Sunday, August 18, 2024

PT-4 "The Nature of God" (1 John 1:5)

 

EVENING SERMON FOR 8/18/2024 2:01 PM

 

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus:  PT-4 “The Nature of God”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                           Reference:  1 John 1:5

 

            Message of the verse:  5 This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.”

 

            What I have decided to do as I look at this verse is to quote from a sermon that John MacArthur gave in this section in 2002.  The important thing that I am trying to talk about is that God is Light.  I know that in the past that I looked at this subject, perhaps when I was studying the Gospel of John and remember that this is a very important truth for us to understand and that is why I chose to quote from this sermon mentioned above.  It will take us a  number of days to look at it as I do not want to put so much on these SD’s that will take a long time to read and may discourage people from reading it.  Let’s begin today to look at the first part of this sermon.

 

“God is light. Jesus Christ is the very image of the invisible God. It is through Him that the very light of God is conveyed to us in the gospel. Philippians also, chapter 2, verse 15, says that we appear in the world as light. We appear in the world as lights. Backing up yet again to Ephesians chapter 5 and verse 8, Paul writes, “You were formerly darkness but now you are light in the Lord.” Peter, getting on the same bandwagon, as it were, in 1 Peter 2:9 says, “God has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light.” Jesus says in Matthew 5:14, “You are the light of the world.”

“God is light, Jesus Christ is light, and we who come to Christ share in that light. Now, that demonstrates the relationship of light but doesn’t define what it is. What is it? Listen to Psalm 36:9. The psalmist writes, “For with you is the fountain of life; in your light, we see light.” Now, just think about that for a moment. With you is the fountain of life. In your light, we see light. That is a Hebrew parallelism. Those are two statements saying the same thing. You are the fountain of life. In your light, we see light.

“What that verse does is equate light with what? Life. That equates light with life. It’s only because of God that we have life. It’s only because of His light that we see light. Life and light are linked in Psalm 36, verse 9. Life and light are linked. And right there, you have the first way to understand the concept that God is light. God is light in the sense that God is life. As light emanates from its source, life emanates from its source.

“To show you this, I want to take you back to John’s gospel, chapter 1 - John’s gospel, chapter 1. This is one of those wonderful foundational truths that’s going to enrich your understanding of Scripture every time you come across these ideas. In John 1, “In the beginning was the Word,” that’s Jesus Christ, “The Word was with God, the Word was God, He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being by Him, and apart from Him, nothing came into being that has come into being.” Why? Verse 4, “In Him was life” - and listen to this - “and the life was the light.”

“You see it? There you have John defining life as light, light as life. And verse 5, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.” That life was the light of men; the eternal Word. The One who created everything, the One who made everything, apart from Him, nothing came into being that has come into being. He is clearly the source of life. Whoever is the Creator is the source of life. God created ex nihiloout of nothing – everything that exists and therefore demonstrates that He is the source of life.

And Jesus Himself, being God, is the Creator. All things were made by Him and for Him. He is the source of life. Verse 4: In Him was life, and the life is the light. Light equals life - light equals life. Men would not live if God hadn’t given them life. There is no other source for life other than God. That’s true physically, that’s what he’s saying here. All things came into being by Him. He’s talking about creation here. In Him was life, all that lives received their life from Him - and including mankind - and life is that light.

8/18/2024 11:02 PM

 

 

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