How are your Advent Preparations going this year?  I read about a Mother and Father who  wanted to find out what their Children had remembered from their family devotions the year before about Advent.  They asked their children, “DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN WE WOULD LIGHT THE CANDLES ON THE ADVENT WREATH?  WHO CAN TELL ME WHAT THE 4 CANDLES IN THE ADVENT WREATH REPRESENT AND MEAN?”
       The 7 year old son jumped in and said with a 7 year olds wisdom and excitement, “THERE’S LOVE, JOY, PEACE AND.... AND...  “I know the other one said his 6 year old sister as she interrupted him, “LOVE, JOY , PEACE AND QUIET!”  I don’t know about you but she may have something there we may want to consider! 
       This season of Advent is important for us to celebrate in helping us to prepare our hearts and minds for the celebration of Jesus Christ’s birth even if Christmas is still 23 days away!  Advent is indeed a season of Lights as we look around our neighborhoods and communities as we see  more and more lights to give extra light to our physically and spiritually darker and darker  days!
       I read about an English professor at a downtown university in a big city who introduced his class to what he called one of the most important phrases in the English language.  The phrase was, “WALK WITH LIGHT!”  He said that those words had a major influence on people and often guided them in their lives in what they did and where they went.
       Looking at his class one day he said, “THAT PHRASE -WALK WITH LIGHT- is one of the most powerful and influential phrases I see and people respond to it in many different ways, DON’T YOU AGREE?”  The class knew that this professor was a little off the wall sometimes and very eccentric, so they agreed with him to keep him happy and asked him what was so special about that phrase and what did it mean?  He said I see that phrase every time I look out the classroom window because it is written on a sign at the intersection of Main and Broadway- “WALK WITH LIGHT” and I am truly amazed when people obey that sign because people don’t do it very often and there are near accidents and collisions every day!

       The truth of that little phrase “WALK WITH LIGHT” became apparent to me a number of years ago on a Thanksgiving Day when myself and about 500,000 other people stood on the streets of Houston to watch a Thanksgiving Day parade.  As we were leaving the Parade, there were signs at each intersection that said, “WALK WITH LIGHT” which were there to help people  safely cross the street and get to their cars.  How often were those lights obeyed?  Only when there was a police officer standing there directing traffic.  The rest of the time there was a great deal of confusion and a big traffic jam as people were running between the cars because they did not “WALK WITH THE LIGHT”.
       How often doesn’t this same truth apply to our world today?  When people obey the light of Jesus Christ and walk with Him - there is peace and safety.  When they don’t obey the light of Jesus Christ -there is confusion and chaos.  There are amazing results when people “WALK WITH THE LIGHT OF JESUS CHRIST IN THEIR LIVES GUIDING THEM AND DIRECTING THEM!”
       Our Old Testament lesson from Isaiah 2: 5 encourages us to “WALK IN THE LIGHT OF THE LORD!” which the prophet Isaiah shared with the people during very difficult times.  The prophet Isaiah began his ministry around the year 740 B.C. about 7 centuries before the birth of Jesus Christ!  His job was to warn the people of Judah that they would be destroyed if they didn’t turn back to worshiping the true God!  At this time, the land of Judah was financially prosperous, but spiritually and religiously bankrupt.   Judah’s king, Ahaz pretended to be a believer, but in reality , he was a power-hungry politician who turned his back on God.  Judah was being threatened by powerful enemies and they wanted to know what to do.
       Isaiah tells them that the only true source of peace and leadership in their life is to “WALK IN THE LIGHT OF THE LORD.”  The peace in our Old Testament lesson began with the promise of a Messiah and Savior and would be fulfilled in Jesus Christ as God’s Gift of Light for His people to follow and to believe and to obey!
       Isaiah was preparing the people for “WALKING IN THE LIGHT OF THE PROMISED SAVIOR” as he spoke to them words of hope and comfort.  Isaiah was preparing the way for the arrival of Jesus Christ- the LIGHT OF THE WORLD who would lead people out of the darkness and hopelessness of sin and into the light of eternal life through faith in Him!
       Jesus Christ came into the world because each of us needed Him to save us from the eternal darkness of sin which tries to control our lives and the world today.  Jesus came to lead the way for us to follow- to believe in Him alone as our Lord and Savior and the only way to eternal life in heaven , with the LIGHT OF HIS LOVE AND HIS LIFE SHED ON THE CROSS OF CALVARY LEADING THE WAY to our eternal life in heaven!  The Light of Jesus Christ shining in the darkness of sin in our world today is our only hope and source of true comfort and peace!
       There was a story I read a while back which reminded me of the power that light has to change things.  The story talked about one of the darkest times in our nation’s history- the Civil War when about 1 ½ million men and women lost their lives during that war.   More Americans died in that war than all of the other wars that the U.S. has fought since that time combined.  It was a time of great darkness in our nation’s history as Americans fought one another and there was a great deal of suffering and pain as our nation battled itself!
       When the war finally ended, the people wanted to get the war out of their minds as quickly as possible.  There was one group of people who were very sad when a news blackout was imposed by the government regarding the war as people began the healing process.
       News photographers had over 100,000 pictures that they could not sell to the newspapers because of people trying to forget the war and the government blackout.  The cameras that the photographers used at that time to take pictures had panes of glass that would capture the image on it and when it was exposed to light and then put on paper with the right amount of chemicals in a darkroom a picture would appear.  These news photographers were “STUCK” with over 100,000 of these glass panes that they could not reuse.

       So they decided to sell these panes of glass to Greenhouse operators along the East Coast who used them as the roofs for their greenhouses.  But then something amazing happened after they were installed.  There was a long stretch of cloudy days with some sunshine through the panes of glass and  the pictures on the panes of glass began to develop.  The people who worked at and visited the greenhouses would look up and see the pictures of the war right before their eyes.  Every day they would see images of dead and severely injured men and women that would remind them of their sons and husbands and family members who had died in the war.  The people were shocked by this experience.
       But then another amazing miracle occurred as after a number of days of sunshine these images faded as the SUNLIGHT caused the pictures on the panes of glass to fade and eventually disappear.  The pictures of war and darkness disappeared as the light of the sun soon removed the darkness of war and the horror of death from the people’s lives and eyes!
       In much the same way, God’s light in Jesus Christ has removed the darkness of sin in our lives.  The images of sin and eternal death in our lives have been removed by the light of the world- Jesus Christ- and have been washed and cleaned by the blood of Jesus Christ.   The CLEAR PANES of our Christian life and faith have replaced the sin-filled panes and pictures in our life through Jesus Christ  SHINING in our lives and WALKING IN THE LIGHT OF JESUS CHRIST!
       We can “WALK WITH THE LIGHT” of Jesus Christ because we are people who “BELIEVE IN THE TRUE LIGHT, THAT WE MAY BE CALLED CHILDREN OF GOD” as John 12: 35-36 tells us.  It is a miracle of faith that Jesus Christ can and does accomplish through God’s Word, Holy Baptism and Holy Communion.  Jesus Christ alone gives us the power, the ability and the joy of being “PEOPLE WHO WALK WITH THE LIGHT” and share the “LIGHT OF JESUS CHRIST” with others!

Copyright © 2007 by Pastor Mark Cattau.  All rights reserved.

Credits:
 
  Epiphany logo designed and provided by Dale Bargmann at daleb@ecentral.com