As we find ourselves at the beginning of mankind’s darkest days it is proper and fitting that we remember God’s intent that we not walk in darkness (John 8:12).  In America and the British Commonwealth nations we have been the recipients of the greatest blessings God has ever bestowed on a people.  We were given ample opportunity to live according to God’s principles, morality, and values, but we have chosen to be a lawless people.  We have chosen darkness over light.  It is only fitting and just that God give us the leaders that will bring about our ultimate demise in short order.  Incredibly, at the same time that modern Israel is being plunged into darkness, God is calling a people out of this deceived world of madness into His glorious light.

Through His Prophet Daniel, God foretold how there would be a people who believed and submitted to His sovereign rule over their lives.  He spoke of a future resurrection in which the obedient, converted saints, who had overcome this world’s darkness, would glisten as light like the stars of heaven: 

“They that are wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness shall shine as the stars forever and ever.”  (Daniel 12:3)

A persistent theme throughout the Bible is premise that mankind is on the journey from darkness to light.  On the wrong side of the scale is the eternal darkness of death, while the ultimate goal of the plan of God is for mankind to attain to its vital and glorious destiny of becoming sons and daughters of God in His eternal Kingdom.  That is the purpose for which man was created.

As Christians, let’s ask ourselves where we are on that sliding scale between darkness and light.  It is a most serious question.  The light of God is a spiritual concept that has far-reaching connotations. 

The Biblical reveals that the contrast between darkness and light could not be more extreme.  The vast expanse of this great gulf between the two, relays to us the consequence of the backwardness of ignorance and sin, as distinguished from the ultimate spiritual enlightenment of God’s truth.

God clearly shows us how to come out of darkness and into His light.  Darkness is the absence of light, but more important than that is what God desires for us to gather from this Biblical metaphor—and that is spiritual darkness is the absence of the truth of God.  The prophet Isaiah helped develop the image that light is associated with goodness and righteousness, while darkness is synonymous with wickedness.  Spiritually speaking, darkness and light are antonyms of each other—they are opposed to one another.

“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!”  (Isaiah 5:20)

As the comparison between the two expands in Scripture, we begin to see how light represents the good characteristics of God – while darkness is the absence of Godliness.  God establishes this theme in the first few verses of Genesis.  Our earth was well on the way to completion when it was annihilated in the demonic battle that took place at the time that Satan attempted to seize God’s throne.  We are told that everything became tohu, bohu and coshek (Genesis 1:2).

“The earth became without form [‘tohu’] and void [‘bohu’], and darkness [‘coshek’] was upon the face of the deep...”

In Worldwide we always focused on ‘tohu’ and ‘bohu’ but did not touch on ‘coshek’- the darkness that prevailed over all creation as a result of Satan’s rebellion.

“And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.”  (Genesis 1:3-4)

In setting this powerful theme, God without a doubt shows that it is He alone who is the one to separate light form darkness.  In today’s sermon we will explore the importance to God’s people of understanding why this theme is driven home to us from Genesis to Revelation.  We will see that God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance (2Peter 3:9).  God is actively separating His people from the darkness of ignorance and sin.  Knowing that, we find a vital participation by God included in the theme of ‘darkness to light’—that of God’s direct intervention in dividing (Genesis 1:4) His glorious light from the evil darkness.

“All things [the universe] were made by Him [Jesus Christ]; and without Him was not anything made that was made.  In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.  And the light shone in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” (John 1:3-5)

“[God] only has immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen.”  (1Timothy 6:16)

From the fall of man until the fruition of God’s plan, the Bible is the story of God’s direct involvement in man’s quest to come out of the darkness of ignorance and sin, and into the glorious light and liberty of God’s radiance.

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Sermon:

"Darkness to Light"