From Shadows to Substance Conference (Day 1 Kevin Hay) JESUS THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD

I appreciate that so much, and it is just an immense honor and privilege to be here with all of you for this conference. I want to thank Pastor Jeff Rice, Covenant Reform Baptist Church, and Open Air Theology for hosting this event.

I can say not only am I humbled to be here serving alongside so many faithful brothers, but I'm just excited to see how the Lord is going to use our time together here at this conference over the next few days.

And just from the very beginning, I'll say, kind of echoing the brother before me, that my prayer for this conference is that believers will be edified, that unbelievers will be evangelized, and that God, through it all, will be glorified.

Amen? So, to that end, I'd like to invite and encourage you to open your Bibles with me to the book of John, the Gospel According to John, and we're going to begin reading this morning at verse 12 of John chapter 8, and we're going to read through verse 21.

And as you're turning there, it's worth noting that verse 12 is really the beginning of John chapter 8, since the earliest manuscripts did not actually contain the first 11 verses, along with verse 53 of chapter 7, and most of your Bibles will have brackets to indicate that as well.

And that will be important as we begin to make our way through the text, because that bracketed section actually interrupts what is actually taking place there in the passage. So, with that in mind, I'll ask that you stand with me now for the reading of God's word from John chapter 8, beginning at verse 12.

And there, God's word reads, Again, Jesus spoke to them, saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. So the Pharisees said to him, You are bearing witness about yourself.

Your testimony is not true. Jesus answered, Even if I do bear witness about myself, my testimony is true. For I know where I came from and where I am going. But you do not know where I come from or where I am going.

You judge according to the flesh. I judge no one. Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father who sent me. In your law, it is written that the testimony of two people is true.

I am the one who bears witness about myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness about me. They said to him, Therefore, where is your father? Jesus answered, You know neither me nor my father. If you knew me, you would know my father also.

These words he spoke in the treasury as he taught in the temple, but no one arrested him because his hour had not yet come. So he said to them again, I am going away, and you will seek me, and you will die in your sin.

Where I am going, you cannot come. And with that, I'll ask that you be seated as we pray together. Father, Father, we come to you in the name and through the person of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

We come to your throne of grace today, fully acknowledging and submitting ourselves to the blessed reality that we are only able to come because we are clothed with the righteousness of Jesus. We are able to have access to your throne because of the merits of what Christ has accomplished for us.

And we come as your word calls us to, boldly, with confidence, because of what Christ has done. We are a needy people who are deeply in need of your grace. And so as we come, I ask, oh God, that you will be with us today.

I thank you for this opportunity to stand among these brothers and sisters to open your word and to declare with clarity and conviction and confidence and compassion your word to your people for your glory.

So I ask, oh God, that you will rest upon us in a mighty way, that as I proclaim your word, oh Father, that you will anoint the preaching and the reading of your word, that this will be a time of true worship and true revival, Father, that you will grant us greater confidence in your word, that you will stir up within us greater affections for your Son, and that we will be all the more committed and devoted to pursue lives of holiness, to be ever conformed to the image of our Lord and Savior.

I pray, oh God, that we will see clearly the truths that you desire to convey to us today, and that by your Spirit you will apply your word to our hearts, may our thoughts and our values and our priorities be increasingly conformed to the values and priorities of your word, help us to put on the mind of Christ, and as your Spirit has filled our hearts with your divine love, God, give us a greater love for you and for your word, that we might proclaim the excellencies of Christ after being equipped in this place together.

I pray all of this in the powerful and precious name of Jesus. Amen. Well, I want you to imagine with me, if you will, the formless and void, pitch black darkness of creation before the Lord ever uttered what would become his first recorded command of Scripture saying, let there be light.

I think we would all admit that our minds can barely scratch the surface of what that moment must have been like during the earliest flashes of our world's existence. But then we fast forward through time and space and we discover a reference found in the book of Isaiah, chapter 9, verse 2.

Says there, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. And these words uttered by the mouth of the prophet, yet given directly to him by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, transport our thoughts, rightly so, back to creation.

And yet at the same time, they are simultaneously summoning Isaiah's original audience to a glimpse of something that was to come. And for the people of Israel, I want us to understand right from the very beginning that this was always God's original plan for them.

This was his revealed will for the Israelites. We see it in Exodus, chapter 9, verse 6. The Lord instructed Moses to tell the people of Israel saying this, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

That was his will. A kingdom of people who would represent the kingdom of God on earth. A people who would uphold the law of God, signified by its delivery upon that exalted mountain of Sinai, provided as a beacon of light and hope, revealing and reflecting like a mirror the character and the heart of the one true and living God.

That was their purpose. So that a people from every tribe and language and nation and ethnic group of the world would see that light shining forth from Israel, piercing the darkness of the rest of the world and beckoning them to come and see and discover and taste the goodness and the greatness of God, their creator.

And as a holy nation, Israel would be set apart in this way, reflecting God's holiness and glory, and through the sacrificial system, as our brother has just proclaimed to us, that humanity would be called to repentance as the lives of these animals were sacrificed and blood was shed again and again and again as this perpetual reminder that sin always and unequivocally leads to death.

And through that, that sinful humanity would see the seriousness of their sin. And they would be directed to put their trust in God as their savior and as their deliverer from spiritual bondage. So again, I just want us to understand that this has always been God's great plan of redemption.

To infiltrate and overthrow the spiritual darkness of this earth and to shine the light of salvation into every crack and crevice of this broken world. To redeem humanity from its fallen condition and to raise us from our state of spiritual slavery and depravity into the life and freedom that is found in Jesus Christ.

The problem, of course, was that much of Israel stopped seeing their own need for spiritual redemption. And equally significant, they stopped truly entrusting themselves to the only one who could actually provide it.

What was supposed to be a flame burning brightly for the world to see became nothing more than a flicker at best. And so it's in the midst of that flicker, both literally and figuratively, that we find the glorious declaration of Jesus in our text.

And it's important for us to remember that at this point in John's gospel, that Jesus has been engaging the Jews during a major festival called the Feast of Tabernacles. And the Feast of Tabernacles was one of three major feasts that the Lord had instituted to be a perpetual reminder of the protection and the provision that he had provided to Israel, particularly during that 40-year journey through the desert, following their redemption from Egypt.

And it's worth noting that for Jesus, this will be the last Feast of Tabernacles that he will experience during his earthly ministry, because he is at this moment in redemptive history, just six months away from the moment when he will be hung upon a cross and he will be crucified and satisfy the wrath of God in our place.

But as it pertains to this Feast of Tabernacles, I want us to understand that there were two major themes that played a prominent role, and those themes were that of water and light. So back in chapter 7, picking up what I referenced earlier in terms of the break that we find in that bracketed section that does not belong in the text of Scripture, beginning in verse 37, John describes how Jesus used the visual demonstration of the water ceremony as an opportunity to stand up among the crowds and prophetically declare with great compassion that if anyone is truly thirsty, then they could come to him and they would find a drink.

And not just any drink, but that the result of that faith-filled drink, Jesus said, would result in a river of living water bursting forth from their dry and lifeless hearts. Well this morning, what we're going to find is that after the divided crowd responded in various ways and the debate among the Jewish leaders had potentially subsided, Jesus begins to speak to this crowd again.

And this time, instead of using the theme of water as his reference point, Jesus is going to use the second of those themes for this feast, which is light. And through that, we together today are going to discover Jesus, the light of the world.

Jesus, the light of the world. And so we're going to begin actually by focusing towards the end of the passage, starting with verse 20, and we're going to do that because we want to recognize as we begin the significance of the setting.

The significance of the setting. And it doesn't, again, give us that until the end of the passage. So if you look with me at verse 20, it tells us there once again, these words, he, meaning Jesus, spoke in the treasury as he taught in the temple, but no one arrested him because his hour had not yet come.

And so first and foremost, for the third time in about 30 verses, John finds it important to point out here that not a single person laid a hand on Jesus or arrested him. Why? Because his hour had not yet come.

And so in other words, although the Jewish leaders were still seeking to kill him and the officers had been commanded to arrest him, the divine timetable of God's sovereign plan superseded any of those human schemes.

Amen? And so this is a wonderful truth for us to just begin with today and to park upon for just a moment, because in the midst of human agendas, we need to have it settled in our minds that God's agenda always reigns supreme without fail.

So from the most microscopic of molecules to the greatest of galaxies and beyond, our God is absolutely sovereign. It does not matter how much power or money or technology or human wisdom people in places of authority think they have.

My friends, Scripture is abundantly clear. There is no king, there is no emperor, no government, no political party or president that can dictate the direction of God's sovereign plans. If the goals and agendas of humanity are not in line with the sovereign counsel of God's will, all of their plans and efforts will come to naught.

And Jesus lived with the absolute knowledge and unshakable confidence of that reality. As he will later say in John chapter 10, for this reason, the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again.

No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again, this charge I have received from the Father. And he would take it up again, wouldn't he?

But then from there, in addition to the divine timing of this situation, we also want to notice that Jesus, location-wise, is in a place called the treasury of the temple. And so it's likely that some time has now passed from the time during the day when he spoke among the crowd.

As we'll see, it's probably evening as the darkness of night has begun to set in. Jesus has now made his way to an area within the temple where the treasury was held. And just so we understand, the treasury was simply a place in the second outermost court of the temple where 13 trumpet-shaped offering boxes hung on the walls.

And there was a sign above each of those trumpet-shaped boxes designating what type of tithe or offering was to be placed inside. And another name for this area in the temple was called the court of the women, because it was as far into the temple where women were allowed to actually go.

And so as we think about the significance of that setting, there are two very unique and interesting things, I believe, about the area of the treasury as it pertains to our text. And the first one is that the place where the Sanhedrin met, that is that body of religious leaders, was very close by in a room that was commonly known as the Hall of Hewn Stone.

And so you may recall from that final scene of chapter 7 that there's this dispute that breaks out among the religious leaders of the Sanhedrin. The officers had come to them empty-handed, though they were commanded to arrest him.

And the chief priests and the Pharisees are debating among themselves, what are we going to do next? And although most of them wanted to kill Jesus, we find in our text that instead of running away from them, because of his supreme confidence in the Father's divine timetable, Jesus comes to an area that is essentially right under their nose.

Our Savior is not running, he is no coward. But then that leads us to the second interesting thing about this particular area in the temple, and that is that during the Feast of Tabernacles, the Jews held a particular ceremony called the Illumination of the Temple, and it was a lighting ceremony.

And that ceremony was held just outside the treasury, the very place where we find Jesus in our text. And so what I want us to try to do today is as best we can to imagine the scene which would have taken place during this Illumination of the Temple.

And so picture with me, if you will, four massive lamps, or candelabras. These lamps stood at about 75 feet in the air, as tall as the highest walls of the temple. Each lamp held a golden bowl holding approximately 65 liters of oil, along with a ladder leaning against each one that reached up to the top.

And on every night of the feast, as the sun would begin to set, young priests were tasked with the responsibility to climb these ladders to the tops of these lamps, and they would be the ones to light the wicks in each bowl.

And eyewitnesses of the ceremony have written that huge flames would leap forth from these bowls at that point, creating these four massive torches of light. And the brightness of that light, they said, would practically illuminate the entire city, causing every courtyard in Jerusalem to practically be lit up by these massive flames.

And for the rest of the evening, as the night grew darker and the lamps grew brighter, the Jews would enter into this time of celebration. As one Jewish historian wrote, men and women would dance before the lamps with burning torches in their hands and would sing songs of praise.

And the Levites would be on harps and on lyres and with cymbals and with trumpets and with other instruments of music without number, they say. So just try to imagine thousands of people filling this area of the temple in celebratory song with the fire from the lamps above them and those in their own hands permeating this area with light.

And at the same time, it's also important for us to understand the purpose for this particular ceremony. So why were the Jews celebrating? Why did they have these instruments in their hands? And what was the significance of the theme of light?

Well, the occasion was to celebrate God's provision in the lives of their ancestors. It was a celebration of the great pillar of fire in which God manifested himself to the Israelites during that 40-year desert journey.

And scripture provides for us three major aspects of God's blessings to the Israelites through that pillar of fire that I want us to look at today. So first, I want us to recognize that this pillar of fire was to guide the children of Israel at night.

It was to guide the children of Israel at night. Exodus chapter 13, verses 21 and 22 says this,. And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light that they might travel by day and by night.

The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people of God. So this light ceremony during the Feast of Tabernacles then was to celebrate God's perpetual guidance with this fire of divine light.

The Lord never at any point left them. He continued both day and night to manifest his presence and at night in particular it was through this divine fire. Secondly, the purpose of this fire was also used by God for Israel's protection.

We see that in Exodus chapter 14, verse 24, where it says that in the morning watch the Lord in the pillar of fire and of cloud looked down on the Egyptian forces and threw the Egyptian forces into a panic.

So through this light ceremony then the Jews are also celebrating God's protection. But then finally and most importantly I want us to recognize that Scripture tells us that this divine fire was a picture of God's extraordinary grace and mercy.

We find that spelled out for us in the book of Nehemiah chapter 9 and I know there's a lot of talk right now about revivals and such but what I want us to understand is that if we want to know what a true revival of God looks like, right, from the very foundation of what a revival actually is from a biblical perspective, Nehemiah chapter 9 I would recommend to you as a great place to start because it's in verse 3 of that chapter that we find the Jews who have now returned to Israel from their time of exile.

So they're free from the bondage that they were placed in because of God's judgment and it says there that they stood up in their place and read from the book of the law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day and for another quarter of it they made confession of their sins and worshipped the Lord their God.

That my friends is true revival. And then on down in verses 16 through 19 as they're praying to God they begin to recount the way the Lord dealt with their ancestors saying this, but they and our fathers acted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey your commandments.

They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt but you are a God ready to forgive.

Listen to that. Gracious and merciful slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and did not forsake them even when they had made for themselves a golden calf and said this is your God who brought you up out of Egypt and had committed great blasphemies you and your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness.

He didn't leave them there. The pillar of cloud they go on to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go. It's all of this rich robust theology I want us to understand today is is bound up within this symbolism of this celebration of light ceremony that's being held by the Jews during the Feast of Tabernacles and it is on the last evening of the feast at some point during this celebration of light that we find Jesus making a divine statement of fulfillment a divine statement of fulfillment.

And so we'll see that if you look with me at verse 12 it says there again Jesus spoke to them saying I am the light of the world whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life and so the first thing I want us to recognize about this statement is that it's one of at least seven of the great I am statements made by Jesus in the Gospel of John and as we think about the theme of our conference when Jesus makes these I am statements he is essentially declaring that he is the substance of a shadow or shadows that are found sprinkled throughout and permeated throughout the Old Testament.

And in this case that analogy is especially fitting for the substance is the light of the world. And so what we need to understand is that when Jesus makes this declaration there is no confusion among the Jews about the claim that he is making.

That's why it makes the point to tell us that no one laid a hand on him after he says it because his hour had not yet come. The Jews were intimately familiar with the messianic promises throughout the Old Testament and this declaration would have brought to their minds a great many themes and ideas and prophecies particularly I believe from the book of Isaiah in particular their thoughts would have been drawn no doubt to Isaiah 42 because it's there in verse 1 that the Lord speaks through the prophet approximately 700 to 750 years before the birth of Christ saying behold my servant whom I uphold my chosen in whom my soul delights I have put my spirit upon him he will bring forth justice to the nations plural.

And then down to verses 5 through 7 he says thus says God the Lord who created the heavens and stretched them out who spread out the earth and what comes from it who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it.

I am the Lord I have called you in righteousness. I will take you by the hand and keep you I will give you as a covenant for the people a light for the nations you catch that a light of the world to do what.

To open the eyes that are blind to bring out the prisoners from the dungeons from the prison those who sit in darkness. But then we also see this reference as well in Isaiah 49 and verse 6 of that chapter the Lord speaks to the prophet saying it is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob.

It's too light a thing and to bring back the preserved of Israel I will make you as a light for the nations again plural that my salvation helping us to rightly understand what was said in Isaiah 42 may reach to the end of the earth.

So Jesus is declaring here in our text that he is the promised light of the earth. And yet how much more significant is that declaration as we see him proclaiming it here under the brilliant light of these 75 foot tall torches that are blazing in the temple.

And so for the Jews as they hear the words of Jesus fresh in their minds would be the very thing that they are celebrating and intentionally so which is how he appeared to the Israelites in the light of a pillar of fire by night.

And not just in celebration but also in anticipation would have been these thoughts of God's promise. A promise to send a light the light to a sin darkened world who would release God's people from the darkness of spiritual bondage and who would fill them with the light and joy of eternal salvation.

As I was preparing for this I came across Simeon's prayer which is often overlooked and I found it to be so immensely applicable in verses 29 through 32. It tells us there that the time had come for them to bring that is Joseph and Mary the young Jesus into the temple.

And there is a man Simeon who's who's there waiting for the consolation. Right. He's waiting for the promise. And it tells us that he takes up the young child Jesus in his arms. And here is what he prays as he does sovereign Lord now let your servant die in peace as you have promised.

I have seen your salvation which you have prepared for all people. He is a light to reveal God to the nations. And he is the glory of your people. Israel praise the Lord. And so as we bring all of these references together then into a collective reflection of the Old Testament promises.

And there are so many more we could look at as the bright light from these massive lamps are shining down upon the crowd. Imagine with me that you are one of those Jews celebrating in the temple court.

Pick your own instrument. Right. You're celebrating the goodness and the provision and the protection of God. And with the light from those candelabras blazing down upon you Jesus has just declared that he is the fulfillment of the divine light promised by God to the nations and that whoever follows him will not walk in darkness but will have will possess within themselves the light of life.

And in doing so Jesus is essentially saying like the pillar of fire that God used to guide your ancestors in the darkness of the desert to the promised land. I am the light of the world sent by the Father to redeem and guide God's people from and through the sinful darkness of this world to eternal salvation.

So follow me not coincidentally the very next day would be the Sabbath where their rest would be found. So this declaration is a reverberation and an echo of what we see in John's prologue from chapter 1 beginning in verse 4 of that opening chapter of this gospel account John writes in him was life.

And the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him.

He was not the light but came to bear witness about the light. The true light which gives light to everyone was coming into the world. So as we consider that offer of divine mercy from our text. Although we do not know whether the Jewish leaders were already there in the crowd or if they perhaps heard Jesus's words from the meeting place of the Sanhedrin which was very close by.

I personally like to imagine that they were still deeply engaged in their heated dispute concerning what to do next about Jesus. And then all of the sudden they hear his voice cry out among the crowd just outside that hall of hewn stones.

But regardless of how exactly the drama of the situation unfolded what we do know is that they respond to Jesus's invitation of spiritual illumination by providing a self-justifying accusation. A self-justifying accusation.

Look with me at verse 13 it says there. So the Pharisees said to him you are bearing witness about yourself. Your testimony is not true. And so what the Pharisees are doing here are essentially mocking Jesus's words instead of actually considering the claim the monumental claim that he has just made or even asking some questions for further clarification in humility they're simply and immediately justifying their own sinfulness by pointing to the legal technicality of Jesus's claim.

And yet this is nothing new. Jesus and the Jewish leaders have been down this road before. Back in chapter 5 for example after healing a man on the Sabbath in verses 30 and 31 Jesus said to the Jewish leaders.

I can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge and my judgment is just because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me. If I alone bear witness about myself my testimony is not true. And then from there he proceeded to follow the Jewish standard for establishing the validity of a testimony in the court of law which was by pointing to the witnesses he provides there John the Baptist and the works of the Father the Word of God and even which they hated Moses himself.

And so here instead of acknowledging what Jesus has clearly established throughout his interactions with them they're now mocking him with legality essentially saying you don't have any proof for such a monumental claim.

Where are your witnesses. And that's what leads us to what we find in verses 14 to 18 as Jesus provides the evidence to support his claim the evidence to support his claim it says there. Jesus answered even if I do bear witness about myself my testimony is true.

For I know where I came from and where I am going. But you do not know where I came from or where I am going. You judge according to the flesh I judge no one. Yet even if I do judge my judgment is true.

For it is not I alone who judge but I and the Father who sent me. In your law it is written that the testimony of two people is true. I am the one who bears witness about myself and the Father who sent me bears witness about me.

And so in the same way that light doesn't need to do anything else but shine. In order to demonstrate that it is true Jesus initially responds here by explaining that he doesn't need anyone else to prove the validity of what he has just declared.

All he needs to do is shine and that he will. And yet although he could have simply had a mic drop moment as he sometimes does and simply left it at that what we're going to find is that Jesus graciously see the mercy and the grace.

In this response he provides these Jewish leaders with three logical points of evidence to support his claim. So first Jesus supports his claim by pointing to his own divine knowledge of his own heavenly origin and his destiny where he's come from and where he is going he is the Son of God who has come down from heaven through his incarnation where he will soon be returning in glory at the right hand of the Father.

And therefore his perspective is pure. But in contrast these leaders who are in positions of human authority as judges of Israel have demonstrated that they have a no knowledge of where Jesus came from or where he is going.

They do not even see because of their own spiritual blindness and unwillingness to bend the knee to Christ that he is the light of the world. In other words although their responsibility as Jewish leaders is to judge situations righteously that's the command they have demonstrated time and time again their blindness in failing to recognize Jesus's divine origin or any understanding whatsoever regarding the very purpose for which he has been sent by God though they claim to be the representatives of God they demonstrate themselves even as the very leaders that they are nothing more as Jesus said than the blind leading the blind and so exhibit a if you will is the perfect knowledge and perspective that Jesus has a knowledge and a perspective which these religious leaders obviously do not.

But then secondly flowing from that to support his claim Jesus points to the nature he shares with the Father and in doing so he explains that in his first Advent as he stands before them it is as the Savior.

And so although he has the knowledge and ability to do so he has not come at this point in redemptive history to judge anyone as he says at the end of verse 15. But then he goes on to say that the judgment that he will take part in which will happen at his second Advent is a judgment that he shares with the Father.

So in other words Jesus is telling these Jewish leaders that they can be concerned with earthly judgments and use the semantics of a human legal system as a justification for themselves all they want to.

But there is a far greater legal system that they should be concerned with and a far greater judgment that they should rightly be worried about. And that is the divine judgment of Almighty God in which he will be the final arbiter of what is just he will be the ultimate judge the judge who judges perfectly and whose judgment will be sealed for eternity when that divine gavel falls that will be the last word.

But then that takes us then to the third point of evidence Jesus provides to support his claim. And for that he goes ahead and uses the law which they have been attempting to use against him as a tool of vindication and mockery.

And he says that since it's true that the law calls for at least two witnesses he's going to use himself as the first witness because his testimony is true. But then for his second witness Jesus does something extraordinary.

He tells them that he is going to call to the witness stand if you will God the Father himself. He's calling upon the testimony of his Heavenly Father because not only is his testimony perfect and eternal but he is the very one who sent Jesus to be the light of the world.

And yet after listening to the profound claims that Jesus has provided the religious leaders respond by further demonstrating their spiritual depravity. And we're going to see that as we discover the sobering reality and our final two verses of rejecting the Savior the sobering reality of rejecting the Savior.

Look with me at verse 19. And then verse 21 once again it says there they said to him therefore where is your father. Jesus answered you know neither me nor my father. If you knew me you would know my father also.

And then to verse 21 so he said to them again I am going away and you will seek me and you will die in your sin. Where I am going. You cannot come. So proving now that they have rejected Jesus's claim these Jewish leaders ask him in merely human terms.