“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do men light a lamp and put it under the peck-measure, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all that are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:14-16).

Light is another illustration or word picture that Jesus used. In Jesus's time, they used lamps. The wick of a lamp is a very, very small thing (a bulb is a very small thing today). But it lights up a whole room! It was not the size of the wick or the size of the bulb, but the intensity of light that would come forth from it that mattered. Again the emphasis is not on quantity but quality. There are zero watt bulbs that emit such a dim light that you can hardly see anything from them, and then there are powerful bulbs about the same size, like halogen bulbs, which light up a whole street. A bulb can be very low wattage or very high wattage. The important thing is not its size, but its power - the intensity of power with which it can light something up. And Jesus says, “You are the light of the world.”

The world is in darkness, and there must be nothing of that darkness in me. If I am a bulb and the darkness of the world is in me, then I am like a broken bulb. A lot of churches have Christians who are like broken bulbs. Once upon a time they were burning, but now they are broken: they are backslidden and their light is not shining anymore. What is that light? It says here, “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in heaven.” In those days, light came through a lamp that was constantly burning with oil that enabled the wick to burn, and the oil is the picture of the Holy Spirit.

One mark of a person anointed with the Holy Spirit is that he does good. It says in Acts 10:38 that when Jesus was anointed with the Holy Spirit and power, He went about doing good. He didn’t go around collecting money from people for His ministry like a lot of so-called “anointed” preachers do today. He was exactly the opposite of that. He went around doing good, and He never charged for it. People voluntarily gave Him gifts without His asking and He accepted them, but He would never make His needs known to anyone. He went about doing good without any charge.

He says, “Let your light so shine upon men so they may see your good works and not glorify you, but God!” If you do good works to get honor for yourself, to get glory for yourself, that’s actually darkness. And lot of good works that many Christians do are actually advertisements for themselves, to get honor for themselves. Their organization or their ministry is actually darkness because there is no glory that goes to the Father in heaven. Instead, glory comes to that particular organization or that particular man. But Jesus said, “Let people see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” That is the true light, where a person is doing good and as a result of that, Christ is glorified, not the individual.

This is what it means to manifest light. In John 1:4, this light is described like this: “In Jesus Christ was life, and that life was the Light of men.” So the light is not a doctrine, a teaching, or a particular message - it’s a life. It’s the very life of Jesus coming forth from us through the Holy Spirit. The life of Jesus coming forth from us is like an old lamp that was lit with oil, giving off light.

Jesus said very clearly in John 8:12, “I am the light of the world; he who follows me shall never walk in darkness.” Whenever a person is walking in darkness, according to John 8:12, we can say without a doubt that that person is not following Jesus. If you say, “Well, I am a bit dark right now,” the reason is that you may not be following Jesus. Please do not confuse walking in darkness with being unsure of God’s will. Even Jesus was confused about the Father’s will, being perplexed in the garden of Gethsemane. That’s why He prayed for one hour, “Father what is Your will, should I drink this cup or not?” That’s not darkness. Perplexity is part of the life of faith, but darkness is something else, something contrary to the life of Jesus. Jesus said, “He who follows Me will never walk in darkness but have the light of life, because I am the light of the world.”

Then He went on to say that He was the light of the world only for certain period of time. “While I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). How long was He in the world? He was in the world for 33 ½ years. That’s all.

People may be super-spiritual and say, “Isn’t Christ in the world right now?” Well, if you read John 17:11, He says, “I am no longer in this world.” We have to get rid of our super-spirituality. Just before Jesus left this earth and went to heaven, on the eve of the cross, He said, “I am no more in the world. But these disciples are here in the world. They are in the world, but I am no more here. I am coming to You, Holy Father, so I am not in the world anymore.” So when He said in John chapter 9, “As long as I am in the world,” He was talking about that 33 ½ year period where He manifested life. After He went up to heaven, who is the light of the world today?

Matthew 5:14 says, “You are the light of the world.” If somebody were to ask me, “Who is the light of the world?”, the Scriptural answer would be to say, “Me. I am the light of the world, along with others who follow Jesus.” Have you ever thought of it like that? Have you ever thought of answering the question, “Who is the light of the world?” by saying “Me and others who follow Jesus”? That is the right answer.

It is very easy to say “Oh, don’t look at me. Just look at Jesus.” But He is not in the earth! He said, “I am the light of the world only as long as I am in the world.” So many Christians haven’t read the Scriptures properly, and they get many types of wrong ideas in their heads that are from their own understanding and are completely wrong. Just like God depended 100% on Jesus Christ during those 33 ½ years to manifest His life perfectly, He is depending on His church - His disciples on earth - to manifest that same light perfectly now.

“Let people see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”