Light and life go together. When Jesus declares Himself to the light of the world, He does so against the backdrop of darkness. “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life” (John 8:12).

Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, ‘I am the light of the world (John 8:12, NKJV).

Light plays a prominent role in God’s creating work. When He said “Let there be light,” it was against the backdrop of darkness. “The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep” (Gen. 1:2). Light dispelled the darkness.

In John’s new creation account light again comes into play. Speaking of the Word that was with God and was Himself God John says, “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). The God who is light and in whom there is no darkness had Himself come into a world dark in sin. The darkness in this case was not nothing, as in the first creation; it was something – sin, rebellion, depravity, death, evil.

Light and life go together. When Jesus declares Himself to the light of the world, He does so against the backdrop of darkness. “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life” (John 8:12).

Jesus is the light sent from God to dispel the darkness of bondage to sin. His is a new creating work, in the cosmos as a whole and in the hearts of those dead in sin. Paul expresses the new birth John speaks of in his Gospel (John 3) as nothing less than God’s new creating work. “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6). Jesus is the one who gives light to the blind (John 9:5).

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