The Light

For those who have been here today, it would like to be no surprise to you if I said, turn to John's gospel. I have been reading this gospel. My daily reading consists of New Testament and Old Testament.

And in the New Testament, I am reading in John's gospel. So I'm just going to share with you a few things that I've enjoyed from John's gospel. Just part of a verse, chapter 8 and verse number 12.

John chapter 8, verse number 12. John 8, verse 12, then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world. Those words, I am the light of the world.

I think we should understand that the events in the early part of our Bible that we know to be the book of Genesis are very parallel in the old creation to what we have in a new creation. We speak of a new creation, we're speaking of a person being saved, a person coming into the good of what Christ has done at Calvary, once in darkness, brought into his marvelous light. We don't realize, there's no one here tonight that can really comprehend the darkness that envelops a soul that doesn't know Christ as Savior.

It's horrid. My friend, the choice is this. For you to remain in that darkness and to refuse the one who is the light of the world, God simply extends your choice and will send you to a place where it is the darkness, the blackness of darkness forever.

Back in the town where I live, there's a mine, a potash mine, 2,200 feet down. Some of those runs go out over a mile. Some of them up to three to four miles.

I guess even more than that. On occasion, a supervisor took me down into that mine. And I said, I think they do.

Partway out in one of those runs, he shut off all the lights. I could put my hand up in front of my face and did not know whether it was two inches from the front of my face or two feet from it. It was that dark.

My friend, the darkness of that potash mine is not to be compared with the darkness to which you are going to, to which you will be in forever, simply because you refuse the light. I could have read him other passages dealing with the light tonight, the light of the gospel and so on. I want to draw four things to your attention, I think, that are very important to understand and link with what we're going to consider tonight.

First of all, the person of the light. He says, I am the light of the world. It's a person.

It's interesting, when you go back to the book of Genesis, that in the first creation, God commands, commanded the light to shine into the darkness. But when we come to the new creation, God himself draws into our hearts. He shines into our hearts.

In other words, it's really how much more personal it is, not just commanding the light, but he actually moves into the light of a person, into the life of a person. What was once darkness suddenly becomes light. The Bible says, if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his son cleanses us from all sin.

I couldn't imagine, that would have to be the longest weekend in a person's life. When I used to go to places delivering eggs, invariably people know me, they say, what church is on this weekend? What they meant by that is a conference. And for sake of conversation, they say, okay, what time in the morning does it start? I say, oh, about 10 o'clock.

And when's it end at night? Oh, about eight o'clock. All day church. It's interesting, as believers.

I don't know, we come to a conference like this and enjoy the fellowship one with another and the light of it. And that God has literally come into our lives with light from himself. We don't even think of that.

Do you know why they can't comprehend that? Because they're like you today. Like you, they're in the darkness and they don't want to move out of that darkness. The person of darkness will come back to it.

The plight of the light. Not only the person of light, but the plight of the light. The apostle says, if our gospel be a hid, it is hid to them that are lost in whom the God of this world had blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ should shine into them.

Let me ask you tonight, young man in this gospel meeting, dear girl tonight, how can you remain in such darkness? How can you remain in a place never to see your loved ones again? My wife is down visiting her sister in Shelfont, Pennsylvania right now. They've had a hard month. My brother-in-law who refused the gospel all of his life, very successful in his life.

He had everything, fellas. He had the toys. He had the tractors to plow the snow.

He had the snow machines. He had the motor home. He had the big job.

Year and a half ago, he told his sister, my wife, his wife did rather. She says, you know, April the 5th, April the 5th, 2015, Henry gets his pension. It's icing on the cake.

It's pushing back and enjoying life. And Henry died March 28th. Gospel meetings right at the end of it.

Gospel meetings four miles from his door. His sister, again my wife, he has two sisters. This is Mr. Gustafson's wife and my wife, would literally go, and these girls here know her, out of her comfort zone.

Snowing didn't matter. Would go to that home. Great big brother, 6 foot 3, hiding in the bedroom like you do.

Wouldn't come out and talk to his sister. She went down the bedroom. Henry, will you not come with me to a gospel meeting? Came to what? Sat in a gospel meeting.

Myself and another brother were having the meeting in Sussex. Give her a nudge near the end of it. He said, can we go out the back door? She said, whatever you want.

That's the last gospel meeting he was in. Every night of those meetings, snowing, rain, sleet, weather in the East Coast like we've never had. And she went, begged, begged her brother to come and hear the gospel.

Don't die in such darkness. Very little response. Finally, she did.

Almost the unthinkable. He would have no time for me. She said to me one morning, I didn't plan to tell you this.

Would you not go in and speak to Henry? I said, with you if you want me to. Please. We went in.

He was down in his bedroom. Must have saw the car come in. We sat on the couch, talked to his wife.

His wife, she said, he's not coming out. I said to my good wife, I actually give her a little push. I says, my dear, go down and get your brother.

I'm going to his bedroom. She went down. She brought him out.

Lou Gehrig's disease. Wouldn't go for the first. Wouldn't even go.

This has been going on a while. Wouldn't face it. When the doctor wanted him to come back for the final assessment of a situation, he wouldn't go.

So his wife, my wife went. The doctor says, and the man that's sick won't come? It irritated him. Don't blame him.

Well, he says, I'll tell you. He says he got maybe, maybe a year and a half. My friend, he didn't have a month and a half.

He sat down across the table from me, wouldn't speak. Couldn't speak. Couldn't speak.

I said, Shirley, give him a card. Tell him to write down what he wanted. She says, he won't write.

I says, he'll write. I put the card over. I said, Henry, what model is the John Deere tractor that you bought? He wrote it down.

6200, he set it back. What year is the tractor, Henry? Put it down. 2002, whatever it was.

He could do it. Finally got to a point, don't ever you go this way. Don't ever, young man, you go this way.

Or she just would go and read him the Bible. Three days before he went into eternity, she read the whole of God's way of salvation to him. Poured it into his ear.

You go to that kitchen, and to catch his breath, he would go at six foot two, great big fellow, push himself up like this, catching his breath. Didn't want to go to the hospital. Something told him I'm not coming back.

Ambulance came. He had no choice. He had to go.

Motioned to him a minute. He staggered around that property, and he looked at his little tractor. Looked at two pickup trucks.

Dry neither one of them. Didn't need them anymore. Went over and looked at some of the toys in life.

Looked at his house. Looked around. Went over, and he climbed into the ambulance himself.

Laid down, and he was dead the next day at noon hour. To have that much strength to do that, and to be in eternity in 24 hours. His other sister, driving into Bangor, flight was late.

My wife went down to pick him up. Got back at 10 o'clock, said, that's kind of late. She says you better go oversee him.

She went over. She doesn't know what's going on. She doesn't know if he knew she was there or not.

That's Joan, Joan Gustafson. Next morning, I'm out here having meetings. I wasn't even home.

I was in Ontario having meetings. Next morning, she says, why don't you go and see Henry? I'll do dishes, clean up. We live right behind the hospital, and I'll come over.

Sure, she says. That sounds good. Shortly finishing the dishes, she gets a call.

She says, your brother's dead. Now what? No funeral. A viewing.

I would have gone home for a funeral, but I don't call a viewing an urn of ashes at the front of a building and everybody in there is talking about business and what they're doing. Gone into eternity. How about you tonight? Well, you say, I've got more respect for the gospel.

I've got more interest in that. My friends, it's a costly business to resist this light, the person of the light, the plight of the light. But something else, there's the penetration of the light.

And I will touch on the persistence of the light. First of all, the light is a person. The Lord Jesus spoke of himself as lighting every man that comes into this world.

I don't think as Christians we can conceive what this world would be like had not the Lord of life and glory, the light of the world, ever come into it. Any wonder that when he is still in that resurrection morning, Mary arises when it was yet dark. World's a dark place, boy.

You'll slumber, you'll go through it, you're going to make it, you're going to do this. David Hunt stood on this platform when Mr. Albert Hall had gospel meetings, it must have been a couple years ago because I was at your conference. David Hunt was just a little like you, a little careless, a little indifferent.

Come into a gospel meeting and there's a man by the name of Doug Howard likely that stood on this platform too. Mr. Howard was a gentleman, very mild sort of an individual, uncharacteristic of him. He looked back in that corner, he knew the Hunt family.

David would be back there, his arms folded, almost putting his head back like he was going to go to sleep. Finally, Mr. Howard had all he could take. And out of that meeting, he said, David, my boy, wake up or you'll be in hell.

Oh, David said, I come up in that chair, I thought I'll never go back to that hall again. Oh, he got thinking about it. He thought Mr. Hunt has more, or Mr. Howard has more interest in my soul than I do.

That kept gnawing, gnawing at his conscience. He went back. David got saved.

He's in the Word today. Isn't that something? What will it take to wake you up? I have no plans of doing, I've never done the meeting that. I have no plans of doing that.

But what will it take to wake you up? When this light has shone all around you, parents that are saved, Sunday school teacher that was saved. Come on, you know that. You go to school with boys that don't know anything about what we're talking about in this meeting tonight.

The light's never come near them. Can you resist that light? Can you turn your back on that light? Not only the penetration of the light, the persistence of the light. That's what people don't like, the persistence.

Phone vibrates. Oh yeah, there he is. That preacher texting me again, want me to come tonight.

I got a boy thinking that way right now over in Ontario. You get there and something else happens. You drive down the road, there's a man sitting in the meeting, he'll testify of that.

Sees a gospel text in the field. When everybody else is driving by it, speaks to him. Breaks him down.

And he comes to a conclusion. Either I come to know Christ as my Savior, come into the goodness, marvelous light, or die in my sins and go down to hell. Hard, my friend, to think of anybody sitting in a gospel meeting like this, to die in your sins without a Savior.

When he says, I am the light of the world, he is friend. He shines in various ways, various forms, at various times, but just like that sun, whether the clouds are between us or not, constantly the light shines. It was back earlier this year.

It was in the wintertime. Mr. Larry Wilkins was sitting in his home in Pachuca, Kentucky, him and his wife watching a little evening TV. So they're watching the newscast from the local television network there.

They noticed that a plane had crashed somewhere near the Pachuca, Kentucky, airport. He said to her, Larry, we didn't hear that. I didn't hear anything.

Oh, didn't he? He no sooner said that, he says, is somebody at our door? Yeah, she says, you better check. Mr. Wilkins walked over to that door, looked out that door, and there stood a little seven-year-old girl, a little seven-year-old girl. Sailor Gutzler was her name.

Leg was bleeding. The other one was scraped, scratched. Clothes were torn.

Mr. Wilkins says, can I help you? Yeah, she said, we had a terrible plane crash. My mom and dad are dead out there in that plane. My cousins are dead.

I'm the only one left. He says, well, come on in. And the man knew a Wilton in front of the little girl.

And he called the authorities, told them what had happened. They said, well, just keep her there. Make her comfortable.

We're coming. And they discovered the wreck. They're coming back from Florida, flying a Cherokee Six, single-engine airplane.

Whatever went wrong, they were talking to air traffic control, something went wrong. I'm not sure what went wrong. That plane crashed on its approach, coming into the Pachuca airport, just so close to it, yet missed it.

They went back through the briar and the bushes. How does a seven-year-old girl that ends up inverted in an airplane, with parents dead and cousins dead, gets herself out of that belt, out through the door of the plane, walk through all, in the dark of night, all that underbrush? How does she ever do it? Of course, the radio station didn't want to find out the story from Sailor herself. Oh, she says, it was the light.

It was the light. She says, I saw that light. I kept my eye on that light.

I just went to the light. Mr. Wilkins said, he said, when I signed the contract with Kentucky Utilities for that Dust Bowl Dawn Lamp, I wondered if the expense of it was worth it. He said, I put it there for security, but it saved a girl's life.

My friend, the light of the world is a costly business. It costs Calvary. When the Lord Jesus spoke this, he had in mind Calvary.

The world thought they were putting out the light of the world when they crucified the Son of God. Only did he shine brighter, my friend. Oh, the glory of the cross tonight.

The finished work of Christ. Let me tell you about the person of the light. Nice to know that I have that person.

He's mine, a Savior, all to myself. Why would you not want him tonight? See, you young folks sitting up here at the front, just like I used to sit in gospel meetings. Come from a large family connection.

Used to be over 60 of us sitting in those front rows. Mr. Robert Orr remembers that, because I can remember him preaching. Don't know if I ever told him that, but I do.

I don't want to tell you what year that was. And we'd sit there. Most of us got saved.

Maybe two or three out of 64 of us not saved. You know why? Not because we were good, we were bad. Whole bunch of us.

All sinners. Deserving of hell. But I want to tell you there's tremendous light in our home.

The Bible says there was a light in the dwellings of the children of Israel, the Egyptians. There was darkness. I knew in the home I was raised like the home you're raised in.

I knew there was a light in it. My father didn't care who came through the door. That book, that was opened.

Men come to buy chickens, come to sell fertilizer, come to sell seed corn. He says, have a seat. We're reading our Bible.

They sat and they listened while we read the Bible. I used to feel sorry for them, because they looked so awkward. Oh, they looked so out of it.

Oh, it must have been grueling. I can see them yet, the look on their faces. I think, poor fellow.

But the worst is coming yet. Couldn't get down and pray. And those poor fellows, those knees buckle and down they get.

My dad prayed for them. You know what would come to my mind? I can't go to hell from a home like this. Can you? Can you? You say, we don't have a home like that.

Why don't you tell your dad you should? I thank God for that. My father's 96 years of age. Had a call from my brother in North Carolina yesterday.

He says he's slipping. He's going out. They moved him.

Man, I owe a lot to that man. Took me to gospel meetings just like you. Didn't want to go to them.

But I always wanted to be saved. But I didn't like going to the gospel, the meeting. You know why I didn't like the meeting? Because the light got too close.

Let me tell you about a woman in John chapter, well, Acts chapter 24. There's a man by the name of Felix. Called his favorite preacher.

I think so. Not too many call for a preacher to come preach to them. Felix did.

Didn't change Paul. Paul preached righteousness, temperance, judgment to come. And there was a woman draped on his arm that had no interest in that.

I almost could see her, if I had enough imagination, saying, Uh-uh, Felix. This won't fit with our lifestyle. And it didn't.

Paul got too close in the preaching. The light got too close. It was doing its work.

And he cut it off. Oh, he said, go thy way. He says, go thy way.

The words that he used are very strong. Out of here. Just get out of here.

When I have a convenient time, I'll call for thee. He was having it. And when did he call? He never called.

He never called. There's calls I've long waited for. Long waited for.

Gospel meetings after gospel meetings. Before we had caller ID and that sort of thing, I used to say to the children, stay off the phone. I'm expecting a call.

Sometimes you got those calls. I can remember right in Iowa. I can take you somewhere.

I saw a girl, a few here today. I can remember right the spot on some of your roads. I can take you right to the spot.

So could John Meakin. So could Brody Thibodeau. Just a minute.

There's a call. Pick up the phone. It's quiet.

You think, well, I got a bad cell reception. No. You hear a little voice.

Mr. McCandless, I just got saved. Do you hear that? I just got saved. Isn't that wonderful? I wonder if that will ever happen to you.

That call never came. He cut the light off. There's a woman in John chapter 4. My, she's like little Sailor Gutzler.

Oh, she welcomed that light. She went to a well just to get water. Just like another.

Just like another day. Just a day in, day out business. She got there, and there's somebody different at the well.

You know who was at the well? The light of the world. The light of the world. He never ever ceased to be anything else but the light of the world.

Calvary didn't make him the light of the world. He came from the essence of glory as the only light of the world. She looked at that stranger, and he asked, water.

Well, that well was deep. She had never been satisfied at that well. And I don't care what well you go to tonight, my friend.

It will not satisfy you, dear boy. It won't. My brother-in-law had every toy that a fellow could ever want.

He did. And he enjoyed them. He had fun.

Didn't know a dime. Debts were paid. And finally, they get in a conversation, the Lord Jesus does.

It's getting a little closer. You know, we read it because we know what's coming. The woman didn't know what was coming.

He said, oh, go call your husband. Whoa. Well, she thought, this isn't easy.

Oh, I don't have one. Oh. Well, you've had five.

And the one you have now is not your husband. In that sense, thou truly. You know, she had a choice right then.

What she could have done? She could have cut off the light and said, excuse me? Excuse me? You have stepped outside of the box. You've gone beyond what is your business, sir. I will see you.

She didn't. She welcomed that light. She welcomed that light.

That night sitting in the darkness of my bedroom, even though a summer sun was setting, it was shining in the room. I welcomed that light. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.

Thank God. I'm the lost one. I'm the one that he's come to seek and to save.

I welcome that light. There's a young girl sitting in this gospel meeting tonight. Texted me the other day.

Just got saved. She said, I know I got saved. She says, my phone got saved.

She says, all the old world songs are gone. You know why? The light of the world came in. The computer got saved.

All the garbage has gone off that too. Must be a pretty clean computer. Come on, you admit it.

Your parents knew what you've looked at. You think it's all hid, just like this woman. No, she had a choice.

Just like you. She could pretend everything was fine. Just check out.

She welcomed it. Listen to what she says. Come see a man that told me all things that ever I did.

Is not this the Christ? And so powerful was the testimony of that woman. That others were brought to Christ. It's a wonderful thing.

Wonderful thing to be a Christian. Thank God, brethren, we'll never be in hell. Wonderful to be saved.

If there's anything better in life, I do not know what it is. I'm not saying that because I'm a preacher. I'm saying it because I've experienced it.

The person of the light. The plight of the light. There's a devil working against that light.

He had his way, there'd be no light here. There'd be no testimony in Stout, Heightsville, or any of these areas around here. Cedar Falls.

He doesn't want no lampstand. He doesn't want anything that reflects the light. Wants nothing about the light of the world.

He's the God of this world who had blinded the minds of them that believe not. Lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. That's our prayer.

That you, your darkness, and your rebellion tonight. That that light of the gospel would shine into that soul of yours. Lest you be in hell.

The person of the light, the plight of the light, or the penetration. That's okay. It's okay until you're in a meeting and you feel like you're the only one there.

That's how I felt. I didn't know if there was anybody else there. To be honest with you, I didn't even care.

I wanted it. I wanted it. And I received it.

Trusted Christ as my Savior. The penetration of that light. And the persistence of that light.

Oh, thank God for that. Those brethren, some of them older men tripping up that stairs. Going into this room over here.

Your name prayed for. You're going to go to hell with that? Back where you live? Is it possible? I sat in a man's home. He's in eternity now.

Most of his family saved except two. Dad never got it as far as I know. Poor old Joel Balblum.

His sisters, who I know. One of them's husband is in the work. The other husband is an overseer in the assembly.

We're pushing him into the, running alongside of the gurney. He was going into the operating room. They said, Dad, trust Christ.

Dad, don't die in your sins. Trust the Savior. The year before that, having gospel meetings there, I went to his house.

There's a worn spot. I don't know if it was from the heels of his shoe. By the chair where his mother-in-law used to sit.

And in his kindness, not only did he make his children go to meetings, but she stayed in the house. But she prayed for Joel and prayed for Joel. And prayed for Joel.

I said, Joel, see that spot there? Tell me that's not. Tell me that's not where your mother-in-law wore her knees out praying that her son-in-law would never be in hell. Just sat there and shook his head.

And he'd come to the gospel meetings. Oh yeah, kids had to go. Had to go to Sunday school.

And in spite of all that, died in his sins. Died in the darkness. Died in the darkness.

Let me ask you tonight. Are you telling me? Are you telling me the only light that you'll ever have in your life? Is what you hear from a gospel platform? What you hear from a caring parent? A loving Sunday school teacher? Is that the only light you'll ever have? Or is there someone here and you can't take the darkness anymore? You want the one who says, I am the light of the world. Let me say, let me tell you.

He's never turned anybody away. He says, oh, the father given me shall come to me. Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out.

Shall we pray? Our father, we are indebted tonight. Something about it thrills our souls to realize we've been brought into this marvelous light. And this light has come into us.

To thank our father that once souls so dark have been illuminated. We thank you for the light of thy word. Everything about God is light.

Everything about this world is darkness. We thank thee for the one who could declare with all of his great I am's as we know them to be. I am the light of this world.

Bless thy word. Thank you for reminding us from that beautiful text in Isaiah. The only one has to realize that they have sinned.

And there's one who has died for the salvation of all. Bless thy word we praise. We thank you for this wonderful day we've had together as Christians.

Enjoying the ministry of the word of God. Enjoying our father the fellowship of saints for which we give thanks in his name. Amen.

We are going to sing this beautiful hymn number 333. Just love that was shed for me. And love of which becomes dearly, O Lamb of God, I love.

Just as I am and waiting now to rid my soul of wonderment, to leave this world and let this world, O Lamb of God, I come. Binding with faith and truth with love, O Lamb of God, I come. Just as I am, for rest of my life, my Christian feelings are all mine.

Yea, all I need in thee to find, O Lamb of God, I am. All I need in thee to find, O Lamb of God, I am. All I need in thee to find, O Lamb of God, I am.