Mar 6, 2013    4^th Wednesday in Lent    Isaiah 60:1

Sermon series by Dr. Reed Lessing

"Enduring Light!"

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text for today’s meditation is Isaiah 60:1 1Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you. S.A.D., Seasonal Affective Disorder also known as winter depression or winter blues. S.A.D. is a mood disorder that some people experience in the winter months of the year. Those who get S.A.D. may sleep too much, have little energy, and sometimes feel depressed. Other symptoms may include overeating and craving carbohydrates, which leads to weight gain. The best treatment for S.A.D. is massive exposure to light. The medical world often suggests light therapy. Light therapy which employs a light-box that emits more lumens than a customary incandescent lamp. Isaiah uses the same strategy. He joyfully announces, "Arise, shine, for your light has come!" God’s good and perfect gift for us tonight is enduring light! "Shine" is a type of verb that both commands and constitutes a promise. Isaiah’s call is an effective word that accomplishes what it says (cf. Gen 1:3). The call to shine is not just mere talk about something; it empowers what it says (Is 55:10-11). "The command to arise is accompanied by the strength to fulfill the order." Examples of this kind of verb include Yahweh’s command to Elijah "Arise go to Zarapheth" (1 Ki 17:9) and Elijah "arises and goes" (1 Ki 17:10). Yahweh tells Jeremiah to "Arise go to the Euphrates and hide" (Jer 13:6) and Jeremiah arises and hides (Jer 13:7). Jesus says "Quiet! Be still" and the tempest becomes completely calm (Mk 4:39). And we have this promise; "For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" (2 Cor 4:6). Isaiah employs light imagery throughout chapter 60. He uses the word "light" seven times in the chapter as well as other words for "light". Words such as: "shine", "brightness", "radiant", "splendor", "beautify", "glory", "glorify", "glorious", "sun", and "moon". What an awesome light show! In my earlier days I was a fan of the Lone Ranger. Countless times I turned on our old black-and- white television for, "nowhere in those sterling pages of yesteryear can one find a greater champion of justice. We turn again to those thrilling days when out of the past come the thundering hoof-beats of the great horse Silver, for the Lone Ranger Rides again!" But in every episode, twenty-nine minutes and thirty seconds into the half-hour program, somebody would inevitably ask the question, "Who was that Masked Man?" Here was someone who had been in the clutches of death, inches from total annihilation, without a pistol or in a prison and certainly in a pinch. The Lone Ranger delivered, saved and rescued them. And they missed it! Israel’s history is one long, sorry story about missing God’s light of salvation. The nation was called out of Egypt, fed, and nourished during the forty-year journey, and given their tribal inheritance. They had the sure and certain prophetic words of Elijah, Amos, Hosea, Micah, Isaiah, and others. The LORD repeatedly delivered, saved, and rescued his people. And they missed it! In Holy Baptism you and I were called out of the darkness of sin. With Christ’s true body and blood we are fed and nourished for our journey to heaven. What’s more, "we have an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade, kept in heaven" (1 Pet 1:4). We have "the word of the prophets made more certain" (2 Pet 1:19). God has again and again delivered us, saved us, and rescued us. And we miss it! Why? John tells us in Chapter 3, "This is the verdict: light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil" (Jn 3:19). All too often our lives mirror that of Israel. We love the darkness of self-centered self-absorption; we live in the shadows of lies and half-truths, and long for more of the gloom that feeds our flesh. The Prince of Darkness mocks our feeble discipleship, our failed relationships, and our fatal attractions. We end up lost in a sad, sad, sad, sad world! But Isaiah promises God’s good and perfect gift of enduring light, and it is delivered by Jesus! Luke writes, "An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them" (Lk 2:9). Simeon celebrates, "A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel" (Lk 2:32). The magi marvel, "We have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him" (Mt 2:2). What a light show! Majesty arrived in the midst of the mundane. Holiness in the flesh appeared in the presence of cattle manure. Divinity entered the world on the floor of a stable, through the womb of a teenager, and in the presence of a carpenter. Jesus is the Light of the world who took on flesh so that he might take you into his arms, heal your hurts, forgive your filth, and destroy your darkness. Jesus became a human being, not to demonstrate the innocence of infancy, but to live the life we could not and die our death so we need not. Here is dazzling light, brilliant light, and eternal light. No wonder the Nicene Creed says of Jesus, "God of God, Light of Light." But Isaiah promises God’s good and perfect gift of enduring light, and it is delivered by Jesus! Luke writes, "An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them" (Lk 2:9). Simeon celebrates, "A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel" (Lk 2:32). The magi marvel, "We have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him" (Mt 2:2). What a light show! Majesty arrived in the midst of the mundane. Holiness in the flesh appeared in the presence of cattle manure. Divinity entered the world on the floor of a stable, through the womb of a teenager, and in the presence of a carpenter. Jesus is the Light of the world who took on flesh so that he might take you into his arms, heal your hurts, forgive your filth, and destroy your darkness. Jesus became a human being, not to demonstrate the innocence of infancy, but to live the life we could not and die our death so we need not. Here is dazzling light, brilliant light, and eternal light. No wonder the Nicene Creed says of Jesus, "God of God, Light of Light." But would Christ’s betrayal, blood, and burial extinguish his light? Would the light fail to endure through the events of Good Friday? Not on your life! "The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it" (Jn 1:4) Divine light still befriends and beckons. It can never be broken. God still delivers his people from the dominion of darkness and transfers us into the kingdom of his beloved Son (cf. Col 1:13). Because the baptized have an "inheritance of the saints in light" (Col 1:12) we radiate God’s presence, just like Moses (Ex 34:29; 2 Cor 3:12–18). The church is the light of the world so we let this light shine (Mt 5:14, 16). And when our evening comes, the Lord abides with us, so that the night of death will yield to the dawn of an eternal Easter. Then we will forever gleam in divine splendor and bask in God’s eternal glory. "Yahweh is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?" (Ps 27:1). And there is more light to come! When Christ returns, he promises to take us to the New Jerusalem where "there will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light" (Rev 22:5). Art Holst, a veteran NFL referee, tells about the game when a Kansas City Chief tight end named Fred Arbanas was tackled so hard that his artificial eye popped out. Soon the missing eye was found. Arbanas popped it back into place and was eager to resume play. Holst then said to Arbanas playfully, "I’m impressed with your courage. But what would you have done if you had lost the other eye?" "That’s easy," snapped Arbanas. "I would become a referee!" Referees aren’t the only ones who sometimes live in the dark, so do we! Hear the word of the LORD from Isaiah 60:1, "Arise, shine, for your light has come". It is God’s good, perfect and enduring gift. Don’t miss it! Amen.