John 1:8,9 - Jesus the light

1:8

Having stated that John the Baptist was a witness to the light, John makes it absolutely clear that he was not the light. Now John contains none of John’s preaching, nor his baptising, in particular the baptism of Jesus Himself. However, John was not “anti John the Baptist”. He makes several mentions of how John the Baptist pointed people to Jesus. This was John the Baptists proper purpose, the purpose he himself delighted in. What needed addressing was the tendency of some to wrongly venerate John the Baptist and to miss the point.

1:9

Some thought that John the Baptist gave light, but he only pointed to the light. The true light was coming into the world. With preachers, prophets and evangelists we need to make sure that we focus on who they are pointing to.

Jesus is the light for everyone. A common view is that all religions are basically the same, but such a view is evidence only that the person has not really thought it through. Ravi Zacharias has said “most people think all religions are superficially different, but essentially the same”, the truth is “religions are superficially similar, but fundamentally different”. And Jesus is the light for everyone. It is not arrogant of Christians to claim that everyone needs to believe in Jesus, it is simply stating the truth.

The “world” is a favourite word of John’s, the problem is that he uses it in a variety of ways, slipping easily from one meaning to another. The variety of meanings includes:

• the universe
• the earth
• the human population
• most people
• people opposed to God
• the human system opposed to God

So there can be an issue at times in determining in which sense he is using the word.