What do We Love?
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Today we want to thank the Webelos for being here this weekend and for helping plan this weekends worship service. As I mentioned before they were the ones who helped to pick out the readings and I was excited when one of them suggested a reading that wasn’t a part of our lectionary. He said that he wanted read for this weekend and we expanded it a little bit to give that famous quote from John’s gospel a little more context to it.
One of the major themes of John’s gospel is the struggle between the light and the dark. If we were to go back to the beginning of John’s gospel and read we would see how John describes Jesus and the word of God and that that word of God is the light of the world. The light of the world is the one that shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.
I bring up this theme from the beginning of John’s gospel because we see this overarching theme show up in . We see it in our text when in it mentions that the light has come into the world and the world instead loved darkness rather than the light. If we also take a look at the wider context of why Jesus says this famous saying in we will see that this whole idea of God sending his only son to die for us is actually centered around a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus.
Nicodemus was a Pharisee who came to Jesus at night time. Now, if we stop and think about it, I don’t think it is too difficult to figure out why he is coming at night. Nicodemus is a leader of the temple, a Pharisee, and he wants to have a conversation with the one whom the Pharisees are trying to overturn. So he comes to Jesus at night. He comes to him when his face will be obscured from the view of other people so that when he comes to Jesus to talk to him the only people that will know that it is Nicodemus and Jesus talking is Nicodemus and Jesus. Now the two of them have a very interesting conversation about being born from above and being born of the Spirit and Jesus even shares with Nicodemus how he will be lifted up and killed to save others and compares himself to Moses, and all of that is very important and I encourage you to read it, but for the sake of staying on task for our text today I want to focus on the whole idea that Nicodemus came to him at night.
Why did Nicodemus come to him at night? He wants to have some anonymity when talking to Jesus. He doesn’t want other leaders to know what is happening. He doesn’t want people to know that he believes that the things that Jesus is doing has to come from God and nowhere else. Nicodemus is a believer in Jesus but he doesn’t want anyone else to know that. He uses darkness to hide his true actions and faith. I understand why Nicodemus would want to do this. He doesn’t want the other Pharisees to see him and remove him from his status of being a Pharisee and a religious leader of the people. I understand how difficult it must have been for him to come to Jesus at all and how much he was risking to do it. It wasn’t safe and it might have cost him everything so he does it at night when the shadows of darkness can shroud and conceal what people look like.
Jesus came as the light to scatter the darkness so that the darkness could not overcome it. That is what the beginning of John’s gospel tells us and yet we have this story of someone coming to Jesus in the darkness . As much as this story tells us the amazing words of , think that we cannot ignore this whole idea that John’s purpose is to reveal the light to the world and Nicodemus tries to come to know that light through the darkness of night. So I began to think about things in terms of darkness and light. Can we read a book in the darkness? It’s not possible and we need a reading light to read them. Or if we have a tablet then the tablet has it’s own light that lights up the words of the screen. We can’t do a lot of the things that we do during the day when there is light if we were to try them in the darkness of night. We can’t cook or sew when the darkness is around us. We need light. It is a simple truth that we all know.
I don’t know how many times I have told Aubreigh that we have to go inside the house where we have light because it is getting too dark outside to play soccer or throw the frisbee or ride her bike. She thinks she can still do those things in the dark and once or twice I have let her and eventually she decides it is too dark to do those things and sometimes she tells me it’s not fun anymore. She’s right. Think about those times when we have been blindfolded to play pin the tail on the donkey and we walk around unsure of where to go to find the donkey. I don’t know about you but I never enjoyed those trust games that involved blindfolding yourself and having someone else lead you to where you needed to go. Or the ones where they only lead you by their voice and you have to walk and turn based on what they tell you.
Think about it.
I also remember a time when Aubreigh wanted to show me something in her bedroom and she wanted it to be a surprise and instead of having me close my eyes right before I got to her bedroom she made me close my eyes all the way from the kitchen to her bedroom. I don’t remember what it was but right after we started my foot kicked something and I stopped and told her she had to do a better job guiding me in the dark. She simply said, “oopsie” and then encouraged me to keep going. Once I hit the carpet I knew that it was just a straight shot for a while until we turned left into her room, but the fear and panic of being in the dark and not being able to see caused me to walk slowly and uncertainly until she finally let me open my eyes again.
Being in the dark and not knowing what lies ahead causes panic and uncertainty. I wonder if the whole reason Nicodemus doesn’t truly understand Jesus’ words isn’t because Jesus was talking about something he couldn’t understand, but because Nicodemus was living in and thinking in a place that began with darkness. He came to Jesus, but at the same time he did it in a way that would never allow him to truly live the way that he might have believed. He came to see the light but he was confining himself to a dark place. He couldn’t live in the light because of that fear of what others might think of him. He was living in night because he didn’t want people to see what he truly believed.
This is what God offers to us: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” God loves the whole world not just certain people in it. Why? In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth and at the end of creation he made you and me and when he looked at all of creation he said that it was very good. God loves the whole world and would do anything, and I mean anything for people to have everlasting life. When Jesus says that we have everlasting life it means that we have it now and on until forever. The grammar of it is not to imply everlasting life is something we will one day have but something we have now and will continue to have forever.
Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
Sometimes it’s easy to live in the shadows of night so people don’t see everything we do, but Jesus invites us to live in a world of light. To live out in the open so that all our deeds may be seen. So that everything we believe may be known. We are people of the light and meant to live in it. We are meant to be examples of light and doers of light. We show our light so that everyone may see that the deeds we do are the deeds done by God, through God, and for God.
God so loves this world, that he gave his only son so that everyone who lives in the light and loves the light and does the things of the light may not perish but have a life that goes from now until eternal life with God in heaven. That is the promise we have. That is the gift of being a bearer of the light. God love all creation so much that he wants us to live in the light where God can have a relationship with us. Live in the light and share your light with others and know that God’s light will shine in and through you this day and always.
For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
Amen.