Reflectors Of Light

Sermon.980

“Reflectors Of Light”

From the pulpit of Bayview Baptist Church, Sunday, June 24, 2001

Text: John 1:6-9 (page # 1646)

These verses are written “So that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name” (John 20:31).

John the Baptist was sent by God as a witness to testify to everyone he met concerning the Light; Jesus, “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

Before John the Baptist, there had not been a prophet for God’s chosen people for 400 years.

God had been silent for 400 years, then John emerged with a fresh message concerning Jesus as the Logos/Light.

Key verse 8 “He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the Light.”

John the Baptist was the last of the Old Testament prophets, chosen and set apart by God to give us a glimpse of Chirst.

John the Baptist was not the Christ, he came only as a witness to the Christ.

How many of us have walked outside on a summer day and said, “I bear witness that today is a bright and sunny day!”

Without sunlight our world would quickly be in a mess.

I saw a documentary this past week that claimed if our sun should suddenly burn out, we would have approximately 8 minutes of light and heat left; then planet Earth as we know it would slip into a permanent deep freeze.

We cannot survive without sunlight.

Just like we need sunlight to survive, we need another kind of light too.

Our souls depend upon the Light of God.

Jesus said, “I am the Light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

In our spiritually dark world, God uses us as his witnesses to point out the Light.

People who are living in sin or in their deepest despair cannot see the Light because they are too busy living in the darkness.

That’s where you and I come in.

Jesus told his followers, “You are the light of the world.”

When a nice lady bought some new clothes and some food for a poor family, a little girl in the poor family asked her, “Are you any kin to Jesus?”

The nice lady almost said “No” but instead she said “Yes. Jesus is my brother.”

The little girl said, “I knew you were kin to Jesus!”

Our task is to live so that others will see Jesus in us.

Jesus is the true Light, and we can learn to be reflectors of His Light.

To become a reflector of the Light of Christ, we have to first develop good listening skills.

Unlike two gentlemen who met on the sidewalk one afternoon.

One of them was the kind of person who dominated every conversation.

“Hey Mark,” he said, “you’ve grown taller.”

Then he went right on talking without giving the other man a chance to say anything.

He talked on for a little while and then the next thing out of his mouth was, “Hey Mark, you’ve put on a lot of weight.”

He kept right on talking, not allowing the other man to get in a word edgewise, and he said, “Hey Mark, you’re losing a lot of your hair aren’t you?”

That was about all the other fellow could take, so he immediately broke in and said, “I’m not Mark!”

The other man went right on talking and he said, “Oh, I see you’ve changed your name too!”

So, develop listening skills as you talk to others by allowing other people to talk to you while you witness.

You and I have seen enough courtroom movies on television to know that a witness is a very valuable person, because he or she has seen something so crucial to testify on the witness stand, that the person being charged with the crime could either be convicted or set free.

Our personal testimony of Jesus is critical too, because it means life or death for a soul hanging in the balance of eternity; so may I ask you this morning this very important question: “Have you seen Jesus?”

You can’t witness to what you have not personally seen!

You cannot be a witness to what you have not personally experienced!

In a court of law, a witness has a very important testimony to share.

I’ve seen witnesses go on the witness stand and swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, but the jury suspects otherwise.

The same is true of certain Christians.

They appear as if they are telling the truth about Jesus, but what they testify is far from the truth.