracted to the center of the camp and see the glory of God shining forth above the camp as it stood over center of the camp, that glory which gave them light but likewise protected them from the enemy which encamped around them.

Finally, God was to reveal His plan of redemption to man through His Son. To some, those “wise men” who were far off from the Land of Israel, to whom God called, the birth of that Son was made known through the use of one of the light sources in the universe, a star in the east. And the star led them to the now visible divine light, the Son of God.

About four hundred years prior to that glorious event, Malachi penned the words of God who declared, “For behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. But unto you that fear my name shall the Son of righteousness arise with healing in his wings (or beams); and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall. And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts.”

And the light did arise, And he de­clared, “I am the light of the world.” But another child was growing at the same time in Israel, John. And God spake through Zacharius, concerning the mission of his son, to this young child of eight days, “And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways; To give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins, Through the tender mercy of our God; whereby the day-spring on high hath visited us, To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” And the ways of the Lord were prepared, and at the appointed time, the light began to break forth. God declared, “This is my beloved son, hear ye him.”

Another John was chosen to write of the Light that had shone in Israel. The words of this “Son of Thunder” who had brought the three endearing letters of love to his ecclesias, was compelled to take us back to the beginning to give us understanding of the name of Jesus Christ and the things concerning the kingdom of God. He begins his gospel message, “In the beginning!” Now we are to be exposed to a new beginning. Not one in which a dead, lifeless form was moving through space, but an earth that had been prepared for the breaking forth of the “Sun of Righteousness.” And this time it was not to be the rays of light to break forth, but the Word of the almighty God was to come forth and shine into the hearts of men. “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.” The new beginning thus commenced in John’s eye at the moment of the coming forth of the Son of God from the waters of baptism.

John begins his first letter to the ec­clesias with a like reference to this new beginning, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (• • • ) That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ.” John then reveals the message which had come into the world, in 1 Jn. 1:5-7, “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in dark­ness, we lie, and do not the truth: But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sin.” We are cautioned that for us to walk in the light, we must love our brother (1 Jn. 2:9, 10). Just as the light of the sun brings with it warmth in its rays, so likewise the warmth of the light of truth expressed in love towards one another brings a warmth into our midst.

John tells us that the light lighteth every man and when men are exposed to the light, their deeds are made manifest. Light permits us to not stumble in the darkness of this world. Without light we do not see the course that we should follow. Paul makes the function of light clear to us in his letter to the brethren at Ephesus, “But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light.”

God has used light and its action in and upon the earth as an aid to us who have come to the light of the gospel. It helps us to understand His dealings with us. God reaches out to man in man’s world of spiritual darkness with His marvelous light of the gospel and He calls men to repentance. Void of the light, men are as the dead earth, they are like the lifeless seed lying in the darkness of the night, void of understanding. But where the light of God’s Truth shines it brings forth life. When the Sun rises from the east, energy breaks forth into the seed and it grows under the tender nature of its Keeper, being watered by the Word, to bring forth fruit. But for those men who refuse the light, who spurn God’s offer of salvation, the light “shall burn them up.” “It shall leave them neither root nor branch.”

Since the days when the Son of God walked on this earth, the earth has once again fallen into a period of darkness. But the light of God’s Truth does shine through the actions of His Word. He reaches out to men whom He chooses and calls them to the Truth. He separates men by the sharp, two edged sword of Truth and commands them to repent. He does this because He “will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.” The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should but perish but that all should come to repentance.

But as the sun is both a source of energy to the seed that is nurtured and watered in the good soil, so likewise is the sun capable of scorching that seed that falls into the fallow soil. To some men, those who have accepted God’s offer of salvation and walk in newness of life (in the light), God will declare, “Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the service of thy Lord.” But not all will be blessed with this declaration. Some will be as the seed that fell into stony ground. While they sprung up under the Divine influence of the light, they did not grow and yield fruit. To them He will declare, “Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.”

At what moment does God make a distinction between those men who remain in the darkness of this age and those who have been brought to light? We know that light is the ground of responsibility. God uses his Truth to separate men and call them out from the world of sin just as day is separated from the night by the power and action of the light of the sun upon the face of the planet. But just as the effect of light is seen when it strikes the earth, God holds a man responsible to His Truth when His light shines forth and impinges upon the conscience of the man and he knows that the God of the whole universe has reached out to him and commanded him to repent.

How can we best express the action of God’s Word upon the conscience of a man as it calls him to repentance? We all know the experience, for we have been through it. What a marvelous moment when we knew the Truth. We saw that God had reached out to us and offered, in His infinite kindness, life to us, who were not deserving of life. In response to that, we in effect, like the eunuch said, in our urgency, “See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be bap­tized?” And the one who was our Phillip said, “If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.” We understood that Jesus was the Son of God, who had come and is coming as the “Sun of righteousness with healing in His beams,” and we desired to be healed from mortality, and all its ills, that rests so heavily upon us.

The Birmingham Amended Statement of Faith states that the responsible to the judgment seat of Christ are those “who know the revealed will of God, and have been called upon to submit to it.” But there are other, equally acceptable ways for a man to express his acceptance of this principle as a statement of his convictions. Brother Roberts put it this way in “True Principles and Uncertain Details,” recently reprinted in The Tidings “General Principle: That men are responsible to the resurrection of condemnation who refuse subjection to the will of God when their circumstances are such as to leave them without excuse for such refusal.” (This is the source of the expression of this Truth which is used in the current California Unity Proposal.) In other words used by Br. Roberts, he said that those responsible would be those who rejected the truth knowing it to be the truth.

In a recent editorial on this subject concerning those who reject God’s offer of salvation, the Editor of the Christa­delphian put it, “In other words, they had been convicted that what they had heard was true and they were rejecting it. They would stand condemned by their consciences in the light of the truth.”

As we reflect, now, upon the use of light in the Scriptures of Truth, we should ever bear in mind that God’s light shone upon a lifeless earth to bring forth life; it rose through the action of the Shekhinah Glory, centered at the mercy seat to protect Israel in their journey in the wilderness from their life of bondage toward their life in the King­dom which God had prepared; it shone as a light to all men, calling all to repentance and to the hope of eternal life, and it will shine when the Sun of Righteousness rises with healing in His beams. Let us let the Truth expressed now take its action in healing a breach in our community and let us stand as one lamp-stand, shining forth with God’s Truth as we wait so anxiously the return of our Lord, “who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God.”