On those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.

It is that time of the moth again, yes it is time for the linked Bible study. The linked Bible study is a partnership between my friend Caron and myself where we both post about the same Bible passage. This month the passage has been selected by Caron and the selected passage is Isaiah 9:1-7, click the link to read it online.

Although the passage is verse 1 to verse 7, I actually only really want to look at verse 2.

Isaiah 9:2 (KJV)
     The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: 
     they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. 

Isaiah 9:2 (MSG)
        The people who walked in darkness
            have seen a great light.
        For those who lived in a land of deep shadows-
            light! sunbursts of light! 

Isaiah 9:2 (NIV)
     The people walking in darkness
     have seen a great light;
     on those living in the land of deep darkness
     a light has dawned.


All three translations I have looked at for this verse start out the same, the people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. It may be no coincidence that I wrote about light bulbs just the other day, but it was not planned by me. I find the analogy of light quite striking when I read it, mostly because I have spent so long studying light and its properties in the past. Light is something that we all know and make use of in our day to day lives, but actually understanding it and how it works is actually quite complex. There are a lot of physical laws that govern it and when it comes down to it we can not even be sure of the form light takes, but wave particle duality is another topic completely. I do find however that the Bible can be like this at times, easy to read the words, but often difficult to discern the full meaning without careful study.

But the description of the Messiah, Jesus, as a great light is for me amazing. Light is what we see the world by, without it we would be blind. We would be blind with little idea about the world without light, we would be unable to see and be reduced to scrabbling around in the dark. However with light we can see everything from tiny bacteria up to Galaxies and everything in between.

Jesus is the light of the world, by Him we are able to see. Not in the sense that our eyes see the world but in the sense that through Jesus we can see what is right, what is Godly and holy. Without Jesus we are just blindly following the laws and stumbling around trying our best. With Him we can see our sinful ways and are then able to do something about it. By Jesus we are no longer those who dwell in the land of the shadow of death. Instead we are born again, able to see and able to be everything that we should be.

Yes we should recognise that Jesus is the promised Messiah, we should remember what was said about Him by the prophets of old:

Isaiah 9:6 (KJV)
    For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. 

He is all of these things and more, He is our God incarnate and He cam and died so that we may have everlasting life with the Father. In this time of Advent in the run up to Christmas we should celebrate His birth, we should remember the promises God made and fulfilled through Jesus. But we should also remember what we are without Him, we should remember that He is the light that illuminates all and that there is no darkness that He can not shine into, no shadow He can not chase away. Remember this Christmas time that;

Isaiah 9:2 (NIV)
     The people walking in darkness
     have seen a great light;
     on those living in the land of deep darkness
     a light has dawned.


As I mentioned at the beginning this post is linked to a corresponding post on Surrendering, please take the time to visit the site and read the post. Also if you are interested in reading the past linked blog posts either look at the tab above or follow the Linked Bible Studies link. As always feel free to leave any comments and I hope you come back again soon.