Sermon Tone Analysis
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Exegetical Point: Jesus is the light of the world, he is from the Father and speaks on his authority.
Homiletic Point: Jesus the light of the world.
Whoever follows him will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.
Intro
Kids - Can you see in the dark?
How can you get around at night?
What if you need to drive somewhere at night?
Car headlights, they light up the way.
We cannot see in the darkness - we need light!
Jesus is our light.
He is the one who lights the way!
He is the only way to eternal life, and so he is the only light for everyone in the world.
You kids, you adults, in order to get to life, you need Jesus.
Recap
The passage from last week - woman caught in adultery is quite likely a true story, but not part of John’s Gospel.
It was inserted here.
Jesus been up at the Festival of Booths - Tents, water from the rock & fire.
We find that when we take out the inserted section, this part flows naturally on from the comments Jesus made about the Living water, and the challenges with the religious elite.
This morning we will see that
Jesus is the Light of The world,
This is an authentic message, and
Jesus is from out of this world!
Jesus is Light of the World (v12)
Watching a German drama called Blackout - intriguing, and scary stuff.
Quite close to home considering the power shortages at the moment with power stations offline etc.
How dependent we have become on electricity in general, and electrical light sources.
Even our generators and cars etc rely on fossil fuels pumped by electrical pumps!
Without light we can’t drive at night, we can’t see where to walk, we see dangers lurking in the dark.
We can’t do much after sunset.
Imagine you were the Israelites, running away from Pharaoh in Egypt.
He has proven time and again that he’s not willing to let his slaves go.
There have been several false starts when he changed his mind.
Now you’re finally on the move, leaving Egypt, but at any moment you expect a swap of Egyptian chariots to appear behind you and overtake your people to cut off your escape.
You fear the dark, because you don’t have car headlights, or floodlights or night vision goggles.
Yet, God was there with you, leading the exodus.
A fiery pillar to light up your way!
This would be celebrated at the feast of booths.
The feiry glow at the temple lighting up the city.
In that context, Jesus says
Jesus essentially says that he is the Pillar of Fire & Cloud.
As we do biblical theology and look at the connections across the scriptures, it seems highly likely that the appearances of God were pre-incarnate appearances of Jesus.
This ancient cloud was described in some places in very close connection to God himself!
God came and saved His people, met with his people, protected them and guided them to the Promised Land.
Jesus takes that mantle upon himself - he is the one who saves, who walks among His people, who protects them and leads us home to Paradise.
We Christians are like Israel, fleeing the slavery of Egypt.
We pass through the waters of Baptism like Israel passed through the Red Sea, and the Lord goes before us to light the way to our new home.
Right now we are in the wilderness - we are pilgrims on the way.
We have passed out of slavery, but we have not yet received the fullness of what is promised.
In this wilderness, we are not free to map our own course to the promised land.
You either follow the light of Christ, or walk in darkness to your doom.
Something which Jesus will talk about later in out passage.
John 8:12 (NIV)
“I am the light of the world.
Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
We must follow Jesus.
He is the one who lights the way through this darkness.
He is a faithful light, his “batteries” will never go out.
If he is our light, we will never walk in darkness.
He will be ours - we will have the light of life!
Jesus the light of the world.
Whoever follows him will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.
This is an Authentic Message (v13-20)
Not everyone likes this message!
Returning to a familiar theme - the truthfulness of Jesus claims.
Quite relevant to us, because the basic problem for the unbelieving world is that they do not trust that Jesus is who he says he is.
Everybody would do well to look into the authenticity of Jesus message, the believer to be encouraged and have confidence, the unbeliever should look into it so that they can see the truth and put their faith in Jesus!
Whats’s the issue here?
Jesus had previously said:
The Jewish folks picked up on this idea, and they confront him:
Misusing what Jesus had previously said.
Jesus had previously argued that if he was operating apart from the Father, then he wouldn’t be worth listening to.
But, instead of responding to the actual content of what Jesus had said, the people want to try and pin Jesus down on some technicality as if they were in a courtroom.
So Jesus goes over some of the stuff he’s said before from a slightly different angle: I know what I’m talking about because I’ve seen it!
He’s not speaking on his own authority (as he has proved before), but even if he was, it’s still a true testimony!
Nevertheless, Jesus does return to the “judicial” proof:
Jesus does not judge the way his opponents do.
Not “no judgement whatsoever”, he is The Judge!, but rather not judgment like they do - according to the flesh.
But look, even if Jesus was standing like an earthly judge, his judgments would still be true because he is aligned and connected with God the Father.
He is not an independent.
He meets the qualifications under the Law (OT).
They had to prove criminal proceedings on the basis of witnesses, something we spoke about last week.
But even if you didn’t have a criminal proceeding, lets just say you had a dispute about a business deal, or the sale of a property, you would still want witnesses.
They would transact business in the city gate, where the leading men of the city would gather to decide cases and be witnesses to agreements being made.
If you came and declared I am the owner of XYZ block of land but so-and-so is taking my crops from it, the people who who witnessed the sale could say “yes, I saw and heard you buy that block of land”
Beyond reasonable doubt - two or more witnesses.
Even now, when matters go before the court, we’re looking for “witnesses”.
Whether it be formal agreements or emails or payment records - it is a witness of the truth.
In criminal matters, we look for eye witnesses, for video footage, DNA evidence, etc.
Jesus speaks an authentic message, not only does he have an intimate knowledge of everything he is talking about, God the Father is his Witness.
And what is he a witness of?
Jesus the light of the world.
Whoever follows him will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.
Believe in Him! Follow Him! Receive life!
In fact, you can even know the Father!
Jesus says as much as he continues to responfd to the Jews:
To know Jesus is to know the Father.
Jesus is the route, and the expression of the Father.
The Father has no body, but if you have seen Jesus you have seen the Father!
He’s the spitting image!
But to reject Jesus means you cannot know God.
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