The Rooted Podcast

Speaker 2 (00:00.686)
When we get to the point where the teachings of Jesus himself are seen as subversive to us, then we're in a crisis.

What is that really? Is it seeking after truth? Because that's the most important thing. And if we haven't grasped the truth, then all of our perceptions will be slightly...

The more that what I take in, whether that's the teachings of Jesus or things that are darkness, affects me. And I think it affects how much I can be a light to others.

It's not just this very dramatic but very local vision that he's getting. His eyes are open to something absolutely world-changing because Jesus says, am the light of the world.

it's all written down so that you can believe in him as well. So part of our being lights is to say to people, Jesus is the Messiah.

Speaker 2 (00:49.582)
Bible we say is the word of God, but Jesus is the word, capital W, of God. And we are enlightened by words.

You're listening to The Rooted Podcast from Bible Society. In each series, we take a closer look at a theme or book of the Bible and explore its relevance in our lives today. This is our series on Jesus' I Am statements. Hi everyone, welcome back to The Rooted Podcast. I'm Noelle and I'm here with Mark and Esther. We are recording our second episode in this series, which is going to be all about another one of Jesus' I Am statements.

So if you didn't listen to the first episode, we went over the first I AM statement in John, which is Jesus saying, am the bread of life. And in this episode, we're going to be looking at the second one, which is found in John 8, where Jesus says, I am the light of the world. We want to start just by looking a bit at the context in which Jesus says this. There's lots going on in chapter 7, in chapters 8, and in chapters 9. But Esther, do you want to start us off?

Yes, well, I mean, obviously, because you've just said there we're to be, we're sort of covering chapters seven through nine. This is a huge chunk of text, so we're going to be summarizing a lot. But what I noticed when I was preparing is that there is this real pattern emerging. There's sort of an escalating conflict happening, which I think the roots of it are actually back in John five, when Jesus heals this man at the pool.

and he heals him on the Sabbath and you get, I think it's in chapter five verses sixteen to eighteen, it mentions that the Jewish leaders from that point set out to kill Jesus because he's breaking the Sabbath law, but he's also making these claims to have been sent by the Father, which they reject that entirely and so there's a sense, I suppose, that they might think this is blasphemy.

Speaker 1 (02:50.974)
those reasons, they want to kill him. And you can really see this escalating tension over who Jesus is and what that means over the courses of these chapters we're looking at today. So one big piece of context is whether Jesus is or is not going to go to the feast of the tabernacles. But He does go. He teaches something specifically and then it sets in motion this long discourse where

The Jewish leaders are increasingly angry and want to suppress what he's saying and they reject the claims that he's making. But the people are really divided. They're confused. Some people say, well, look at the things he's doing. He's obviously a good man. And others are saying, no, he's deceiving the people because they don't believe his statements, so he must be a deceiver.

there's sort of this repeated thing over whether Jesus is a sinner or not, the Jewish leader saying, you know, he is a sinner, and they want people to agree with them and reject what Jesus is saying. That is the nature of the dispute.

I think that whole thing continues in John chapter 8, actually. It's basically about who Jesus is and it's about people not understanding Jesus. There's a sense of frustration there, basically, I think. It's quite a complicated passage with a lot going on, but I think that sort of frustration comes through it all. And it's about people not understanding Jesus. They think he needs external validation. They think he needs a witness to his claims of some sort. And then they say, well, we're children of Abraham.

you have absolutely nothing to offer to us in effect. And they say that he's a Samaritan and he's possessed by the devil. And I think all of this is just in the context of Jesus having said, early part of chapter eight, I am the light of the world. So if I am the light of the world, you need to see by my light. And they're not seeing.

Speaker 3 (04:46.51)
So that's sort of the context in which Jesus says this, and we're going to get into it later about how there's then one of the seven miracles, seven signs of John is in chapter nine, and which we'll come to a bit later. But Jesus says again that He's the light in the middle of that sign, that miracle. But before we get onto that, maybe we could talk a bit just about light in the Bible. So Jesus saying, am the light of the world, this isn't the first time that we're hearing God be referenced to as light.

There are so many, we found so many, but maybe we could just touch on a few of these and maybe talk a bit about why Jesus would call himself the light of the world and also why John has included that specifically in his gospel.

Yeah, there's a lot in the Old Testament about light, isn't there? Lots and lots of references where God is described as being light. You know, the Lord is my light and my salvation. And there is the idea here of illumination, that God shows us the way to go.

Well, yeah, I mean, it just even makes me think in terms of that illumination point of Genesis 1, where it says, you know, God said, let there be light and there was. So that's different from him being the light, but, you know, he's the origin of all the light that illuminates the world, if you see what I mean. I guess it also makes me think of sort of messianic prophecies like you get in Isaiah 9.2, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.

One of the interesting things, I think, is how in the mystery religions, which were around at the time when John was writing, light is a really big theme. A symbol of the sun, was an emanation of the sun, and the sun was a powerful god. So the idea of a deity being light was quite familiar to the culture. The Septuagint, which was the Greek translation of

Speaker 2 (06:48.434)
Old Testament, a verse from Psalm 27 verse 1, the Lord is my light, my salvation. So that's what it says in Hebrew, the word light, and Hebrew has quite a restricted vocabulary. But when they translated that into Greek in the Septuagint, they translated it as the Lord is my illumination and my salvation. And the thinking is that by using the word illumination, which means

something which enlightens us, which shows us things that we didn't know before, it avoids having to describe God as light, because light was something which was actually worshipped. And so you could sort of confuse God as God with light and end up slipping into a sort of idolatrous relationship with light. But if you translate it as illumination,

it says something about what God actually does rather than about who God is, which I thought was fascinating.

Well, I really like that as well in the sense of, so in Old Testament terms where you've got, for example, God appearing to the Israelites in the wilderness as a pillar of fire at night leading them through the wilderness. But also, I think it's really interesting that this I Am statement that we're looking at today, it doesn't stop at I am the light of the world. Jesus then says, whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

So there's an idea of following something. So it's not just, yeah, like you say, sort of a static thing to worship, but it's something to follow. It's something that illuminates everything we see, understand, do.

Speaker 2 (08:37.32)
And of course, the first time that God describes himself as I am, he is speaking from a burning bush, which would give light. So there's a lot going on here, isn't there?

As always.

Yeah, that's really good. So then, guess people who are reading John for the first time, when John wrote it, this isn't the first time they've seen God be described as light. But I guess it's the first time they're saying Jesus called himself the light of the world. But actually, maybe not, because in John's gospel, there's also tons of references to Jesus being the light before we even get to chapter eight. So we've got in John one,

John says, him was life and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. And there are a few other times in John 1, John 3, John 5, before we even get to John 8.

But just, you know, in that John 3 passage, that's part of that whole paragraph, starting with the famous verse that pretty much everyone seems to know, John 3.16. But in that same passage, it kind of goes on to say the light has come into the world and people loved the darkness rather than the light. So it's that question around, this is what Jesus has been sent to do. How are you going to respond? You know, do you love the light or do you love the darkness?

Speaker 3 (09:59.8)
Yeah. I also wondered a little bit as I've been reading about this as to whether there's a link between light and learning or light and knowledge. I was thinking about how in human and just like in society today, we use light as to say like, you know, if you remember something you say, light came on in my head or I was enlightened or like you shed light on something.

And there are all of these terms that we use that link knowledge with light or understanding. And then when we think about something like Psalm 119, which I think Mark said something about earlier, your word is the lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Almost the understanding that, yeah, I don't know. Do you guys think there's some sort of link there? I've just been thinking about that between those two.

Well, it's interesting. The motto of the University of Oxford is Dominus Illuminatio Mia, which are the opening words of Psalm 27 in Latin, so the Lord is my light. And I think it's really significant that that's the motto of a university, which is a place of learning and exploration and discovery and all of that kind of thing.

And so it's as though it's saying, well, behind all this is God who opens up things which were closed and reveals things which were hidden. And there's the idea of exploration and discovery and finding out new things.

also, you know, just so much in these passages, if you read through John chapter 7 to 9, there's repeated mention from Jesus about the truth, you know, that he is speaking the truth to them and whether they're able to discern it or not is in question because if they can't see the light, they will not be able to appreciate the truth. And it comes up in several different little

Speaker 1 (12:04.512)
sections throughout these passages. And I think that is that similar idea because there's knowledge, isn't there, and understanding and exploration, but there's also what is that really? Is it seeking after truth? Because that's the most important thing. And if we haven't grasped the truth, then all of our perceptions that we've learned will be slightly off or completely wrong.

speaking about truth and light, I was also looking, and the Hebrew word for light is or, basically, O-R. I probably am not saying it right, I'm sure. It's my American acumen. But Torah has those same two words in it. I think, Mark, you made a connection we were talking about between light and Torah, I think. But I was just thinking about how there's a connection or seems to be a connection there as well.

I'm not a scholar in Hebrew at all, but yeah, I noticed that too.

I don't think Americans pronounce Hebrew any worse than Brits do, so don't feel bad about that. it's fine. I'm not a Hebrew scholar at all, actually, either. I don't know about the linguistic connection, but I do know that the Jewish people think of the Torah as their light. Another metaphor is the Torah as bread, as we were talking about last time.

It enlightens them, you know, and we would say the Bible enlightens us. And it's so interesting, isn't it, that the Bible we say is the Word of God, but Jesus is the Word, capital W, of God. And we are enlightened by words. You know, we're enlightened when people tell us things that we didn't know before. We're enlightened by, you know, by signs expressed in words and numbers. We're enlightened by poetry.

Speaker 2 (14:01.678)
We're enlightened by the way that people communicate, and Jesus is God's communication to us.

Well, just connecting that with your reference earlier, Noel, to Psalm 119 verse 105 about, word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Yeah, I think, I don't know whether that is because of that connection that Jewish people make between, you know, the Torah or being God's word and then God's word is this to me. But it does flow nicely and it

I think it's interesting, you know, just off the back of the last series that we did in Proverbs, and there was so much imagery in Proverbs about not straying from the path and, you know, not going to the left or the right. And this idea of light illuminating the path we should take is also about guiding us to stay on the right path and be doing, you know, yeah, following God, obeying Him, etc.

And how do we know what that is if we don't have the Word, if we don't have God's revelation of Himself to us and how He wants us to live?

Good. Why don't we take a moment to look at the sign that sort of coincides with this I am statement, which is in John 9. So this is the miracle where Jesus heals a man that was born blind. So basically, this man seems to be a blind man who's well known and he's a beggar. And some people approach Jesus and they say, why was this man born blind? Was it his sin or his parents' sin?

Speaker 3 (15:42.996)
And Jesus says, it's neither this man nor his parents that sinned. This happened so that the works of God may be displayed in him, which is interesting. After that, he says, while I am in the world, I am the light of the world. And then he heals the man. So he spits on the ground, he makes mud, he puts it on the man's eyes, he tells him to go wash in the pool of Siloam. When the man goes and washes, he comes home seeing. So this is one of John 7 signs.

And it's such an interesting story. It takes all of chapter 9 to sort of get through the conversations that happen after it. But again, I think just like we were talking about in last episode when we said that John seems to be using symbolism to make a connection, I think he's doing the same thing here where there seems to be a very deliberate connection between there's a man who's living in darkness and then he opens his eyes and he sees light. And in the same story, Jesus says, am the light of the world. So I feel John is trying to make a connection there that's quite obvious.

But there's some other connections throughout the chapter as well. It's not just physical darkness and light, is it? But it's also spiritual darkness and light. So what do we think John is getting at here in making this connection?

if I could just give it a bit more context as well before we go into that because the context of this event, Jesus saying, am the light of the world is the feast of booths. And this was a time when the whole of Jerusalem was kind of lit up. And I've actually got a quote here from the Sukkah which describes the feast of booths and what it was like at that time. So,

It says in the court of the women in the temple, there were golden candlesticks with four golden bowls on the top of them and four ladders to each candlestick. They made wicks from the worn out drawers and girdles of the priests. How about that? And with them they set the candlesticks alight and there was not a courtyard in Jerusalem that did not reflect the light. Which I think is fascinating, isn't it? Because you've got this picture of the whole of Jerusalem lit up.

Speaker 2 (17:50.476)
by the flames from the candle in Candelabra in the temple. And there's this man who is blind and he can't see it. And then Jesus opens his eyes. And it's not just the light of the candles in the temple that he can see, for the first, well, yes, for the first time. But Jesus says, am the light of the world. So it's not just this, well, very dramatic, but very local vision.

that he's getting, his eyes are open to something absolutely world-changing because Jesus says, am the light of the world. But I interrupted you and … Well, your question was about how this sort of blindness, how it wasn't just a physical thing for this one man, but it sort of echoed throughout the chapter, isn't it? And I think you can see the Pharisees and the Jewish leaders being blind as well. mean, I think it's absolutely hilarious.

dialogue in here because they are absolutely determined that either this wasn't a miracle at all or that the man was blind and hadn't got better after all. And, you know, in the end they're confronted with the evidence and it's absolutely unassailable because the blind was blind and the man can see. And it says something like, you were born in utter sin. Do you presume to teach us? Have they cast him out? They can't cope with

their presuppositions being so completely upended. They can't cope with the light. They'd rather stay in darkness.

I think that is the framing of this whole chapter because right at the beginning of chapter 9, John writes that there's this question that they ask Jesus, know, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? And Jesus says, neither of them. You know, they didn't sin, but this has happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. And we have more light imagery here because he says, as long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me.

Speaker 1 (19:58.858)
night is coming when no one can work, but I am the light of the world. Sorry, while I'm in the world, I'm the light of the world. But so there is this question around sin, and Jesus corrects this sort of wrong supposition here, but when you read the chapter as a whole and you look at the determination of the Jewish leaders to reject what they're being told, there is a clear implication that their spiritual blindness is sinful.

You know, that's where the chapter kind of ends. This is verse 40. Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, what are we blind to? And Jesus said, if you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin. But now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains. And it's all around this question of whether they accept what Jesus is saying about himself. They accept him as the son of man. Because that's so interesting. We have got the repetition of I am the light of the world. We've got this blind man who not only can see.

see any light at all, but sees the light of the world. But Jesus then changes that language slightly. When He comes across this man again, He said, do you believe in the Son of Man? So you've got, I'm the light of the world, you've also got, I'm the Son of Man, and will you believe in Me? And I think the man says, tell me about this Son of Man so that I can believe in Him. He accepts Him. The Jewish leaves, the Pharisees will not.

We've had this whole escalating narrative of how so many times of how they keep trying to kill him, even to the point of picking up stones to stone him and Jesus escapes because it's not his time. So it's not just a not understanding, I don't think. I think there's a sense that it's a rejection and an outright attempt to suppress any more of this.

And I think you can see that in something else that they say, they're trying to convince this man that he hasn't really been healed or that, you know, wasn't Jesus who healed him. And they say, give glory to God, we know that this man is a sinner. Well, they don't know anything of the kind, of course. But he replied, whether he's a sinner or not, I don't know. One thing I do know, I was blind, but now I see. And that is such a fantastic line, which

Speaker 2 (22:18.546)
is, of course, directly quoted in the hymn, Amazing Grace, which was written by John Newton, who really knew what it was like to be morally and spiritually blind as a slave trader and to come to a point where he could say, see. And I think that's really a picture of grace, it seems to me, that we're taken out of darkness into light. And that can happen in all sorts of ways. And here it's physical,

In other ways, I think it happens to us when we understand more about the love of God, more about the grace of God. And that's enlightenment as well.

I do think there's something else that's really cool about that guy's testimony and just how simply he rebukes the Pharisees essentially. They're trying to obfuscate everything and turn it into a theological argument and they've already decided what the outcome should be. They insist, they make these statements and they want to force people to believe. It sounds from this account in John like they knew the score because

I think it's in verse 22 to 23, when the Pharisees try to enlist the guy's parents to testify something about it, it explicitly says that they were afraid of the Jewish leaders who already had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue, and that's why they kind of refused to say what they see.

what they really probably believe at that point, they're too afraid. So it's not that they don't understand or they don't have viable evidence, but they are too afraid of those who are in power and the consequences for them if they come out and say what they see. And it's not a baseless fear, I suppose, because the man who was born blind does get thrown out, doesn't he? He's thrown out of the synagogue or the temple courts.

Speaker 3 (24:29.102)
And then it sort of seems to come to a point at the end where Jesus relates this to spiritual blindness, which Esther, you've touched on a little bit. But he says, judgment I have come into this world so that the blind will see and that those who see will become blind. So yeah, so does seem to be a really cool connection that John is making here. And I think he continues to make it throughout his gospel. I was just thinking about how, I don't know if it's in John's gospel actually, but how at the crucifixion when Jesus dies,

it becomes dark, doesn't it? And all of the light seems to go, which is really interesting. I don't know if that's specifically in John's gospel, but I know it's in one of the gospels.

I think it might be Mark, but I need to check. But it does make me think about the part at the Last Supper in John, Judas goes out to betray Jesus and it says, it was night at the end of it. So there's that imagery of the darkness again, isn't it? Judas goes out into the night away from the light.

Yeah, I bet if you just read John and you just thought about darkness and light, you'd pull out so many different things like that.

Yeah, it's all way through, isn't it? Yeah.

Speaker 3 (25:39.48)
We were thinking as well as we were preparing for this, in Matthew, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, are the light of the world to the people that he's teaching. Which is really interesting for Jesus to say in John, I am the light of the world, and then to say you are the light of the world. Just as we sort of wrap up, I guess, what does Jesus being the light mean for us today? But then what does that mean when he says that you too are also the light of

I do think that one of the things that Jesus does is challenge the way we think about ourselves, the way we think about the world that we live in. I think to me that's quite important that Jesus is kind of a yardstick, Jesus is kind of a yardstick or a measuring stick by which we measure what the truth is. And I think it's so easy in this sort of post-truth era where

you know, alternative facts are the thing. And where there are so many, you know, different ideologies which are sort of scrabbling about for space in our heads and which want to make us think in a particular way, I think it's really important that we just keep focused on Jesus and that we really, you we should be steeped in the Gospels. We should be reading the Sermon on the Mount. We should be saying, how do the other things that I'm reading and

and hearing people say and hearing on the radio or on the TV, how did these match up with the spirit of Jesus? I was very struck by something I came across the other day and it was a quote from Russell Moore. And I don't know if people have heard of Russell Moore, but he was a big wheel in the Southern Baptist Convention. One of the things that he says is that multiple pastors, this was in an interview,

a couple of years ago actually, that multiple pastors had told him that they would quote the Sermon on the Mount, specifically the part that says to turn the other cheek when they were preaching, and someone would come up after the service and ask, where did you get those liberal talking points? And he said, what was alarming to me is that in most of these scenarios, when the pastor would say, I'm literally quoting Jesus Christ, the response would not be, I apologize. The response would be, yeah, but that doesn't work anymore. That's weak.

Speaker 2 (27:57.344)
And then Russell Moore said, when we get to the point where the teachings of Jesus himself are seen as subversive to us, then we're in a crisis. And I thought that was so powerful. And it just speaks to me of how we are so tempted to turn to the darkness and to move away from the truth. And Jesus brings light. Jesus is the light. And if we shut our eyes to that, then we have become blinded again.

I mean, that was beautiful what you've just said. I think it's also about, you've got the example in the Gospel of John of John the Baptist sort of being like a lamp that lights up the way, you know, he's this voice in the wilderness testifying to the coming Messiah. But in John chapter five, it says, John was a lamp that burned and gave light and you chose for a time to enjoy that light.

He's witnessing, in a sense, and pointing forwards and pointing at Jesus and saying, this is the Messiah, this is the one. But we're called to be the light of the world now after the fact. It's an interesting role because we're pointing back to what Jesus said and did, everything that happened while he was here on earth. But we're also pointing forward to the fact that he's going to return.

know, just to your question about what does it mean to be lights today, think a lot of it, yes, it's about being steeped in Scripture. It's about that illuminating and shaping everything we do as Christians, but also it's not just so that we can be good people who display the works that Jesus would have us display, but it's also specifically to point to Jesus is the Messiah. And that's like John's overall purpose in the Gospel anyway. It's all written down.

so that you can believe in him as well. So part of our being lights is to say to people, Jesus is the Messiah.

Speaker 3 (30:07.852)
Yeah, I agree. And I think, Mark, what you said too about Jesus's teachings is really good because I think the more that we're in the light, the more that we can be the light. But you're right, it's so easy. I was actually thinking about that with the episode you recently did with Stuart, which was all about lying. If you haven't listened to that episode, it's very good. But something as simple as that, a teaching that we very easily maybe make excuses for.

But actually, the more that I stay in the light, it also reminds me of the Sermon on Mount when Jesus says the eye is the lamp for the body, the more that what I take in, whether that's the teachings of Jesus or things that are darkness, affects me. And I think it affects how much I can be a light to others. So I think that was a really good point. Yeah. Yeah, really good. Thank you both for another good conversation about this second I Am statement.

It's been really fun to look through these and just think about them a bit more deeply. Thank you to everyone listening. I hope you've really enjoyed this episode. I hope it's been really helpful for you as you're reading through John or just following along with us in the podcast. That's it for this week. If you love the podcast, you can leave us a review or a rating or send in your questions to biblesociety.org.uk forward slash rooted questions. We just got some

new questions in recently and we'd love some more. So thank you for sending those in to everyone who has. And that's all for this week and we will see you next week for another episode where we'll look at another I Am statement of Jesus'.