Pentecost and the Light of the World

The Gospel Reading of the Eastern Church for the Feast of Pentecost (John 7:37-52; 8
:12) includes these very famous words from Jesus, “I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12) What darkness is Jesus talking about? What life does he promise to give? The whole Feast of Pentecost hinges on these two questions and for that matter, so does the Christian faith and gospel. 

Darkness more than anything else in confusion and chaos, the absence of God and his powerful love filled grace. The Bible opens with the great problem of darkness, but God through creation, fills his new world with light and overcomes the darkness. But what does man, the one charged to help God fill the world with light do? He disobeys God and returns to darkness, to the land of exile away from God’s presence. This is the result sin and idolatry, they move us further from God and one another, thus breaking our fundamental bonds of relationships with each other. This is at the heart of the story of the Tower of Babel in the Book of Genesis (11:1-9). Here Man is trying again to become like God and find his way out of darkness and exile by getting to the heavens and making a name for themselves. What does God do in response? He destroys the Tower and scatters the people over the face of the each because of their idolatry of self, their desire to be something “more” even without God. He confuses their language, so they may not attempt this little scheme again. This story then comes full circle with the Day of Pentecost. (Acts Chapter 2) God sends the Holy Spirit upon his new Church and instead of darkness the people see a great light, the flaming fire of the Holy Spirit. Instead of chaos, confusion, and exile; the people from many nations hear the Gospel message about Jesus Christ in their own language. What was scattered by sin, is now brought together by love. The love of God revealed in Jesus through his disciples for all the world to see and hear. The power of life and transformation is then allowed by the grace of God to be unleased into the world. 

This new “life” is what Jesus is talking about when he tells us at the end of Luke’s Gospel, “You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high.” (24:48-49) We as God’s baptized and faithful disciples are now longer clothed with the skins of dead animals like Adam and Eve (Gen 3:21), no we are now clothed with the newness of life, life given to us by God through the gift of the Holy Spirit. We are told that God “clothed” Adam and Eve in death, now he has “clothed” us in the power of his Spirit. Yes, God had been faithful through the work of Jesus Christ to restore his creation to be how he always created it to be. As Saint Paul tells us so clearly in Galatians, “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (3:27-29) We therefore must not be like those at Babel and try to make a name for ourselves, God has already given us his name at baptism. We indeed have been imprinted with the name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Let us then not return to the darkness that God has rescued us from but let us live in the light of life that Jesus Christ calls us to. Let us truly be his faithful witness to the ends of the earth.