Advent Devotion – A Light Shines in the Darkness – Day 3
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.
Isaiah 9:2
Hope and Purpose
This passage describes us as a people walking in darkness. Why is it that we are “living in the land of deep darkness”? Well, look around. We see hopelessness and despair. We know something about this world isn’t right, but we don’t know how to fix it. No political system, no act of charity, no script of behavior can change the problem of sin and the fact that people live in pain and then die.
But we don’t stay in the dark—“a light has dawned.” What is that light? What could change the darkness we cannot seem to escape? Isaiah doesn’t leave us wondering, continuing in verse 6: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
Jesus is that light for the people walking in darkness. Isaiah prophesies the gospel message and relives the anticipation of the Savior. All of Scripture points to him, and he is the light by which we interpret the most difficult passages of Scripture.
In her book Creed or Chaos, Dorothy Sayers says of Christ. “The Church asserts that there is a Mind which made the universe, that He made it because He is the sort of Mind that takes pleasure in creation, and that if we want to know what the Mind of the Creator is, we must look at Christ. In Him, we shall discover a Mind that loved His own creation so completely that He became part of it, suffered with and for it, and made it a sharer in His own glory and a fellow-worker with Himself in the working out of His own design for it.”
Jesus is true God and true man. His death has meaning because it is the death of God’s own Son—of God himself—and his resurrection brings us joy because we share in it! Through Christ we see God and his nature, and in Christ we see our highest purpose and joy. Christ’s identity is at the center of Christian theology. If he did not rise, our faith would be in vain. If he did not die, our debt would remain unpaid.
Now that we know who Christ is by faith, we are enlightened; we have hope. We know why we are here, and what we are to do here, and why it all matters. By faith in Christ, we see evil and pain through the lens of his death and resurrection.
Sayers continues, “Accepting the postulate, then, and looking at Christ, what do we find God ‘doing about’ this business of sin and evil? And what is He expecting us to do about it? Here, the Church is clear enough. We find God continually at work turning evil into good… as He made the crime of the crucifixion to be the salvation of the world.”
God took a symbol of pain and death and lifted it up as the key to our hope. God works through us, his sinner-saints, to carry out his purpose and fulfill the needs of our neighbors. In Christ, we see hope for our eternity and purpose for our today.
What do we do with this light? We share our hope. We declare, each year with the same joy: Jesus is the light of the world!
Prayer: Lord, thank you for giving us Jesus, the light of salvation. You take a dark world and make it brilliant with the light of your love for us. Grant that we never close our eyes to your love. Amen.
Written by Alyssa Ebeling
