The Light of Men - John1:1-5 - Let There Be Light (Christmas at Tanger, 2023)

All right. Hey guys, you can take a seat all around the auditorium here today, but as you guys are taking a seat, especially if you are part of the home crowd, you got some water. Oh, there we go. Especially if you guys are part of the home crowd here at Mercy Hill, you know that we get a chance to be led by this awesome group in all six of our locations, all spread out every single week. Can we just give them, show some honor to them and thank them for the tireless effort? Thank God for that.

Thank God for them. Guys, we are so excited to be with you here. And man, if you are a home folk or if you are brand new with us, we want to welcome you just the same. I'm actually going to be opening the Bible for just a little while tonight in John chapter one.

All right. So if you brought a copy of scripture, fine. If you want to find it on a phone, fine. Or we're going to have it all on the screen for you. You know, I mean, if you came and you weren't prepared for that, that's totally fine. We've got it for you. And what we're going to be talking about together here tonight, and I hope you can see it.

All of these songs are not just kind of random selections. Y'all were telling a story here together tonight. And the idea is that in the beginning, as many of us grew up, you know, maybe you're in the South, maybe you kind of been around the Bible, been around some type of, you know, religion in terms of Christianity or whatever. You might know, you know, that even this verse in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Well, what we understand at the beginning is that one of God's first creative acts was to speak light and to shine light into what was dark. But he is still in the business of doing that today. He didn't just do it one time in creation. What we're going to see in John chapter one today is that he also has done that again in sending. This is what Christmas is all about. Sending a great light into the world whose name was Jesus Christ. And we're going to talk about that. So John chapter one is where we're going to be.

I do want to do this, though, before I get ahead of myself here. Guys, every year at our Christmas services, we get a chance to try to bless and invite and show honor to different groups in our society that work on behalf of our good. So we've done things for the social services kind of department. We've done things with foster care. We've done things last year. We did some stuff with firefighters. And this year we had a chance to personally invite and show some appreciation for in terms of just kind of some goodie bags, snacks, things like that.

Every single one of the over 700 officers of the Greensboro PD. And we wanted to do that not just for them. I know.

Hey, I want you to celebrate that and I want you to. But we're going to do that in a really big way in just a minute. Okay, so thank you guys for jumping the gun.

But here's here's the thing. So whether you are an officer, High Point, Greensboro, anywhere else in the triad, city, you know, county, whatever it is, I wanted you to hear something. We understand that you guys are running in when the rest of us are running away. We understand that the time that you put yourself in danger in order to seek the good of the city, and to seek the good and the peace of families just like mine and we appreciate that. If you are here and you are one of those officers, we wanted to have you stand but then we realized half of you are undercover. Okay, so we can't do that. But we do want to mercy heal everything we combustor. Can we show some appreciation to these guys, these men and women.

Yes. You guys listen, men and women that carry the uniform you are honored guests here tonight. All right, we're gonna be in John chapter one today, and I'm at my clock is short y'all we got to get back to singing in this awesome music that we're experiencing and so we're going to dive right in John chapter one, here's what it says. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God and all things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made in him was life and the life was the light of men kind of our theme for tonight the light shining into the darkness, and the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Now I know I don't know if you've been studying the book of John, I really don't know if you're here tonight and you've ever even cracked the Bible, but in theological circles, the first chapter of John the first 18 verses. Listen, it's not called the prologue of John, it's actually just simply called the prologue. And the reason for that is because it is so weighty, I mean you think about the mountains of theologians and what has been written about the Bible throughout the last couple thousand years, and among all of that stuff there is a recognition that the first few verses of the book of John are some of the deepest in all of Scripture. And while we could preach series and seminary classes on it, I wanna try to show you what I think is really at the biggest level, the highest idea of this passage, and here's what I think it is. John is trying to show us that just like in the beginning there was a light that shined in the darkness, there was another light that shined into the darkness when Jesus came onto the scene. And he calls him the word here, now we're gonna talk about who the word is, and I've already let the cat out of the bag, it's Jesus Christ, we're gonna see that.

But he also, I also wanna talk for just a minute about what the word does, not just who he is, but what does he do, and look what it said. It says that in the beginning was the word, the word was with God, the word was God, but then in verse three it says this, all things were made through him, without him not anything was made that was made, and in him was life, and the life was the light of man, and the light shined in the darkness. So before we get into who he is, let's talk about what he is doing, and what he is doing is shining light into the darkness, there is kind of a congruence between Genesis 1 and John 1.

God created, the earth is formless and void, boom, light, and here's what he says in John chapter one, in the beginning, the word active in creation, and boom, light has shined into the darkness. You know, this is very good news for us, and I don't know what you hear when you hear that word darkness, there's a lot of philosophies that pour in, and I don't know what all your background is, but I think pretty much we can all agree on this, that when we talk about darkness in terms of the absence of light, even the way we use the language shows us what we really feel when that comes up. When we talk about darkness, we say things like this to each other, man I'm going through a dark time. We say things like this, I'm not on the top of the mountain where the sun shines, where am I, feeling low, I'm in the valley where there is no light, where it's dark in the valley. See, darkness is synonymous with chaos and trouble.

It's synonymous with sorrow, it's just think about the way we use the language, we know that. All right, I thought about this, you know, thinking about chaos and all of that, July 13th and 14th, 1977, okay, a full 15 years before Macaulay Culkin got lost in New York City, inexplicably again, okay, and you know, what happened? Y'all, New York City was on fire, 1,000 fires had been intentionally set, 1,600 businesses were being broken into, 500 officers were injured, over 4,000 people were arrested and multiple people died. It was one of the craziest times ever in New York City and one of the largest cities in the whole world. Do you know what brought all of that about?

What do you think happened? The lights went out for one day. When the lights go out, what is that, there is chaos, there is sorrow, there is this trepidation, this fear that we all have of the lights going out.

Why? Because darkness is synonymous with things that are hard, with chaos, formless, void. This is what darkness, I mean, I think about, you know, listen, I'm not like a full prepper, okay? Now, when somebody says they're not a full prepper, it's like, okay, you know, we do live on our own farm with a large food supply, okay? We got a lot of weapons, all right? I mean, if our, you know, the power goes out, the generator's hooked up and running everything within about five seconds, okay?

But I'm not a full prepper, all right? But what I know about, you know, what all of us know, what is the first thing that you put into any emergency kit for any situation? A flashlight.

Why? Because we understand darkness, chaos, there is a light that needs to shine out. This is what Christmas is about. John chapter 1 is a Christmas passage. This is about the light coming into the darkness, and it mirrors Genesis chapter 1. Look what it says in Genesis 1, 1, you don't need to turn there. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters, and God said, let there be light, and there was light. Why do you take your kids out, put them in their pajamas, and drive them around this time of year to see the Christmas lights? Christmas is synonymous with this concept of light breaking into the darkness of the world, and this is what I want you to see tonight.

If you come to Mercy Hill, man, I've got quotes, and I've got big ideas, and we've got outlines, and all that kind of stuff. Tonight, it's all about one idea, and here it is, that in the beginning, what was formless, and dark, and void, God spoke a light into. There was light that was revealed, and God is still in that business today. And how do we know that?

We know that because of Christmas. Now, who is this word? In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

Now, I want to skip down to verse 14 just to show you this. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. Y'all, the word is Jesus Christ. What do we celebrate at Christmas? We celebrate this idea of one of the members of the triune God breaking forth into our world in humanity, putting on flesh. It's mind-boggling, really, when you think about what he has done. Man, a member of the Trinity, you know, we believe in Christianity. God is one God in three persons, and one of those persons has come to walk in our shoes to bring a light to us. It's an amazing thing when you think about it.

Christmas, Jesus Christ coming as a baby. My dad is a musician, and he'll, man, he's like a real folksy, bluesy musician, okay? And, I mean, he's got the guitar, and he's got the harmonica hooked up with the guitar, and the harmonica, and the washboard, okay?

And he can just slap play. And one of the things that he liked to play when I was a kid, I remember this song, he would always sing an old blues song, and here's what it said. It said, little baby Jesus changed his diaper and put him in the bed. He created this whole world, but he couldn't even raise his wobbly head.

This is what Jesus has done. He has come into our world, and what is this all about? It is all about, I mean, when you think about the virgin, the manger, all of this, what is it about?

It is about a light coming in to the dark world and shining so that we would be able to come in line with the very purpose for our creation, to be in relationship with God, and to live out our purpose in this life. Now, here's what's interesting, okay? John, man, this is one of the reasons why this passage is so deep. It's because John attaches a word to Jesus here, and here's what he calls him, all right?

What did I say? He calls him the word of God. Now, what does this mean, the word of God? Well, in Greek thought, in the philosophy of the Greeks, the word was a principle, it was a reason. I mean, the word actually means logos, that's the Greek word. This is where we get our word logic from, okay? The word is a governing principle in terms of Greek philosophy that you could align with, and if you could discover it, if you could find out what the logos is, what that word is, that governing principle of reason is, then you can come alignment, come into alignment with the reason that you were created, and you can live a harmonious life. Here's what John does. He kind of flips that a little bit, and he says, hey, guys, actually, you're not totally wrong. There is a governing principle.

The only difference is he's not a principle, he's a person. There is a person that when you get right, and when you align, and the light dawns into this dark world, then you will be able to kind of live the purpose and come back into the family of God once again. You know, this is what the Bible is trying to get us to see today, that this is what Christmas is about. It's about us having the opportunity to align with the reason that we were created to come back into relationship with God, but it happens through us understanding the lights as the light shines in the darkness. Y'all, we know this. We live in a dark world. You know, there's darkness that is all around us. You know, I think about in our own life, you know, we just think about the brokenness that we see. There's brokenness, there are thorns and thistles, there are things that we don't understand. Y'all, I think about how when, you know, what the Bible teaches is that this came about because sin came into the world. That when Adam and Eve were put in creation, when God shined light into their world, it wasn't enough for them. And they broke his rules, and they ran away, and three relationships were broken.

Their relationship with each other, their relationship with creation, and their relationship with God Almighty. And these things were fractured, and we feel the results of it. Now, listen, don't go throwing rocks at Adam and Eve, okay? Because who among us have not chosen their path and rebelled against God at some point in our life?

Somebody in here is like, well, I've never done that. Well, yeah, you did. You struggled with pride. Okay, I'm just going to be honest with you, all right? I mean, you know, we all do. I want you to think about this for a moment. God knows every thought you've ever had. He understands every single motivation for every good deed you've ever done. I mean, God understands us.

He knows. We have chosen after Adam and Eve. There is a darkness in the world. And yes, relationships are broken. Look at our world. You know, the relationship with the very earth. I mean, I'm not saying it's someone's fault.

What I'm saying is the world is broken. We feel this in our family. I mean, we feel this in our family. Our fourth child has come to us through adoption seven years ago.

And she has Down syndrome. And I look forward to the day when I sing these words of the Christmas song. A light has come in. The weary world will rejoice, right? There is a coming, a Savior who will come and finally restore and put things back together. And the Christmas song says, far as the curse is found.

My daughter is seven years old and she doesn't talk. But one day she will sing praise. One day her tongue will be loosed so that she can praise her Creator and we will be able to hear what's in her heart and to hear what's in her mind. Now, what is this all about?

This is what Christmas is. It's the light coming in to restore those three broken relationships, our relationship with God, our relationship with each other, and our relationship with the very creation, the very earth itself. Look what it said in verse four again. In Him was life. And life was the light of man. The light shines in the darkness. And the darkness has not overcome it. Okay, we've got to get to the point, all right?

Okay, we get it. He has come. He's not just in the business of light and creation. He's in the business of light and recreation.

This is why the word has come. But how is it that the light comes into your life? And how does the light come into my life? Well, that light ends up, you know, Jesus Christ, yes, He was born and He was laid in a manger, but He was destined for a cross.

And here's what He has done. This is a simple gospel message. You can go read this in 1 Corinthians 15.

If you want to track it down yourself, but it's all over the pages of Scripture. This is why Christians sing. This is why we shout. This is why we raise our hands.

This is why we do things like rent out the Tanger Center for a bunch of people to come and to hear. This is the very core message, that Jesus Christ has brought this light, and the way that you come in is when you submit yourself to what He has done for you, and that's this. In our sin, we are separated from God forever.

I know what we say. Well, I'm not really that bad. Well, that's because you're comparing yourself to someone else, not the holiness of God. When we think about what God has called us to do and the life that we live, suddenly we get revealed pretty fast. There's a lot of things in my life I should have done that I didn't do. There's a lot of things in my life that I did that I shouldn't have done. There's a lot of motivations that I've had. There's a lot of things that I've thought about others.

There's a lot of things that I've said about other people. I mean, there's so many things in our life. We understand that we're sinners. Here's what the Bible tells us, that in our sin, we are destined for a godless eternity, but Jesus Christ has come into this world and taken on flesh, listen, so that he could take the penalty for all those things that we have done and give us the rewards of all those things that he did. Jesus Christ never sinned one time and yet he willingly went to the cross. We call it the great exchange in theology so that you and I could get away and out from under that burden of sin. In sin, we deserve death and hell and for all eternity, but the Bible is saying Jesus took both so that what would be left for us is neither. And so what we have is Jesus who comes, who takes our penalty, and then he dies on the cross and three days later, he raises from the dead and he offers us the chance through admitting our sin and believing in what he has done and confessing him as the Lord of our life.

We come back into relationship with him once again. That is what it means for the light to dawn upon us, right? Okay, I wanna apply this to two groups of people and then I'm done, okay? I know if you're part of the home crowd at Mercy Hill, you just about fell out of your chair because I'm not at minute 55 yet, all right? But I am gonna restrain myself here tonight. Two groups of people and I'm done.

The first group is this. You know, we're about, you guys see the candles, you know where this thing's headed, okay? All right, we're gonna be, you know, I get that. But here's the thing, you can hold onto that light, but that doesn't mean that you have it. You can try to shine, you can try to project the light. That doesn't mean that you actually have it. And my question for you is this. Has the light dawned in your life? Have you given your life over to Jesus Christ?

Not a great reasoning principle, but a person who loves you enough to come and to die on a cross for you and in his resurrection to give you the newness of life that, yeah, the party gets to start here, but it goes on into eternity. I don't know if you have or not. I think that many of us maybe have not taken that step and here's why. Because we feel like our life is too messed up. Nobody knows this, but you know, maybe you're, maybe, you know, things have gotten too out of control.

It's just like, man, I don't know. Nobody knows it, but the drinking has gotten out of control. Nobody knows it, but the dead has gotten out of control. Nobody knows it, but the things that we're looking at online have gotten out of control.

Nobody knows it, but the spending's out of control. You know, when I start talking about a light that is shining in, there are some of you even here tonight right now that you're thinking to yourself, man, Andrew, I don't know if the light actually does not get overcome by the darkness because my life feels pretty dark right now. In a room this size, statistically, there are some of you that are not planning on making it through 2024.

I want to tell you today, there is a light that does not get overcome by the darkness. And here's the deal. Many of us never want to start the journey with him because we already feel like we're too far gone. Man, I'm too far behind.

I'm too far back. It's just, it's too much to overcome. The life that he wants for me is so different than the one that I'm living, why would I even begin? Isn't it just like a human? The main reason why we should start today becomes the reason that we don't start at all. I mean, think about it. I mean, how many people that are way up to their eyeballs in debt, why do they not start some kind of plan today because they're too far behind? That's actually the reason you should start right now, right? It's ironic, but this is how we are.

We feel like the journey's too long, so we don't even want to start. I remember, guys, a couple years ago, I was, we, we were selling some pigs, okay? I know that's a little weird, okay? But I'm, you know, people ask me if these stories are true.

They are true. Actually, these are the two pigs, okay? So, I want you guys to see, this was Burt Neffel, all right? And what happened is, leave this up here for just one second. The guy comes to buy the pigs, and he gets out of a 1990s Astro minivan, okay? I'm like, what's up, man? Where'd you come from?

He said, Arkansas, drove all night. Now, as you're looking at these pictures, you're like, you get it. You're like, my word, those are the most beautiful pigs I've ever seen. I know what you're thinking, okay?

You can take them down, all right? But I, I, I was so intrigued by it. I'm like, man, I was like, oh, this is, this is my kind of dude here, okay?

He drove all night, Arkansas, you know, got the Astro minivan. I'm like, I'm looking around, I'm like, hey, man, where's the trailer? Oh, no, man, they're going in the van.

I live for moments like this, okay? I'm like, man, let's do it. What's the plan here, man?

What's the plan? Opens up, he's got this whole thing partitioned out, wood panels, man, two of them are going, and these ain't little pigs. I mean, that one on the left, Burt, that dude is one cheeseburger away from 330 pounds, okay?

I'm telling you. And so it's not like these are little, two of them are going in the cab, you know, like where your kids would normally sit, all right? And, and then one of them is going in the back in the cargo space and he's got it all partitioned out, hey, all this kind of stuff. And I'm like, man, let's go.

So the first, we start loading them, we get them up in there, we got one of them gets in there, we're giving them food. Then the big one, like I told you, he starts to, his space is going to be the cargo space. He gets about halfway in there and he decides he ain't going. He's kind of gotten wise to the whole thing. And he turns around to get off. And my man from Arkansas, he squares off like a sumo wrestler, okay? And the pig just flips him. I mean, rolls him right on the ground, just like this.

It was awesome. So about an hour later, you know, we trick him into finally getting back. You know, everybody says pigs are so smart. They're kind of smart, okay?

They're not really all that smart. So he, he got in, finally got in. This is what I remember about the story, all right? As soon as he got in, shut the gate, I'm telling you within 20 seconds, this dude is in his seat, buckled up, money hanging out the window, and he is putting tracks in my yard on his way back to Arkansas. Where are you going?

I got a long way to go. I'm telling you, I'll tell you this too. When I looked in and took the money, he's like rolling away. I swear if I'm lying, I'm dying. He had a little baby goat riding shotgun with him, okay? I'm telling you.

All right? And I've thought about that story. I've thought about that story many times because it's so funny to me how when we have a long way to go, that's why you start right now. But a lot of us have a long way to go and that's the reason that we don't start at all.

Actually, the Arkansas pig man has it right. If you've got a long journey, you don't wait till tomorrow, you start today. Some of you are not believers.

Some of you are like, man, I don't know a lot about this. Listen, are you living the life that God has called for every single one of you? There is a purpose, there is a destiny, there is a calling. Has the light dawned in your life?

How far are you away from that? Here's what I want you to hear. God will grow you. When we grow in the Christian faith, it is God working and it is us working.

There are two parts. That's not how it starts though. The way that your path starts on the Christian life is not a little bit of you and a little bit of God. It starts by God saving you. You submit to him and God comes and rescues you. Would you take that step today?

Admit your sin, believe that what Christ has done on the cross is sufficient for you, not your works, and confess him as the Lord of your life. Man, I want to show you a couple of stories here of some people who that darkness was enveloping them and the light came in. You guys check out this video. Man, can we give God some praise for that story? Y'all, this is my awesome wife, Anna.

Some of you guys know her. Hey, so the last thing we want to do here in terms of my time, and then we're going to jump back into some music, which is going to be pretty awesome, is we want to have this moment together. If you guys want to grab this candle light, don't turn them on, okay? Last night, the group was real antsy, okay, to turn the candle on, all right? They kind of ruined the moment.

No, I'm just kidding. So hey, you know, some of you have been part of traditional candle light services. Some of you guys have no idea. I was personally lobbying for a full 3,000 person, you know, real candle, but the Tanger Center didn't like that, I guess, so for whatever reason. So this is what we're going to do tonight.

I told you I had two groups of people that I wanted to apply this to. I mean, that first group, you know, there is a light that dawns into the darkness in our life, not just about the community out there, but in us, you know? But then, man, for every one of us, there is a, I mean, what does it say in verse four and five? The light, you know, in him was life, and life was the light of man, you know? The light shines in the darkness.

Y'all, that's our turn now. Like, as God has shined light in our life, now we get a chance to shine before others. Matthew 5 16 says, Let your light shine before men so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. Y'all, God has a calling, a purpose, and a destiny for each and every one of us, and as we approach the new year, we have an opportunity to decide how we're gonna let that light shine for him and for his glory. So here's what we're gonna do.

We're gonna try really hard to have kind of this moment that simulates what it looks like for us to go out in 2024 and let our light shine. I don't know what God's calling you to in 2024. Maybe it's fostering a child. Maybe it's jumping into an adoption process. Maybe it's jumping in with our city and some of the initiatives around homelessness or something like that. Maybe it's giving. Maybe it's jumping into a ministry within the walls of the church. Maybe it's reigniting that passion you have in your vocation.

Maybe you're a teacher or a nurse. Maybe it needs to be more about those families and the kids once again. I don't know what that means to you when I start talking about, will you shine your light? But what the Bible tells us that every one of us that call Christ our king, we have a responsibility to let our light shine before others. And so what we're gonna do here together tonight is we're gonna kind of simulate that, all right? Now like I said, last night people got super antsy. They didn't realize that the song is like seven minutes long and they thought they were about to miss the boat.

You're not gonna miss the boat, okay? The light's gonna get to you. But here's what we wanna do. We wanna simulate that moment of someone giving you their light and you giving it to somebody else. So I'm gonna ask you, don't turn your light on until somebody else with light on has touched your light, okay?

Now here's what we're gonna do tonight, all right? Actually, everybody that is on the left side, if you are the closest one to the wall, and I know you guys can't see it, but the balcony's like full too. So if you're all the way up there, the very one closest to the wall, then I'm gonna ask you to turn your light on. You guys can turn it on.

Nobody else, just them all the way around. You guys can look up, you can see, all right? They're starting to turn on. You see that light go all the way up. All right, guys, here's what we're gonna do.

Let's all stand together. And man, when the music starts to play, you guys that are on the very end, as soon as we start to sing Silent Night, you guys pass that light to the person right next to you, and then that person passes it on. They're gonna touch your light, but it's not magically gonna come on. You still gotta turn it on at the bottom, okay? So hey, and we're gonna watch, and we're gonna see this light just move all the way through.

I have no idea. I bet there's 2,500 people in this auditorium right now. We're gonna see all that light go all the way through the auditorium, and we're gonna think about what it would look like for us to shine our light outside of these walls, all right? You guys, go ahead.