Adrian Rogers was a motivator, an encourager, and a leader of the faith. He was also passionate about presenting scriptural application to everyday life circumstances. And you'll hear that in today's message.
Now, let's join Adrian Rogers. Would you be finding John chapter 1? I want to tell you an interesting story. Really, very sad story. Back in World War II in the North Atlantic, there was an aircraft carrier that was in danger.
From enemy submarines, and they sent out five of their finest airplanes with five of their finest pilots. to scout out and to see if they could spot. The enemy submarines. It was at night time. The captain of that aircraft carrier realized he was in grave danger.
and gave this commandment. He said, every light on this ship. is to be extinguished. There is to be a total Blackout. Those five pilots that had gone out to reconnoiter.
to try to find those enemy submarines. finally came back and they radioed to that aircraft carrier. They said We're coming home. Give us some light. to land by.
The radio operator said, I'm sorry. There's a total blackout. We cannot give you light. Another of those pilots radioed in and said, just give us some light. And we'll land.
Again, the order came back. It is Total Blackout. We cannot give you some light. In desperation, one of the pilots Radioed in and said Give us just One light. to help us find our way home.
The radio dispatcher there on board that aircraft carrier with a broken heart said. I can give you no light. and shut off the switch. And five brave American pilots. Five of America's best.
went down in the blackness. to the chilly waters of the North Atlantic. and out into eternity.
Now, I want you to keep that story in mind as I read to you from the Gospel of John, beginning in verse 1. In the beginning was the word. And the word was with God. And the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him. And without him was not anything made that was made. In him Was life now listen to this And the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness. And the darkness comprehended it not.
There was a man sent from God whose name was John. The same came for a witness to bear witness of the light. that all men through him might believe. He, that is John, was not that light. but was sent to bear witness of that light.
That was the true light. which lighteth every man that cometh In two. The world. I want to talk to you today about Jesus. The light of the world.
Jesus The light of the world like Those pilots We're in a desperate condition, but thank God there is light. Light. Has come into the world. Light. came to the world in Bethlehem.
In Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 2, Isaiah, looking forward to that time when our Lord and Savior would be born in Bethlehem, said, The people that walked in darkness. have seen a great light. And they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death Upon them hath the light Shine. And that light, of course, Isaiah goes on to tell us in the sixth verse of that same chapter: for unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. That child is the light that Isaiah was prophesying about.
And Zacharias. Who was the father of John the Baptist? He anticipated the coming of the Savior into the world. And he said in Luke chapter 1, verses 78 and 79: through the tender mercy of our God, whereby the day spring on high hath visited us. The day spring from on high, that's another word to describe the Lord Jesus, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
to guide our feet into the way of peace. Simeon, that dear old man of God, picked up the baby Jesus. To bless the baby Jesus. And here's what Simeon said in Luke chapter 2, verse 27. The Bible says, Then took he him up in his arms and blessed God and said, Lord, now let us thy servant depart in peace according to thy word.
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation now he's holding the baby Jesus. And this is what he says: For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people. A light. To lighten the Gentiles and the glory. of thy people Israel.
Christmas is about light. Jesus is the light of the world. We love to sing Silent Night. Holy night. But silent night, holy night, is not about the night, it is about the light.
And one stanza says, Silent night, holy night, darkness flies. All is light. It's not about the night. It's about the light. We sing joy to the world and a part of that is hail the heaven-born prince of peace.
Hail the Son of righteousness. And the word Son is spelled S-U-N. Light and life to all he brings. Risen. with healing.
in his wings. Light is come into the world, John tells us in the third chapter of John. I want you to notice with me today as we think about Jesus, the light of the world, five things about him. Five things about his wonderful, glorious light. First thing I want you to notice is the purity.
of that light. The purity of that light.
Now the Bible says the light was in The world. Jesus was in the world, but friend, He was not of the world. In the natural world, There is nothing as pure as sunlight. Nothing as pure really as any kind of light. Let me tell you something about light.
Light can never be defiled. Listen to me. Light can never be corrupted. No matter what it passes through. Or no matter what it falls upon, Light can never be defiled, it can never be sullied, it can never be corrupted.
You can let light fall on the most corruptible, putrefying. vile, loathsome, disease-ridden object or subject? And yet, the light is not touched by it at all. It can expose it. but it's not touched by it.
Now you take water from the pure spring. And it might be pure water, but as it bubbles up and begins to flow away, it gets contaminated. But not with light. You can take snow. Crystal pure, let it fall from heaven.
But before long that snow will be corrupt, but not light. Not like. Light can never be defiled, and therefore, light is a wonderful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus was in this world. Jesus, the light of the world.
He exposed sin, but he was never contaminated by sin. Jesus could touch sinners. But sin never touched Jesus.
Now you think about it. He's absolutely, totally undefiled. And so I love the picture of light when the Bible calls Christ the light of the world. It reminds me of the sinless, stainless. Purity of the Son of God.
Jesus was the only one who ever lived who could look others in the face and say, Which of you convinceth me of sin? Hmm. I wouldn't say that to my friends, much less to my enemies. But Jesus was absolutely pure, absolutely sinless. Light is coming to the world.
He was in the world, but he was not of the world. He was there to expose sin, but he was never contaminated by sin.
So when you think of Jesus as the light of the world, first thing I want you to think about is his uncorruptible purity. Have you got that?
Now here's the second thing I want you to think about when you think about Jesus as the light of the world. Not only his purity, But his Constancy. You see There's one thing about light. Light is constant. The first two verses here tell us that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Now Jesus is God. And being God, He never changes. God cannot change. How could God change? He couldn't get better, and He surely won't get worse.
He's God, He's absolutely unchangeable. He says, I'm the Lord. I change not. And you see, light is constant. Light does not Change.
James 1, verse 17, the Bible speaks of Jesus and God the Father as light that's unchanging. And it says, every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from above, from the Father of lights, in whom there's no variableness. What does that mean? There's no change.
Now Einstein came up with the theory of relativity. And it's an incredible thing. A few men other than Einstein and myself understand it. The theory of relativity. E Square.
That simply means that the energy of any given object equals its mass times the speed of light. Square. Doesn't that make perfect sense? Maybe. Stands for energy.
In ergs, that's why they call it E. M Stands for mass. M grams. That's why it's called M. And C.
Stands for the velocity of light in centimeters per second.
Now what this all means is that a small amount of mass is able to produce a tremendous amount of energy, that is, for example, in nuclear fission.
Now, Einstein said this, and I want you to listen to it. He said, the reason. that he was able to construct And write down the theory of relativity is because There is one thing and one alone in the world that is constant and cannot change. as the speed of light. The speed of light.
186,282 miles per second. He says that's constant. Everything else is relative. The only thing that is constant. in our universe is light.
And Jesus in the spiritual realm is the one constant. He is light and he does not change.
Now, let me illustrate the constancy of light. And relativity. If I get in my automobile out here on Interstate 40 and I'm driving. At 50 miles an hour this way, And you're in your automobile. and you're driving at 50 miles this way when we pass each other.
The relative speed is what? 100 miles an hour. That's relative speed. I'm going 50, you're going 50. That's the relative speed.
Male Speaker 1. If I'm going 50 and you pull up alongside of me, and you're going 60. Then relatively to me You're going ten miles an hour. That's your relative speed to my speed. You see, everything there is relative.
But now suppose I hijack a light beam. And I'm on a light beam, I've got that thing saddled, and so I'm traveling now at 186,282 miles per second. That's fast. That's around the world seven times in one second. I'm traveling that way.
I am traveling. at the speed of light.
Now let's suppose you get a light beam and you're going the opposite direction. You're traveling 186,282 miles a second. You're going this way, and I'm going that way. We pass. How do we pass?
We pass at the speed of light.
Now Is the relative speed doubled? No. It's constant. You don't double that. It doesn't change.
The thing that changes then is not speed. But time Hi. You see, The faster you get to the speed of light, The more time slows down. And if you were to achieve the speed of light, Time would stand. Still.
Now think about it. One day we're going to achieve a speed of light. I mean, God is light. Christ is light. One day we're going to be made just like The Lord Jesus.
You know, right now the Bible says He dwells in light that no man can approach unto. But one day when we see him, we'll be like him. We'll be transformed into his perfect image. And for us, time will stand still, will be in eternity. Time will stand still.
We've gone from time to eternity because we are like the Lord Jesus Christ. But think about those in hell. For them. Time slows down. They're in darkness.
Through the eons of the ages. Endless, timeless, dateless, measureless. They're in hell, and the Bible says they have no rest day. No night. Those away from our Lord.
You see, he is constant. The speed of light is constant, and it tells us of the Lord Jesus not only because of the purity of that light. But the constancy of that light. Let me give you two verses. Malachi chapter 3, verse 6.
For I am the Lord. I change not. Therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed. Let me give you another one. Hebrews 13 verse 8.
Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever. You know, a world of change, isn't it wonderful? There's one who will not change, and his name is Jesus. He's the light of the world. I heard a preacher preach a while back and he said something just tickled me all over.
He said, you can't make God nervous. I love that. Oh, there's no panic in heaven. Friend, he does not change, and he sees the beginning from the end. We sing it, Great is thy faithfulness, O God, my Father.
There is no shadow of turning with thee. Thou changest not thy compassions, they fail not. Great is thy faithfulness. O Lord, unto me. But I want you to think about a third thing about this light.
I want you to think not only about the purity of it. Jesus Christ, absolutely pure, cannot be defiled. He can touch sin, but sin cannot touch him. He can expose sin. But sin cannot defile him.
Think of the constancy of this light. He never changes. The third thing I want you to think about is. I'm so grateful that he's described as light, that little baby that was born. And that's not only the purity of that light.
and the constancy of that light. But the victory. of that live. The victory of that light. Look, if you will, in verses 3 through 5.
All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
Now, watch this verse. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness. comprehended it. Mm.
Now what does that mean? Does it mean the darkness didn't understand the light? That's the way we would translate the darkness comprehended it, or that's what the normal meaning would be, but. I looked this up in a number of different translations. And here are three that I want to share with you.
The darkness has not overcome it. Here's another. The darkness cannot put it out. Here's another translation. The darkness can never extinguish it.
What he's talking about here is the victory of this light. All history. Here's the history of a battle. Between light and darkness. That's what it's all about.
Everything. There's a battle. Between light And darkness. Satan His name is Lucifer. It means white-bearer.
But Satan turned against God and sinned against the light, and now no longer is he the light-bearer. Lucifer, the son of the morning. He has now become Satan. The father of the night. And there's a darkness.
A dark, devilish darkness. That is at battle. With the light. I want to ask you a question. Who must win?
As night follows day and day follows night, it is as clear. as the light of the noonday sun. Darkness has no power. Against light.
Now you think about it. Darkness has absolutely no power. Against light.
It is totally powerless. Against the light. If you're in a dark room and you wanted to get the darkness out, how would you get the darkness out? Could you take a vacuum cleaner and suck it out? Could you take a shovel and shovel it out?
You just take a broom and sweep it out. How would you get the darkness out of that room? Turn on the light.
Now, when you turn on the light, where does the darkness go? It flees. Goes under the bed. It goes in the closet. It goes out.
It cannot stay. It is totally Powerless. It's a glorious thought. The darkness can't put out the light. Light is coming to the world.
You think of the sun. How bright the sun is. To look into the face of the sun is to put your eyes out. But that's only a faint illustration. of the Son of God in His brightness.
The Bible tells us in 1 Timothy 6, verse 16, it speaks of our Lord who only hath immortality, dwelling in light, which no man can approach unto. We put a man on the moon, friend. We'll never put one on the sun. But that is only an illustration of the glory. The power.
Of our great God. It's a victory. of this light.
Now let me tell you something about this light. Every now and then in the natural world, we say, Well, the sun didn't shine today. That's a lie, isn't it? If you ever ridden an airplane, you know better than that. You get here an overcast, foggy, clammy, cold day, and you get on that plane and it bumps a little bit, and all of a sudden, poop.
You aren't as dazzling bright. Down beneath are all the clouds. The sun's been shining. And friend, I want to tell you something. You can block out the light.
but you can't put it out. You can't put it out. I mean, there is victory, and rather than praying so much against the powers of darkness, what we need to be doing is realizing the power of light. What we need to be doing is to release the light of the Lord Jesus Christ and to bear witness of that light. Think of Jesus, the light of the world.
Think of his purity. Think of his constancy. Think of his victory. The darkness. Can't put out the light.
You can walk in a room and turn on the light, but you cannot walk in one and turn on the darkness. The only thing can let the darkness in is for the light. to be blocked out.
Now here's the fourth thing I want you to notice about Jesus, the light of the world. I hope this blessed you as much as all this has blessed me when I studied it. But you think about his purity. He cannot be defiled. He can expose, but he cannot be defiled.
He's in the world, but not of the world. Think about his constancy. He never changes. Think, friend, about his victory. Darkness can never extinguish.
The light. And then think with me. about his vitality. He is the one who gives life.
Now, look, if you will, here in this same passage of scripture in verse 4. In him, that is in Jesus, in Bethlehem's babe, in him was life. And the life was the light. of man. That's the vitality.
the vitality of this light. Light and life are inextricably interwoven. You cannot have life. Unless you have light. When God wanted to bring life to a chaos and make it a cosmos?
In Genesis 1, He said, let there be Light. And when the light came, the seas began to swarm with life, and the trees and the seeds began to. bud and blossom and grow. I've always loved natural science. And I can remember back in the fourth grade.
The first big word that I ever really locked in on That enthralled me. When my teacher told me about it, it was a word photosynthesis. You remember studying that word? Photosynthesis. And the teacher told us there in that class.
I was amazed. I was enthralled by it. She said the word photo means light. And synthesis means to put together. And she said Growing things are put together with light.
Photosynthesis. And how light causes these plants to produce chlorophyll, and how the whole life chain is built upon the sunlight. If you were to take the sunlight away from this world, our world would become cold and dark and dead. It's like a man without Jesus. He's cold and dark and dead.
When Jesus comes into the world, in him Was life. My life! was the light of man. Oh friend, that's the vitality. of this light.
You want your life put back together to be put back together with light. There is a divine photosynthesis when the entrance of thy word brings light, and Jesus is the light in your cold, dark, dead, clammy world. be put back together. When the glorious light of the Son of God. Shines into your heart.
Thank God there'll be a sunrise of the soul. And Jesus said, I've come that you might have life. But you might have it abundantly. There's no life without light when Adam sinned. What happened when Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden?
God was living in Adam. But when Adam sinned, the Lord went out. And when the Lord went out, the life went out. And when the life went out, the light went out.
So when the Lord went out, he's depraved, and when the life went out, he's dead, and when the light went out, he's darkened. But when you get saved, the Lord comes back in. Turns the light on. The life begins again. Jesus is the light of the world.
I want you to think not only of the vitality of this light, But I want you to think now of the glory of this light. The glory of it. Look, if you will, in verse 14 now. And the word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory. The glory as of the only begotten of the Father.
So Of grace. And truth. Do you know what glory is? That's the outshining of the light of His grace and truth. It's the Shekinah.
It's the light of God that's in Jesus Christ. Oh, the glory of this light. Did you know? Uh there are seven colors. that comprised a spectrum of light.
All light is made up of color. There's seven colors in the spectrum. And what do they remind us of? Jesus, the light of the world, who is what? Absolutely perfect.
God is perfect. And so this light were seven colors in the spectrum. Reminds us of the perfection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but put all of those together. and the color is pure white. Pure white.
which speaks of the wholeness of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Now What we need to understand that color is in light. Objects don't have any color of themselves. The color is in the light. Did you know that? Anything that you wear Anything that you have You say, well, this lady down here has on a red coat.
No. She has a coat that picks up red. out of the light. The color is not in the coat, the color is in the light. The most gorgeous bouquet in the world.
If you take away the light, It has no color. There is no color. You don't turn on the light so you can see the color. The color is not there. without the light.
The color is in the light. Jesus. Is the one that makes everything glorious. And then he helps us to see what he's made glorious. He is the glory of God.
Christ is the one. Who gives glory and joy and victory? He's the one who makes this world beautiful in his time. I feel sorry for people. who've never seen the light.
You don't know the beauties that I know. I don't know how to say what I'm about to say. But I tell you something, friend. If you don't know Jesus, I know something you don't know. And I see things you don't see.
And they're wonderful.
Now you may be a Christian and not see them because you're in the twilight zone. I mean you're walking in carnality. Oh, if we walk in the light as he is in the light. We have fellowship one with another. And the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanseth us from all sin.
All the glory of that light. All the multifaceted splendors. He is everything in the spectrum put together, and He is the one that makes all things beautiful. The glory. of that light.
The light of the world is Jesus. The sad thing is this. that many neglect or refuse. That light. They can't find God for the same reason a thief can't find a policeman.
If you want him, Listen to me. Light. He has come into the world. Light was born in Bethlehem. His name is Jesus.
He's the light of the world. And I'll tell you right now. If you'll open your heart, And receive him as the Lord Jesus Christ. He will pull back the veil of darkness, pin it with the star of hope, and flood your world with the sunlight, and you will see things and know things. that you could never know without him.
And he will never leave you nor forsake you. because he changes not. If you want Jesus, would you pray this way? Lord Jesus, I need you. I'm tired of the darkness.
I don't want to love darkness rather than light. I want the light. I want the truth. Come into my heart. Forgive my sin.
Save me. and turn on the light. in my heart. In your name I pray. Amen.
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