DAY 133

LIGHT IN DARKNESS

2 Kings 17 & 18 and John 3:19-36

“And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.” (Jn. 3:19)

Today in the Old Testament we read about two important stories.

The first is the fall of Israel; those ten tribes that split off after Solomon’s death. There kings for the most part did evil – very, very few did good. They had the Light, it was the Law. They had people who would point them to the Light – these are the prophets who we have yet to read. Yet they loved darkness. And so the nation of Assyria conquers them, drags them out of the land and puts “replacements” on their soil (that is how it was done back then).

The second story is in Judah. Remarkably in Judah, Hezekiah (the evil Ahaz’s son) did what was right…he even removed the high places. I find that amazing. A person with a father this evil is able to “do what is right.”  Yet when he came under attack, he took the gold and silver from the Temple to essentially “pay-off” Sennacherib of Assyria. We read how Assyria is not satisfied. Hezekiah makes a treaty with Egypt. The plot is developing. Will this nation fall as well, or will God intervene?

As you read the Old Testament stories there is a phrase that you come across. It usually goes something like, “God sent Assyria to…” It reads as if God is maliciously destroying the nation He created. That can lead to a picture of a God of vengeance. Many people think this is who the God of the Old Testament is. I have a different point of view. My point of view hinges on two connected thoughts. The first is that I think if God were to remove His hand from our world, that even our air would disappear. His presence holds it all together; the fancy word is sovereign. I connect that thought with the Old Testament writers tone. They thought very highly of God’s sovereignty. Therefore anything that happened, especially to his people, could only happen by His explicit involvment.

When we come to these two nations, you and I have read about how unfaithful they have been. They are not following God. They in fact are caught up in a world of sin. They are weak. Did God cause them to be defeated? Possibly, but it is also possibly that they, because they did not live as God has commanded have created a society and a nation that is vulnerable.

As I turn into the New Testament there are those words, they loved darkness. When you love darkness we know where it leads. It leads to death. By the time of John the Baptist’s words for today are written, Israel has been scattered (the scattering you read about today) for five centuries – all because they loved darkness more than light.

The Good News, and we will read and study this much more, is that God did not abandon them. He disciplined them, but did not abandon them. His Plan? Jesus! Jesus is the plan, the Messiah, the Lamb of God. John the Baptist knows this, John the Baptist is the prophet, the one to announce that the Redeemer has arrived.

John the Baptist knows that Jesus must increase and he must decrease (3:30) and he, JB, proclaims, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” I know those are strong words, but you and I have been reading a history of what happens to a people when they in fact live for themselves and not God.

Think back to a few of my blogs. What was the Nation of Israel's (all 12 tribes) purpose? To be great – no! To be light – yes. To be a beacon of living in a fully human way connected to Almighty God. To live in a way that would draw all nations to God. But they loved darkness. We need not judge them, we need to learn from them: may we love light.