In Him Was Life

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.

John 1:4-5

In just five short verse, John has given us so much theology about the identity of Jesus Christ. He was the Word who was with God, who was God, who was in the beginning with God. All things that were made were made through Him, by Him, and for Him--and without Him nothing was made. He was life, and He was light! Wow, this Jesus that we serve is something wonderful!

In Him, the Gospel says, was life. He was the source of life. The giver and sustainer of life. So much of his identity, especially in John's record, is tied to life. Jesus called Himself the Bread of Life, the Water of Life, the Way the Truth and the Life. At the tomb of Lazarus He called Himself the Resurrection and the Life. He is life, and the life that He gives is the light of men.

Did you know we cannot survive without light? Turn off the sunlight, and we die. Going back to the beginning, which we have done with John repeatedly, we find that the first thing God said was, "Let there be light," and there was light. It was the first thing He created in Genesis. But if you read on in the creation account, you find that God did not create a sun, moon, or stars for four more days. How could there be light without a celestial body to shed it? Consider Revelation 21:23--the city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light.

Jesus Himself, eternally existent with God in the beginning, was the light that lit this planet for four days without a sun! Life and light begin with Him!

The light shines in the darkness; I mean, that's what it does. Try to define darkness, and really the only way to describe it is that darkness is the absence of light. There are many levels of light intensity, but there is only one degree of darkness. If it's dark, you can't see at all, but add one particle of light and suddenly things are visible. Shine a lot of light, and darkness turns into shadows and shades of gray. Shine enough light, and darkness dissipates completely. Jesus Christ is that kind of light. He shines a sovereign light into spiritual darkness and darkness has to flee.

In that spiritual sense, you must come to the light to understand the light. Just seeing the light of Christ shine gives you neither knowledge nor understanding. There were those who witnessed firsthand the things Jesus did, and still they did not know to believe. Still they doubted and questioned and wavered and refused to believe. The darkness did not comprehend the light. Many times our response to the light is, "Why does it have to shine so bright? Can't we dim the light just a little bit?" But He shines as light ever bright unto the perfect day! But there is in the language of the Bible the understanding that not only does the darkness not understand or comprehend the light, it cannot overcome the light.

Darkness is not the presence of anything that makes it dark; it is the absence of light. Darkness cannot combat the light, nor can it overcome or repress the light. It is always the light that wins out over the darkness every time it shines. Jesus is that kind of light!