John 12:44-50 I Have Come Into the World As Light
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JOHN 12:44-50 I HAVE COME INTO THE WORLD AS LIGHT “Jesus cried out and said, ‘Whoever believes in me, believes not in me but in him who sent me. And whoever sees me sees him who sent me. I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness. If anyone hears my words and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak. And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.’”1 or almost 150 years, Christians have sung the hymn, “The Light of the World is Jesus.”2 For almost two millennia before the hymn was written, followers of the Christ knew that F He was the light of the world; the song merely put into lyric form the faith of the faithful. It is difficult for us to imagine a world in which we could know neither the love of God nor enjoy walking in the light of Christ the Lord. Or is it? John opens the Gospel that bears his name by writing words we recognise immediately, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 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. “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light but came to bear witness about the light. “The true light, which gives light to 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 1:1-13]. In this prologue of the Gospel of John, the Word, Jesus the Son of God, is identified as “the True Light.” Jesus is identified as very God in human flesh in this passage. This Jesus was the unique God-man—there was no other like Him, nor shall there ever be another like Him. To be certain, He took upon Himself the sin of mankind, providing an infinite sacrifice for fallen mankind; but more than that, the Living Saviour has shed light into every corner of our existence so that we no longer need to live in darkness. BELIEVE? IN WHOM? Words matter! Promises matter! What is promised is important, and the more so when the promise has an impact on our eternal destiny. I have heard people ask how to believe. John wrote, “To all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” [JOHN 1:12]. John equates receiving with believing—to receive Jesus is to believe Jesus. He must be the Master over life if He is to be Saviour of an individual. 1 Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2016. Used by permission. All rights reserved. 2 “The Light of the World Is Jesus,” Written by Philip P. Bliss, 1875 JOHN 12:44-50 I HAVE COME INTO THE WORLD AS LIGHT It is essential for us to realise that God, through His Word, promises to give to a select group of people what He has identified as “eternal life.” Eternal life, God’s salvation, is not distributed to all mankind, but only those who receive it by faith. Those people to whom this divine gift is given are those who receive as Master over life the One whom God sent to deliver them. The eternal life God has promised is not merely endless length of days, though it does refer to an absence of death; eternal life speaks of a quality of life, a new existence based upon an everlasting relationship to God who is life. This new quality of existence is found only in Christ as Master, as emphatically and repeatedly promised throughout the Word of God. Eternal life, that new relationship with God who is life, is reserved for those who accept the Son of God as Master over life. He takes up residence in the individual’s life, and His presence ensures the new relationship with God. The Apostle to the Gentiles affirms that Jesus must be Master over life when he writes, “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” [ROMANS 10:9]. The emphasis is upon Jesus as Ruler over life, not merely a distant deity. I often say, “Jesus is either Lord of all, or He is not Lord at all.” We are not given the luxury of choosing what role we relegate Jesus to—He is Master! We have often heard that we need only believe to be saved. However, I must caution that it is not our faith that saves us! It is the object of our faith that saves. Too many of the professed saints of God have faith in faith, or they have faith in their church, or they have faith in their doctrinal position. We need to point people to Jesus as the Saviour of the world! Jesus said, “Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” [JOHN 11:25b-26a]. It is believing in the Son of God that brings salvation. We have each heard the message delivered in John’s Gospel: “God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” [JOHN 3:16]. “Whoever believes in Him!” You cannot have watched a football game without seeing this message displayed at some point. We teach this truth to children in Sunday Schools throughout the world. And yet, the majority of people imagine that they can find another way, if their failure to believe in the Son of God is any indication. Later, the Word will emphasise this truth when John writes, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” [JOHN 3:36]. “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.” I iterate—we are not saved by faith; we are saved by the object of our faith. The Apostle to the Gentiles will challenge those reading His Second Letter to the Saints in Corinth, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test” [2 CORINTHIANS 13:5]! The issue is too important to ignore, for failure to believe must result in facing the wrath of God. I understand that many people choose to scoff at the idea of God’s wrath. After all, they have never witnessed His wrath, so why should they worry about what they have never seen? What is sad about this particular idea is that these people are now under the wrath of God. Their present condition, the situation that they have come to accept as normal, excludes them from the mercy of God, condemning them eternally. The Word informs Bible readers, “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” [JOHN 3:18]. Condemnation is not a condition that is relegated only to a dim, unseen future; divine condemnation is the present condition of those who have never received Christ Jesus as Master over life. Page 2 of 10 JOHN 12:44-50 I HAVE COME INTO THE WORLD AS LIGHT We who know the Saviour must be very careful not to call people to join the church. Is church membership biblical? Absolutely! However, church membership has meaning only for those who are born from above and now entered into a relationship to the Living God. We must not allow people to foster false hope that joining a church will somehow assuage divine wrath. Similarly, we do not call people to identify through believer’s baptism as a condition for forging the eternal relationship with the Living God. Is baptism a biblical concept? Without question! Is baptism expected of those who have received the Christ as Master over life? Assuredly! All who have believed are called to openly identify with the Saviour through the act of receiving baptism as a symbol of what God has done.