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Well, good morning and Merry 
Christmas It is yet still 

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Christmas. 
It always saddens my heart when 

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the day after Christmas people 
stop saying Merry Christmas. 

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It's just like it's not over 
yet, guys. 

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It's the fourth day of 
Christmas. 

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It's great to be with you. 
My name is Andrew Evans, I'm one

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of the pastors here at Church of
the Resurrection. 

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We will be looking at John 
chapter one, our gospel lessons.

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Let me encourage you to turn in 
your Bibles there. 

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You can find that on page 833 of
the Black Pew Bible. 

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Before we get started, let me 
pray for us. 

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Father, I praise you. 
We praise you for the gift of 

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Christmas and for all that you 
give us in Your Son. 

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Would you meet us this morning? 
Would you help us to see both 

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Your truth and Your grace? 
I pray all of this in the name 

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of your Son Jesus, Amen. 
So think about it. 

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What is the darkest place you 
have ever been in your life? 

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The darkest place. 
I remember I once went hiking 

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with a group of friends and we 
were going to a cave and we went

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into The Cave and the entrance 
of The Cave or the the sort of 

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body of The Cave was sort of 
sufficiently, you know, curves 

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such that when you got to the 
main chamber, there was number 

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light at all coming in from 
outside. 

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And so if you turn off all the 
flashlights and all the cell 

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phones, it was completely and 
perfectly pitch black. 

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You could put your hand in front
of your face and not see it. 

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It was that dark. 
A very, very dark. 

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I think it's the darkest, 
darkest environment I've ever 

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been in. 
And that that perfect darkness 

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was really jarring. 
In fact, people kept turning on 

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their flashlights. 
It was really annoying. 

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It was jarring because in that 
darkness, you could just feel 

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how profoundly vulnerable you 
were, that 11 misstep, and you 

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could fall and you couldn't see 
it where you were going. 

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But it's also a jarring even 
more simply because we are just 

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so used to having light in our 
lives. 

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Even in the darkest places in 
our homes, there typically is a 

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little bit of light coming in. 
And, and even if there isn't 

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enough light, you can turn on a 
switch or pull out a flashlight 

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or your cell phone. 
In order to illuminate things. 

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We need light in order to see 
what's there, to see where we're

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going, to see what dangers are 
there because light by its 

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nature reveals and illuminates. 
This is what light does. 

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Light because of that is 
essential for our lives. 

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Now our gospel lesson here in in
John chapter one, this 

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incredibly famous, incredibly 
rich passage tells us that 

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Christ is the light that came 
into the world. 

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And this is one of the big 
themes of Christmas, isn't it? 

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That's why we have lights 
everywhere. 

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We are celebrating that this 
light came into the world. 

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But this metaphor of Christ as 
the light poses the question for

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us. 
But what exactly this mean? 

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If light reveals, what does 
Christ as the light reveal? 

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What does Christ reveal? 
And the first thing that it 

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reveals is a world in darkness. 
Look at me at verse 4, if you 

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would. 
The light shines in the darkness

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and the darkness has not 
overcome it. 

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I imagine you've probably been 
in a room, maybe your office. 

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It has a window, and you're 
working late in the afternoon 

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and you're working and you're 
just so engrossed in your work 

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that you don't notice that the 
sun is going down and it's just 

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getting darker and darker and 
darker. 

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And you don't have the lights on
because in the middle of the day

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you don't need it. 
But then somebody opens the 

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door, they look in and they're 
like you're in the dark and they

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turn on the light and boom, all 
of a sudden you realize how how 

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dark it actually was there. 
The light reveals just how dark 

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the room was before. 
And something similar is going 

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on here with Jesus. 
Because ever since our first 

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parents disobeyed God, the world
has been cast Into Darkness. 

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It's not perfect darkness. 
The light of God was still 

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shining, His word has shown, but
humanity as a whole has been 

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living in darkness. 
And, and you could describe that

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darkness in a couple ways. 
One would be a kind of moral 

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darkness. 
Moral darkness. 

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We get confused, we get mixed up
about what is right and what is 

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wrong. 
You could say that politics is 

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fundamentally about 
prioritization of moral goods 

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and both sides. 
There's a long tradition of both

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sides claiming that the other 
side is morally mixed up right. 

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Both are probably right in just 
in different ways. 

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But this isn't a new phenomenon.
People have been mixing up good 

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and evil for generations. 
All the way back to the Garden 

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of Eden, Adam and Eve decided 
that it was good to do what God 

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told them was bad. 
We are morally in the darkness, 

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but this moral darkness belies 
an even deeper darkness. 

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We don't know where we're going.
We don't know what the purpose 

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of our life is. 
Theologians will call this 

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teleology. 
What is the end or the tell us 

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of our life? 
God made us to move toward him, 

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to live in his light. 
But when we turned away from God

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in our sin, we lost that, that 
direction, that orientation. 

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And instead of moving through 
life with a sense of we're 

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moving toward God, that God 
provides the purpose and the 

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orientation of our life, we, we 
start moving toward much 

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smaller, prioritizing much 
smaller and lesser goals. 

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So we'll prioritize our jobs, 
our fitness, our happiness, 

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maybe even our family. 
Now, none of these are bad in 

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themselves, right? 
But when they become the 

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ultimate goal of our lives, the 
ultimate purpose, the thing that

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gives us meaning, our lives 
become misdirected. 

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It's like we're trying to 
navigate through the woods at 

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night without, without any 
stars, without any moon, without

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a flashlight. 
You can't see anything. 

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Even if you have a map, you 
can't read it. 

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It's just it's dark and you're 
sort of lost. 

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You're adrift. 
We don't know where we're going.

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We're in the teleological 
darkness. 

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And I think that this confusion 
actually breeds a lot of the 

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moral darkness that we encounter
so much of the time. 

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And Christ, when he came into 
the world, he exposed this 

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darkness. 
He was the first person to live 

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a perfectly upright life. 
And his teaching, with its 

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striking precision and 
penetration, showed just how 

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mixed up the world had become. 
His life radiated with a beauty 

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that showed us just how dark and
ugly the world had become. 

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Isn't it striking how non 
Christians will say so much? 

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You know, I don't really know 
what I think about Paul, but 

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Jesus, he is so compelling. 
There's something that's that's 

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true about that. 
You don't need to dismiss Paul, 

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but there's something about 
Jesus that just radiates with 

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this, this compelling beauty. 
And that's Jesus coming into the

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world, exposing the darkness. 
He showed moral perfection in 

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the the fullness of a life 
that's oriented toward God. 

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He's exposing how dark the world
was. 

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The challenge for us, though, is
just how easily we can become 

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satisfied with living in the 
darkness. 

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We have these little lights, 
light of reason, the light of 

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tradition, but without the light
of Christ revealed in God's 

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Word. 
These other lights are just like

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candles in our house. 
When the power goes off, they 

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don't cast very much light. 
They really are insufficient for

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properly illuminating. 
But let it go on long enough and

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we will learn to make do. 
We think it's enough. 

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We are all too easily satisfied.
And so this light of Christ, 

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when it comes, it confronts us 
with the reality of the darkness

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of our lives, and it provokes a 
kind of crisis, a kind of 

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crisis. 
Will we be satisfied with the 

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darkness and will we continue to
live in it, or will we walk in 

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the light? 
We see this confrontation here 

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in verses 9 through 11. 
Look there with me. 

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We have Christ, the true light. 
He comes into the world, the 

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world that He himself has made, 
that He has been giving light to

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for all time. 
He came to His own people, the 

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recipients of God's promises 
through the centuries, and yet 

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his people rejected him. 
They rejected the light in a 

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real sense. 
They wanted to remain in the 

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darkness. 
Now, this reaction might strike 

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us as odd, right? 
We need light. 

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We know that we need light. 
Why would you reject the light? 

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Well, simply, we reject the 
light because it reveals some 

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very inconvenient truths about 
it, about us. 

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The light doesn't just reveal 
the reality of the darkness. 

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By contrast, the light reveals 
the reality of what the darkness

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was hiding, the light exposes. 
So my wife and I seem to have 

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this tradition of every day or 
two, we we spend time looking 

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for a milk bottle because one of
our sons loses the milk bottle 

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every every every day, it seems.
And that means invariably 

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getting down on our hands and 
knees and looking underneath the

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couch. 
Now, excuse me during, during 

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the day, it's not a big deal. 
There's, there's enough light to

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be able to look in there and see
if there's a bottle. 

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But if it's if it's the evening 
or early morning and I need to 

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grab a flashlight and look under
there, I can see if there's a 

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bottle. 
But you also see so much more 

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when that light starts shining 
underneath there. 

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You see the little specks of 
dirt and dust just sort of 

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gleaming at you, mocking me, the
dust bunnies, flecks of dirt 

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balls, and the books that have 
gathered underneath. 

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There the light comes and 
exposes everything that the 

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darkness was hiding. 
And this is what the light of 

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Christ does to our lives. 
It shows us all the dirt, all 

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the grime, all the problems that
the darkness was concealing, and

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it provokes a crisis. 
Do I accept the light or do I 

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reject it? 
Now I know I've had a glimpse of

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the dirt. 
Am I going to deal with it, or 

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am I going to pretend that it 
never existed? 

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And it provokes a crisis, 
fundamentally, because the 

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darkness isn't just out there in
the world. 

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It's not just the culture that's
lost and depraved. 

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It's not just that other party 
that's so, so lost. 

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It's not just other people. 
It's a Christmas where we've 

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been spending time with family, 
right? 

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It's not just your family where 
the darkness is. 

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It's you. 
It's me. 

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The darkness is in every one of 
us. 

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We all so easily mix up good and
evil. 

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We all get the purpose of our 
life wrong. 

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We're all lost. 
The darkness is in all of our 

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hearts. 
And so it just isn't surprising 

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that many of us would reject the
light. 

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We've done that from the very 
beginning. 

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The light is painful. 
It's even offensive. 

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How dare you say that I'm in the
darkness. 

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I am enlightened. 
Look at what people say about 

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me. 
Look at the recommendations on 

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my LinkedIn, look at my resume, 
look at my influence, look at my

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success, look at my family. 
All of these prove that I they 

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prove that I am not in the 
darkness. 

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How dare you say that? 
It's drawing to hear that maybe.

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But honestly, in a in a sense, 
this reaction, this rejection of

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the light could perhaps be the 
most rational response to the 

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light. 
If all that the light does, if 

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the only thing that it does is 
reveal the darkness and the dirt

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in each of us and provoke a 
crisis in us, the light will 

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crush us. 
We will never be able to clean 

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up all the dirt, all the mess 
that the light exposes. 

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We cannot bear the terrible 
brightness of the light. 

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And that's why it's so important
that this light not just reveal 

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what's true about us, not what's
just what's true about the 

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world. 
This light reveals the truth 

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about the source of the light 
itself. 

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This light shows us God's 
character. 

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There's this phrase that's 
repeated twice in the last 

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paragraph of our passage. 
Look with me at verse 14. 

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And the Word became flesh and 
dwelt among us, and we have seen

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His glory. 
Glory is of the only Son from 

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the Father, full of grace and 
truth. 

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Grace and truth. 
This pair, this combination is 

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so important that John actually 
looped back to it in verse 17. 

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For the law was given through 
Moses. 

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Grace and truth came through 
Jesus Christ. 

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God has come before in history 
with glory, but it was a glory 

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that was terrifying. 
He came with glory on Mount 

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Sinai with dark clouds and 
crashing Thunder and piercing 

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lightning. 
The glory was so overwhelming 

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that the people of Israel were 
terrified, absolutely terrified.

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This glory was not a glory that 
we could handle. 

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And in that way, it's like the 
law. 

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The law came through Moses, but 
the law itself, just like God's 

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glory on its own will crush us. 
But Christ here reveals the 

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fullness of God's character. 
God is a God of truth. 

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Yes, he would sees everything 
about us. 

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Yes. 
He calls to us to a higher 

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standard, yes. 
And he points us to where we 

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fall short. 
Yes, all these are true, but 

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but, but God is also a God of 
grace. 

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In fact. 
Notice what He says first in 

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this pair reveals grace and 
truth. 

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It is grace that we encounter 
even before His truth. 

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Christ has been giving light to 
the world from the very 

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beginning. 
And the light of Christ came not

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in a blinding flash, not in 
judgement and overwhelming 

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glory, but it came as a child in
weakness and innocence and 

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vulnerability. 
Christ laid aside the royal 

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robes of heaven and put on our 
mortal flesh, becoming like us 

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in our weakness. 
He came and dwelt among us, 

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walking with us, knowing our 
condition and revealing His 

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guiding light with patience and 
with love. 

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He did this because this, my 
friends, is God's character. 

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God longs for us not just to 
know right from wrong, but for 

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us to be oriented toward Him, 
for us to see in Him the whole 

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point, the whole goal of our 
lives. 

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He wants us to draw toward Him, 
to be near Him. 

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He wants to make us like Him, 
even to make us His children. 

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And in this grace, this 
unmerited favor, we see God's 

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character. 
A character that is so full of 

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patience, so full of love, so 
full of kindness and generosity 

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that he sent his own light, his 
own Son, to guide us out of 

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darkness, to redeem even the 
most painful parts of our lives 

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and to set us free so that we 
can live new and full and joyful

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lives. 
And it's this light that we 

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celebrate at Christmas. 
This is a light that exposes the

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darkness. 
And it it, it causes a crisis, 

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forces a crisis for every 
person. 

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But this crisis is fundamentally
an invitation. 

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Come, come and follow the light.
Come and receive life. 

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Come and become a child of God 
by putting your trust in Christ 

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and believing in His name. 
Accepting this invitation may be

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the hardest thing we ever do. 
Nobody likes to be exposed. 

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Nobody likes to have the light 
shine into the dark corners of 

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our lives. 
That's humbling, maybe even 

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humiliating, but it is the best 
thing because it means that all 

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of those things that we know are
wrong can be and will be put 

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right. 
We don't have to be trapped by 

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our sin. 
All those places that are broken

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don't have to define us. 
My friends, the light did not 

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come to condemn you. 
The Light came to save you. 

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So my friends, this Christmas, 
this New Year, let us receive 

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the light now and for the rest 
of our lives. 

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In the name of the Father and of
the Son of the Holy Spirit, 

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Amen.