Both of our passages today are about walking in the light. We are supposed to walk in the light, but we need to ask ourselves in whose light are we walking? These two verses from Isaiah 50 are probably not familiar to most of you, but they are to me. I had a Bible study teacher who would constantly quote them. He knew that many of us struggle with and even insist on doing things our own way. We think our way is best. We want to be in control. We want others to see what we’ve done. We like being the boss, even if it is just being the boss of our own lives. But God tells us in Isaiah 50 that this is not going to end well. In contrast, we see in our Ephesians passage that we have been made light in the Lord, and that it is in the light that He has given that we are commanded to walk.
The
metaphor “walk” in the Bible is to live, but it is actively living, not just
existing. To walk is the manner in which
you conduct your life. We all live by a
set of values and principles. Sometimes
we are more conscious of those values and principles than at other times. We acquire these values from a variety of
places—our families, media, culture, religion, peers, etc. We take bits and pieces from these sources
and develop our own manner of life. Most
of us don’t live exactly by the same values of our peers, family, culture,
etc. But for followers of Jesus, there
should be some commonalities in how we conduct our lives because God has given
us some very specific instructions in His Word.
Psalm 119:105 tells us that God’s Word, “is a lamp unto our feet and
light unto our path.” We see some of
these instructions in our Ephesians passage today. Verse 11 tells us we should be exposing deeds
of darkness rather than participating in them or even gossiping about them. We are to speak truth. We are supposed to be wise. How do we know what wise living is? We ask God for wisdom. We learn wisdom from the Scriptures. We are to be productive and to use our time
wisely. What does this mean? It means caring for those God entrusts to us,
it means contributing to a healthy society and human flourishing, it means
spending time on things that have eternal value, it means sharing the gospel
and worshipping God. We are to discern
God’s will. In verse 18, we are not to
get drunk—wine is mentioned, but this would apply to any intoxicating
substance. Instead, we are to be filled
with the Spirit. What does it mean to be
filled with the Spirit. It is to live
joyfully. It is encouraging others. It is using whatever gifts the Spirit gives
us to build up the Body of Christ. It is
being thankful. It is to be guided daily
by the Spirit. It is not doing things
that offend God. It is in all these
things that each of us will have some differences as God leads us, so it means
following God.
Isaiah
50:10 says that if we fear the Lord, if we are serious about God, we will obey
the voice of His servant. This is a
reference to Jesus. We are called to
follow Jesus—to live as he lived. When
we are confused about how to walk, “What would Jesus do?” is a legitimate
question, and we can also ask, as was said at presbytery meeting a few weeks
ago, “What is Jesus doing?” because He is still very much at work right
now. Sometimes when we are walking in
the light of Christ, we don’t get to see very far ahead. We might only get to
see the next few steps or even just the next step. There’s a lot of darkness in our world. I don’t think I have to elaborate on just how
dark it can be. Sometimes we find
ourselves immersed in it. But because
God is everywhere, there will always be light.
As Julie Miller sang in “Love Will Find You,” “When you’re covered by a
cloak of sorrow in the night, and all your hope seems lost without a trace,
even in the darkness there is still a shining light, you will see on Jesus’s
loving face.” That light might seem like
a pinpoint, but as we move in that light, we will be safe and we will know
where to go. If we step in the light of
Christ and follow His steps, we won’t be led astray. We won’t fall off a cliff or step in some
mess we would rather not step in. I
think of the story told of Good King Wenceslas, a follower of Jesus, who could
say to his servant, “Follow me.” The
story told in the song was that as the king and his servant were taking food
and wood to a poor man, the winter storm got so bad that it was hard to see, so
King Wenceslas took the lead and told the servant to walk in his
footsteps. His footsteps stayed
warm. How much more can we can trust
the Lord to lead us? Jesus will lead in
the right path if we listen to His voice and follow His commands. In John 8:12, Jesus calls Himself the
Light of the World and says, “the one who follows Me shall not walk in
darkness, but shall have the light of life.”
God often uses dark times to strengthen our faith and increase our
reliance on Him. Shortly before her death,
Mother Theresa said, “You will never know that Jesus is all you need until all
you have is Jesus.”
Sometimes walking in the light may mean that we need to slow
down and take one step or a few steps at a time until the way becomes
clearer. We don’t want to try to outpace
the Spirit or to pass Jesus on the road.
That is walking by our own sparks.
Why is
walking by our own light so miserable?
Our Ephesians passage tells us that without Jesus, we weren’t only
walking in darkness, we were
darkness. We are incapable of producing
our own light. Any light that is true
light comes from God through Jesus who is the true Light who enlightens every
person, as John says in his gospel 1:9.
We must be enlightened by Jesus.
He fills us with His light so that we are light. Any light we think we might produce cannot
save us. We think of good people who
bring light to the world by their generosity, kindness, and creativity, but if
they do not acknowledge that it is God who has wrought all their works in them,
their end will be torment. We cannot
save ourselves. Jesus said in Matthew
7:22-23, “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in
Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many
miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me,
you who practice lawlessness.’” This
doesn’t sound like lawlessness to me.
When I think of lawlessness, I think of out-of-control people, people
who commit crimes, people who are destructive, people who are evil. But this is not what Jesus says. Some people may be doing what we think of as
good things, but they are not the things Jesus wants them to do. Others might be doing good things, but doing
so pridefully, taking credit for that which they cannot do without the
Lord.
What about
people who claim to followers of Jesus but who aren’t shining. In that same Matthew passage, Jesus addresses
them first: “Not everyone who says to
Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but the one who does the
will of My Father in heaven.” Paul’s
exhortation in Ephesians 5 to live as children of light is an emphatic command,
and taken with Jesus’s words, can even be an alarm. If you aren’t showing forth goodness,
righteousness, and truth, if you aren’t trying to please Jesus, can you really
say that you believe in Him? Paul commands
us to live as children of light because even when we have trusted in Jesus
Christ, we can still fall back into the trap of trying to walk by our own
fire. We even have examples of this in
the Bible. Sarah and Abraham walked in
the light of their own fire when Sarah gave Hagar to him so they could have a
son. It caused misery between Sarah and
Hagar, until Sarah kicked her out for good.
David walked in the light of his own fire when he took a census that God
told him not to. Solomon walked in the
light of his own fire when he made alliances through marriages to pagan
women. Peter walked in the light of his
own fire when he used a sword to cut of Malchus’s ear. It’s really easy for us to do. Can you recognize when you are walking by
your own sparks instead of walking in the footsteps of Jesus?
Proverbs
3:5-6 sums it up, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on
your own understanding. In all your ways
acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your path.” Don’t get swallowed up by the darkness. Look for the light of Christ and follow
it. Don’t try to create your own fire to
walk by; it will lead you to a dead end.
When you are walking in Jesus’s light, you can invite others to follow
you, just like King Wenceslas, just like the apostle Paul, who said, “You be
imitators of me, just as I imitate Christ.”
