Rise and Shine!

Well, I want to say good morning. Greetings in the name of Jesus. We're really glad for everyone who could be here today, our visitors, and I trust that we can continue to learn what God has in store for us. A couple took their son and their daughter, aged 11 and 7, to Carlsbad Caverns, and as always, when the tour reached the deepest part of the cave, the guide turned off all the lights to dramatize just how completely in dark and silent it is down there. And the little girl who's seven years old became very frightened, and she started to cry.

And immediately was heard the voice of her brother who said, "Don't cry. Somebody here knows how to turn on the lights." You can turn to Isaiah chapter 60. We're really only going to look in depth at one verse today.

I'm going to ask all the children here, how many times do you remember your parents maybe coming into your bedroom when it's dark and flipping on the light and saying, "Rise and shine."

When I was little, that sometimes was annoying, actually.

Did you know that is scripture? Do you know that came from the Bible?

Isaiah chapter 60, verse one says, "Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you."

And you know, to appreciate the light, I think we need to just maybe think just a little bit about the darkness. I mean, some of most of us have probably experienced a situation like being in a cave where it's completely dark. But have we ever really experienced true darkness, utter darkness?

Genesis 1, verses 1 to 3, very familiar verses, but I'm going to read them this morning, says, "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, 'Let there be light.' And there was light. And God saw the light that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. So the evening and morning were the first day." And I was thinking just a little bit about what it must have been like when that earth was without form and void, completely.

There was absolutely no light. In fact, I'm not even sure light was. I mean, God is light, and so He always was. But as far as the earth goes, I'm not sure there was even such a thing as light and how dark and void that must have been.

I really appreciated that song we sang this morning, the same one Brandon mentioned. It says, "A dark and silent world in shapeless void lay furled beneath the great creating hand. The word of power rang out, and light from darkness sprang.

The night withdrew at His command. The day before Him stood, and God declared it good." But the last verse says, "Upon earth's ordered frame, sin's curse of chaos came, and man to dark and void returned. But God's incarnate word, once more, that darkness stirred till hearts anew with brightness burned. And where those souls have stood, their God will call them good."

You know, I'm not sure none of us have ever experienced total darkness or really understand what that is.

And you know, there's a connection between physical darkness and spiritual darkness. In Genesis 3, when Adam and Eve sinned, and after that they felt so guilty, and they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. They looked for a little dark space, a little dark spot, because with sin, sin and darkness are very much connected.

The ninth plague from the children of Israel before, right before the plague of the death of the firstborn, was the plague of darkness. And if you look at those plagues, it seemed like there was a progression where they got worse and worse and worse. And I thought, "Well, why would darkness?" It almost seems like, "Well, that's not a big deal." But what did the darkness do? It says the Egyptians were on their bed for three days, and they tried to light a candle in there. They couldn't even light a candle in their tents. That's how dark it was.

It was a darkness that could be felt. And what did it do? It immobilized.

John chapter 3, verses 19 through 21, says this: "And this is the condemnation: that the light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God."

And there's a light that lights every man that comes in the world. That's why I say I'm not sure we any of us have experienced true darkness. There's a light that comes and lights every man.

Someone has said it this way: "Men flirt with the darkness because they always believe they can come back to the light." And you think about that. People flirt with it because they just assume that I'm going to be able to come back to the light again.

I'm going to read what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 6 about our hearts.

Matthew 6:22 and 23, Jesus said, "The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness?"

I ran across an article, and I'm going to read. I'm going to take the time to read it here this morning. It's not real long. This was written by a man from India whose name I couldn't pronounce. And this is not, absolutely not written from what I could tell, from any kind of a spiritual standpoint whatsoever. But I thought it was actually written for the Financial Chronicle of India. But I thought he made some very interesting observations. This world is a perennial playground of darkness and light. All of our stories, myths, and legends, and all of our mundane, everyday endeavors are underpinned by the constant push and shove between darkness and light. No narrative is complete without them.

All religions, when they speak of God, speak unequivocally of the devil, too. The terminology differs: Sur and Esur, Devda and Rakshas, Allah and Iblis, God and Satan, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman. Wherever there exists a supreme, all-powerful being, there exists a resisting evil power, a foil, so to speak. You cannot contemplate goodness and virtue without also musing upon vice.

The roots of these demarcations lie deep within human consciousness and our experience of the external world. Darkness evokes fear of things unseen and unknown. Darkness evokes the feeling of not being in control. Since the beginning of time, darkness brought threats to humankind: the threat of enemies and objects that inflict harm, threats of mythical ghosts and evil spirits. Darkness was abhorred inherently because the primary sense human sense is that of sight, a poor one at that, which was rendered practically useless, which is rendered practically useless by the darkness. The threats of darkness carry over to the modern age in the wilderness, still from wild animals, but in cities and urban areas from a far more dangerous species, the unscrupulous human.

Humans have a natural propensity, then, to gravitate toward the light. Light gives vision, clarity of perception. Light is freedom to step out and explore, experiment, and do what you will. For darkness restrains you within the confines of security.

How great an irony, then, that modern myth and storytelling weaves itself around the freedoms of the dark side. How ironic that in the way things have turned out, the light of spirituality has been transformed into the darkness of threats, massacre, pillage, and destruction. Is that what we understand by coming into the light, or have we inverted our understanding of darkness and light? And I think about this. There's this weird thing that happens in our world today where people have a fascination with darkness, evil things, dark things. And if I think about this when we sort clothes sometimes, that clothes sorting, and you pick up this shirt and there's this horrible picture of a skull or some kind of just really ugly thing.

And somehow people, in a strange way—and I think this is what this guy is trying to figure out: why are people so fascinated with evil things? And he asked the question: have we inverted our understanding of darkness and light?

What is the primary feeling you get when you watch the sunrise? When you watch the first rays pierce through and the world is illuminated, suddenly coming to life, peace, joy, a sense of calm. It doesn't matter whether you're on an illuminated peak, a posh high rise, or just an old house by a village lane. Sunrise is always beautiful.

Dark—and I thought this was interesting—darkness becomes beautiful only when patterned by fragments of light. You might love the scene of the city at night or the star-spangled sky of the countryside, but it's not because of the dark. It's only because of the lights.

Nobody goes anywhere to look at darkness. You travel to places to get a glimpse of light. Perhaps you might like to see the fireworks dance or the reflections of houseboat lights on a lake, the Eiffel Tower decked with brilliance, or the most dazzling, the aurora, the northern lights. Just like tiny winged creatures, we are instantly drawn to light. Light alone sets you free, brings you clarity and purpose, freedom from fear, freedom from confinement, freedom from threats and doubt. That which promotes fear and takes away liberty can never be associated with light.

That which prevents exploration and seeking is the force of darkness, not light. If only you'd know that, you'd never be in thrall of the dark side, because the first moment defining your presence on earth is the moment that you come out of the darkness of the womb and into the light.

I thought that was interesting, just thinking about the fact that men don't travel to see darkness, but it's that little speck of light. It's the little bit of light is what really draws us to.

And it's interesting that at the end here, he mentions the darkness of the womb. And in Spanish, the way they say, "We're going to give birth," is to "dar luz," to give light. And I thought that's interesting. We're going to give light. And that's exactly what the new birth does when it comes to spiritual darkness. It's that light that has come into the world.

Light. In chapter 59, if we just back up, I remember the last message we had in Isaiah.

We talked about sin and what sin does.

In verses 9 and 10, "Therefore justice is far from us, nor does righteousness overtake us. Nor look we look for light, but there is darkness; for brightness, but we walk in blackness. We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes. We stumble at noonday as at twilight. We are as dead men in desolate places." So there's a description of just how darkness is.

And you know, there's a—we talked about the light that lights every man that comes into the world. And we talk about God being that presence of light. In 2 Peter 2:17, when he's talking about false teachers, he says, "These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever." And when I think about judgment, that final judgment, and we talked about the earth being without form and void, and there was absolutely no light. And if God is light and His presence is where we experience that, then judgment and hell is the absence of that. It's absolute and eternal darkness. And that's the kind of darkness that we really should be afraid of this morning.

Praise God we have someone who knows how to turn on the lights. And our verse this morning says, "Rise, shine, for the light has come." And so for an outline this morning, it's going to be very simple. I'm just simply going to take that verse 1, and we're going to invert it a little bit. And we're going to look at four things: "Your light has come. The glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

Arise and shine."

He says, "Your light has come." He made it very personal. Turn to Matthew chapter 4.

Beginning at verse 12, it says, "Now when Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, He departed to Galilee. And leaving Nazareth, He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the regions of Zabulon and Naphtali, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, 'The land of Zabulon, the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light; and upon those who sat in the region and shadow of death, light has dawned.'" From that time, Jesus began to preach and to say, "Repent, for the kingdom of God, kingdom of heaven, is at hand."

Turn to John chapter 1.

"The light has come." He is here.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the light, that all through him might believe. He was not that light, but was sent to bear witness of that light. That was the true light, which gives light to every man coming into the world."

John chapter 8. Of course, in John chapter 3, Jesus talks to Nicodemus about being born again, coming to the light, being born. In John chapter 8, we have an account of a person who came in contact with Jesus, who is the light.

"But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Now early in the morning, He came again into the temple, and all the people came to Him, and He sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, they said to Him, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned. What do you say?' This, they said, testing Him that they might have something of which to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger as though He did not hear. So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, 'He who is without sin among you, let Him throw a stone at her first.'

And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, 'Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?' She said, 'No one, Lord.' And Jesus said to her, 'Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.' And Jesus spoke to them again, saying, 'I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.'" That was an occasion where an adulterous came in contact with the light of the world and resulted in glorious forgiveness.

John chapter 12.

Jesus talking to His disciples. "Jesus said to them, 'A little while longer the light is with you.'" Verse 35, "Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.'" These things Jesus spoke and departed and was hidden from them. And then in verse 46, Jesus said, "I have come as a light into the world, that whoever believes in Me should not abide in darkness."

Brothers and sisters, tonight, today, the light has come. We have someone who knows how to turn on the light. "The glory of the Lord is risen upon you." This is no weak light. Sometimes you see a flashlight and the batteries are just on the verge and it's flickering and it's just really weak.

"The glory of the Lord is such that all of creation isn't big enough to display His light."

Followed a car this week and it had a bumper sticker on it said, "Nature is my church." And I thought of that in the context here. You know, you're missing something if that's all the bigger your God is. I mean, God is—we do see Him there, but He's so much greater.

Turn to Luke chapter 9. Thinking of the glory of the Lord, how great it is.

Jesus is the light. He's an awesome light. He's a powerful light. And we have a glimpse of this when Jesus was transfigured on the mount in Luke chapter 9.

Beginning at verse 28, it says, "Now it came to pass about eight days after these sayings that He took Peter, John, and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as He prayed, the appearance of His face was altered and His robe became white and glistening. And behold, two men talked with Him who were Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of His decease, which He was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. But Peter and those with Him were heavy with sleep. And when they were fully awake, they saw His glory. And the two men who stood with Him, then it happened, as they were parting from Him, that Peter said to Jesus, 'Master, it is good for us to be here, and let us make three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah,' not knowing what He said.

While He was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were fearful as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, 'This is My beloved Son. Hear Him.' When the voice had ceased, Jesus was found alone. But they kept quiet and told no one in those days of any of the things they had seen."

Matthew says that Jesus' face shone like the sun.

The amazing thing about Jesus and the glory of His light is that He wants us to be reflecting of that. 2 Corinthians 3.

Beginning at verse 7.

"But if the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance, which glory was passing away, how will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious? For the ministry of condemnation, if the ministry of condemnation had glory, the ministry of righteousness exceeds much more in glory. For even what was made glorious had no glory in this respect because of the glory that excels. For if what is passing away was glorious, what remains is much more glorious. Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness of speech, unlike Moses who put a veil over his face so the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away.

But their minds were blinded, for until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament because the veil was taken away in Christ. But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies in their heart. Nevertheless, when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart. For we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handing the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the God of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.

For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus' sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

So that glory that is so tremendous, He wants that glory to shine out from our hearts and our lives.

We can be changed to the same in the same image, from glory to glory. To me, that's just a wonderful thought, that earthen vessels like us can reflect that beautiful glory of Jesus.

Isaiah 60, I'm just going to read a few verses. The rest of the chapter describes God's people and the blessings that God wants to pour out. But the end of chapter 60...

Again, thinking of the glory of God. In verse 19, it says, "The sun shall no longer be your light by day, nor the brightness shall... nor for brightness shall the moon give light to you. But the Lord will be to you an everlasting light, and your God your glory. Your sun shall no longer go down, nor shall the moon withdraw itself. For the Lord will be your everlasting light, and the days of your mourning shall be ended. Also, your people shall be shall all be righteous. They shall inherit the land forever, the branch of My planting, the work of My hands, that I may be glorified. A little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation.

I, the Lord, will hasten it in its time." There He says, if we're in the presence of God, we don't need these other lights. "The Lord will be your everlasting light, and the days of your mourning shall be ended."

So if the light has come, and it has, and if the glory of the Lord is risen upon us, and it is, then what is our responsibility?

To rise and shine, right?

I'd like to think a little bit about a rise.

It's not... In order for our light to shine, it's not a passive thing.

Sometimes some of the hardest thing is getting started. I don't know if you find that in your life or not, but just getting started.

Ephesians chapter 5, verses 8 to 14.

"For you were once in darkness, but now are you light in the Lord. Walk as children of light." We see the action here. Walk.

"For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth, finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light. For whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says, 'Awake you that sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.'" So here He's saying, "Awake, arise." Time to get up.

And you know, before things can get done, we have to get up. We have to arise.

For Nehemiah in Nehemiah 2, it was, "Arise and build." For Jonah, "Arise and go to Nineveh."

And when Jesus was explaining to His disciples about the suffering that was coming in John chapter 14, when He was all finished, He said, "Arise. Let's go. Let's go from here."

So our light's to be on a candlestick and not under a bushel.

And to do that, we need to get off our feet. We need to awake out of our slumber, our stupor, and we need to get up and arise.

And then we need to shine.

Since childhood, we've all sang the song, "This little light of mine. I'm going to let it shine. Let it shine. Let it shine." But what does that... What does it really mean to let our light shine?

Just going to read the very familiar verses that we all know in Matthew chapter 5.

Verse 14, "You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, which is in heaven."

So we see it's action involved, that they may see your good works. They may see the things that you're doing. How do we let our light shine? It's by the things that we do, how we act.

In first... I'm going to read some verses out of 1 John.

1 John 1:5-7, "This is the message which we have heard from Him and declared to you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin."

And then if we go to 1 John 2, verses 7 through 11, "Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment, which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you have heard from the beginning. Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you? Because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining. He who says he is in the light and hates his brother is in darkness until now. He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes."

Here John is saying, if you want to let your light shine, you got to love your brother.

In Romans 13, he talks about, "Put on the armor of light." So not only if we put on the light, if we're letting our light shine, there's a protection that comes through that as well.

Robert Louis Stevenson, that was best known for the adventure story Treasure Island, was always a sickly child during much of his childhood and youth. And one night, his nurse found him with his nose pressed against the frosty pain of his bedroom window, and she scolded him. She said, "Child, come away from there. You're going to catch your death of cold." But he wouldn't budge, and he sat there, and he was mesmerized as he watched an old lamplighter come slowly working his way down the street and lighting the street lamps.

Lighting each street lamp along the route and pointing, Robert explained, "Look, there's a man poking holes in the darkness." And that's our job this morning, to poke holes in the darkness.

Peter James Flamming wrote a little article or had a sermon called "Poking Holes in the Darkness." And he gave an example of Hazel. Hazel never considered herself to be a lamplighter. She loved to sing, but she couldn't carry a tune in a wash bucket. That didn't bother her. She sang anyway.

She sang in the choir until they asked her to please praise God in some other capacity. That didn't faze her. Out in the congregation, she still sang out, often leading the less musical congregants to be either sharp or flat. 60 years old and on a fixed income, when Hazel's rent went up, she found she was forced to move to an old rundown apartment house on the rough side of town. She couldn't afford gasoline, so she sold her car and began riding the bus.

From what she saw of her walks to the bus stop, Hazel knew she hadn't landed in the best of neighborhoods. There was lots of noise at night and lots of tough, unpredictable-looking characters hanging around. One man living in her building scared everybody. He looked big and mean and scruffy and maybe even a little crazy. Hazel was afraid of him, but she refused to let her fears stop her from coming and going as she pleased. Nothing would keep her away from church and from singing on Wednesday nights. Then late one Wednesday night, as she was coming into her building, she saw someone waiting in the shadows behind the front door. She was terrified. The silhouette was huge.

At first, she thought it was the scary man in her building, but the figure was different. Immediately, she knew that someone had broken into the lobby and was waiting in the shadows. Hazel had no place to run and no one to call for help.

So she stepped forward. She walked right through the front door, and as she did, she started singing at the top of her lungs. She sang, "When you walk through the storm, keep your head up high and don't be afraid of the dark." She almost... She forgot most of the words and verses, but picked up at the chorus, "Walk on, walk on with hope in your heart, and you'll never walk alone." She walked right by the hawking shadow up the stairs and into her apartment. As she closed the door behind her, she was trembling, but she was safe.

Much later, she calmed herself enough to fall asleep. The next morning, she found a note under her door that had been slipped there during the night. It read, "Dear lady, I don't know who you are, but I want to thank you for singing to me last night. I was ready to cash it in, to take my life. Then I heard you singing out there in the hall. It sounded like you didn't have a care in the world. You got me to thinking about never walking alone. You saved my life. I'm going home to start over. It's time for me to go back to my parents and let them know I'm okay. I'm leaving today. I just wanted to thank you for your song."

The writing was almost illegible, but the signature was clear. It was written by the big, scary man who lived in the building. He hadn't been in the hallway that night, but he had been listening. Hazel never suspected that her song would poke a hole in the dark. So the question, I guess, for us today is, what can we do? How can I be a lamplighter and poke a hole in the darkness?

You know, maybe it'll be an encounter at the supermarket. Maybe if you're a businessperson, maybe it'll be an encounter with that unreasonable customer. Maybe it's simply love demonstrated in our homes and in our church.

There's attraction there. I remember one time flying into New York City when it was very... It was at night. And for probably, I don't know, half an hour, just seeing the lights. I mean, light after light after light, just all the twinkling, many points of light. And remember, we don't go to look at the darkness. We go to look at the light. And my prayer is that we could all be one of those pinpoints of light. "If the day dawns and the morning star has arisen in our hearts, let us rise and shine."

Daniel 12... I'm going to end on this verse. Daniel 12, verse 3 says, "Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament, and those who turn mercy to righteousness like the stars forever and ever." So may God give us grace to shine His lights, to rise and shine. Does anyone have any comments? Or.