The Light of the World

The other day, I drove past a large poster, making a statement about the Light of the World. It had a Scripture quote and a picture of candles. I felt pleased to see it, as it gets harder and harder to put the gospel ‘out there’ into the world.

Thinking about it later, I was reminded of today’s verse from the last book of the Bible. It occurred to me that we may be doing Jesus a great injustice by the representation of Him as a candle. It’s we who should be represented by candles. In Isaiah 42:3, and quoted again in Matthew, we are told that Jesus will never snuff out a flickering candle. That means that, if we are struggling in our faith or our walk with Him, He does not want to snuff us out, but to encourage us.

Revelation 21 is a picture of the heavenly city where we will go if we love Jesus. It was given to the disciple John, by Jesus Himself, when John was an old man, long after the resurrection and ascension of Jesus. The picture shows us that the light of Jesus is a glorious thing, enough to light up a vast city.

It’s tempting to think of Jesus as feeble, like a baby, at Christmas. Of course, in a way, He was then, because He had to become like us, in order to save us. But there is nothing feeble about Him now. He is not a flickering candle at Christmas. Although I’m sure it is fine to have candles to remind us, we must realise that candles are just a metaphor and Jesus is a mighty King. The light He gives in this increasingly dark world is like the sun, and it is glorious.