Jesus Favorite Sermons

I love to preach "series messages." I don't like it when a series comes to an end because I have to decide what to preach the next Sunday. When I pick a theme or a text and lay out the weeks in advance Monday mornings are more pleasant. So this past Monday I laid out a new series with about 15 messages in it. I am good for a while. But, have you wondered how Jesus decided what to preach when He wasn't responding to questions and to His enemies? I think we have an insight into this in John 8:12ff. He had spent a night on the Mount of Olives and managed the situation with the woman caught in the act of adultery. The woman was sent away and the enemies took a break to regroup, and Jesus was left to begin teaching again. In John 8:12 he picks up the common theme of Light. What does Jesus like to talk about? What are His favorite themes? What does He know we need to understand? Remember He came to reveal the Father to us and to give us words whereby we can be saved. He set the theme with Nicodemus in John 3 and with the woman at the well in John 4. He spoke of new birth, God's love, salvation and condemnation, living water, and the Spirit. Here he speaks of being "the light," one of the "I am" statements in John.

Light is a common theme in Scripture. From God's first recorded words ("Let there be light") to Jesus proclaiming Himself to be the Light of the World, we learn that light is a fitting word to describe God's being and glory. Paul writes, "He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, to the King of kings and Lord of lords; who alone possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light; whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen." (1 Tim.6:15-16)  Jesus is the light and in human form is approachable. He comes to dispel the ignorance, moral depravity and hopelessness of earth's long night of darkness. He comes to be the dawn, the rising sun (Son), and light shining in a dark place. He comes to confront darkness and to overwhelm it and drive it out. The very attacks of His enemies are signs that the darkness always tries to overcome the light but that it cannot be successful. It is essential to know that those who follow Him will not walk in darkness.

The world is dark. It is as one poet has said, "Blacker than a thousand midnights down in a Cyprus swamp." We live in this swamp. We huddle in the darkness afraid of the sounds that waft around us. Something slitters by, something brushes our face, something whirls past our ears and we withdraw in fear. Suddenly one comes into the swamp. As we see Him from a distance we see a glory and a shining light around Him. It is not as though He was carrying a light, but that He is the light. As He approaches we begin to see what lies around us. The swamp becomes less threatening. There are eyes shinning in the darkness, but they are there and we are here. As the man approaches things get brighter and brighter. We can see further and further into the swamp. Our hopes rise and our fears subside, and we hear His voice say "come follow me. I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life (zoe)." We glance around us into the darkness trying to remember how we got there. Though we fear it, the darkness calls to us to stay with what we know. But, the man who is the light begins to walk on, and we have to decide. Will we stay there and let the fear return with the darkness, or will we follow, and stay in His light, and walk out of this swamp into a new place where there is no darkness. This is what Jesus loved to talk about.