Friday: Further Thought – The Way, the Truth, and the Life
Daily Lesson for Friday 6th of December 2024
Read Ellen G. White, “ ‘The Light of Life,’ ” Pages 463–475, in The Desire of Ages;
Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com
E. Edward Zinke, “The Authority of the Bible and the Certainty of the Second Coming,” The Certainty of the Second Coming (Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 2000), Pages 23–36.
When Jesus said, “I am the light of the world,” He “was in the court of the temple specially connected with the services of the Feast of Tabernacles. In the center of this court rose two lofty standards, supporting lampstands of great size. After the evening sacrifice, all the lamps were kindled, shedding their light over Jerusalem. This ceremony was in commemoration of the pillar of light that guided Israel in the desert, and was also regarded as pointing to the coming of the Messiah. At evening when the lamps were lighted, the court was a scene of great rejoicing. . . .
“In the illumination of Jerusalem, the people expressed their hope of the Messiah’s coming to shed His light upon Israel. But to Jesus the scene had a wider meaning. As the radiant lamps of the temple lighted up all about them, so Christ, the source of spiritual light, illumines the darkness of the world. Yet the symbol was imperfect. That great light which His own hand had set in the heavens was a truer representation of the glory of His mission.
“It was morning; the sun had just risen above the Mount of Olives, and its rays fell with dazzling brightness on the marble palaces, and lighted up the gold of the temple walls, when Jesus, pointing to it, said, ‘I am the light of the world.’ ”—Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, Pages 463, 464.
Discussion Questions
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A fair bit of what we Christians write and say about "the Truth" is self-congratulatory stuff; we have it, and they don't! I know what my atheist friends would say if I told them that we have the truth and they don't. And in the Australian vernacular, it would not be nice. My secular friends would just ignore me as irrelevant and egotistical.
With my mathematical background, I know the value of a formal proof in proving something is true, and I also know the limitations of such proofs. Pythagoras Theorem is an important deductive proof that the sum of the squares on the opposite sides of a right-angled triangle is equal to the square on the hypotenuse. However the truth of that statement is based on a number of fundamental axioms that have to be accepted as true to start with.
What do we mean when we say truth? Does it mean that we have a theory of everything? Or, we have a consistent world view? For some non-believers, their perception of truth is based largely on the notion of consistency. The issue that we face is that believers and non-believers do not accept one another's basic axioms. This means that if we Christians develop an argument based on axioms we accept, Non-believers are immediately going to see our arguments as inconsistent, and vice versa.
I maintain that a lot of the effort we put into proving we are right, is seriously wasted as a result.
Paul argued the case for Christianity at the forum on Mars Hill. It was quite a good argument, and he appealed to common ground. Ultimately, however, the discussion failed to convince most of the Greeks. Some think that this comment by Paul to the Corinthians is a reflection on his Athen's experience:
In my interaction with non-believers, I recognise the weakness of my verbal arguments. The version of Truth that I pray for is to live as an example of Christ's love. Being there when needed; Understanding pain and suffering; uplifting those who need help. Truth in the Christian sense is not some axiom-based proof using logical operators to come to a a consistent unequivocal; "Therefore God Exists!" conclusion. Rather, it is the acceptance that God uses frail humanity to share his love with others. God put on weakened humanity to save us. It is our mission to share.
Light makes everything different! Light can change the whole perspective, especially when working with images. Jesus came in a human form so people would not be blinded by the Glory of God, even though some were entirely annoyed by His presence! Let us search for Jesus' face to get to the Father's.
In our world today we have people of different races, with different skin color, hair texture, facial shapes, etc. We know from the bible that this world began with two individuals who had similar racial features. This is so because Eve came from the stem-cell tissues of Adam.
Given this fact, how do we explain the origin of the races we have today?
Answer: the principles of adaptation, a scientific discourse that is a part of the theory of evolution. If we spend some time looking at issues like these from all perspectives, it would be easier to take the gospel to people who are non-believers.
I believe Christianity to be primarily spiritual and only secondarily intellectual. We tend to want to make it primarily intellectual. Unfortunately this leaves room for self righteousness which undermines the whole process of being a true Christian. I believe a person can be saved with the wrong intellectual understanding while having the right Spirit but be lost with the correct intellectual understanding having the wrong spirit. The sinful human condition is such that we would be happy to get along without God if we could. We naturally don’t want God, but we certainly need Him. God certainly does not need us, but very thankfully He wants us. I believe recognizing our need of Him is where the rubber meets the road.
“The Jewish elders who recommended the centurion to Christ had shown how far they were from possessing the spirit of the gospel. They did not recognize that our great need is our only claim on God's mercy. In their self-righteousness they commended the centurion because of the favor he had shown to “our nation.” But the centurion said of himself, “I am not worthy.” His heart had been touched by the grace of Christ. DA 316.4
Amen,happy Sabbath!
God’s Way – His Truth – His Light are now present within the believer. No need for symbols to remind us once a year that God is with us to lighten our path. Our life is now in Jesus Christ enlightened by the Holy Spirit to bring honor and praise to God.
1 Cor. 22-24
"Jews demand signs and Greeks search for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified – a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power and wisdom of God.”
1 Cor.3:16-17
”Do you not know that you yourselves are God’s temple, and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.”
1 Cor. 6:19-20
"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore glorify God with you body.”
John 2:19-21
”Jesus answered, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again.” “This temple took forty-six years to build,” the Jews replied, “and you are going to raise it up in three days?” But Jesus was speaking about the temple of His body.”
God’s Way, His Truth, and His Light are given to us to praise Him for Who He Is; His Guidance and Mercy keep us on the straight and narrow road leading home.
Though we pray for His Will to be revealed in our life, we already know that the fundamental aspects of Love and Mercy need to be our constand companions to be extended to others throughout our lifetime.
We will never be perfect, but we humbly seek to be acceptable in His sight as He only seeks from us to love Him with all our heart and to love our fellow man.