Isaiah 60:1 Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the
Lord rises upon you.

 Well, it's a fact.  Christmas is now officially over.  Please note that
Christmas officially ends, according to the church year, on January 5th.
And then on January 6th a whole new season of the church year begins.
That new season is called "Epiphany."
 Epiphany is a word that means: the revealing.  Typically the day of
Epiphany is a day where we hear of the baptism of Jesus.  That is
considered the first revealing of Jesus as the Savior because as Jesus
approached John for baptism John cried out to the crowds: "Look, the Lamb
of God who takes away the sin of the world."  But it is especially
considered the revealing of Jesus because at the baptism of Jesus God the
Father himself spoke from heaven and proclaimed: "This is my son, whom I
love; with him I am well pleased."
 Now I don't know about you, but I'm thinking to myself that if I had
been in the presence of John when all of this occurred I would have
certainly turned my attention to Jesus.  Scripture describes the scene by
saying the heavens were opened, a dove came and landed on Jesus and then
this voice was heard.  What you would have seen was Jesus standing on the
bank of the Jordan River surrounded by the rays of the sun, a dove flying
in those rays and landing on him and then the voice.  Now if all you
would have heard was something like thunder, you still have my attention
because of everything else going on.  Personally, I believe that everyone
there clearly heard a voice that said, This is my son, whom I love; with
him I am well pleased."  I don't know about you, but God has got my
attention at this point.  And when God also said, "Listen to him," I am
thinking to myself that I would definitely pay attention to Jesus.
 So why don't people today pay attention to Jesus?  Why don't they listen
to his words and follow what he said?  Why don't they take his message
seriously?  The answer is really quite simple.  They don't believe!  They
don't believe who and what Jesus is.  Worse yet, they haven't paid
attention to what Jesus is really about and because of that they think
Jesus is just like all the other gods and their religions of the world.
But he is not.  Jesus and his message is different from the run of the
mill work righteous schlock of the false religions.  Just how different I
believe is made clear in God's Word.
 To make sure that we grasp that Jesus is different we are going to look
at how God spoke of the Savior.  This epiphany we are going to look at
the Old Testament prophecies of God's salvation and see just what they
say.  I believe that through these words it can be made clear that Jesus
is different, his message is different and that this difference is what
we are about.  Our first lesson is from the book of Isaiah.  Our theme
will be: ATTENTION WORLD!  1st. Pay attention.  2nd. The Light has come.
3rd. He is the glory of the Lord.
The verse before us starts simply by saying, "Arise, shine."  What is
most interesting about those words is that they are addressed to the
world, a world that is described as slumbering and in darkness.  That of
course, helps us to understand what is being said here.  God is calling
upon the world to wake up but more than just wake up, God is calling upon
the world to be alert and ready.  In other words, these two opening words
have the force and impact of telling the world to stand up and pay
attention.  Stand up and pay attention because something wonderful and
exciting is going to take place.
 What is wonderful and exciting is revealed in the book of Isaiah.
Isaiah was a prophet of the Lord who lived some 700 years before the
coming of the Christ child.  Yet Isaiah was given the privilege of
revealing in increasing measure clear pictures of what the world could
expect and find in this Savior to be born.  When one reads Isaiah one
finds that there is a clear shift in the message starting with chapter
40.  Before this chapter the predominant message was of God's judgment
upon the Israelites and the world for turning their back on his love.
From chapter 40 on, the predominant message would become how God was
going to deal with sinful and unbelieving mankind.
 In increasing measure Isaiah reveals the promised one of God and what he
would do.  Our chapter is one of those revelations.  In our chapter and
the verses before us we are going to learn just what it was the God was
going to bring about in the Messiah.  No wonder this verse starts with
the clear call: "Arise, shine."
What is it that we are to stand up and pay attention to?  Our text tells
us: "For your light has come."  Such simple words and yet words filled
with meaning.  Consider just the verb for a moment.  The verb "has come"
is in a tense that conveys that the light has come, is present now and is
going to have a lasting impact.  The importance of this is so that we see
that the light's coming is not because we have stood up and paid
attention, but rather is because the light is and has been at work.  The
light is moving toward its goal, and indeed, the light is going to have a
lasting and eternal impact on the world.  All of this is important
because it then helps us identify and pinpoint what the light is.
We can also use the beginning of verse 2 to help identify this light.
Verse 2 begins, "See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is
over the peoples."  Here is a direct contrast to the light.  The light is
going to come because of the darkness, the thick darkness that plagues
the world.  Listen to these other verses of Scripture and see if you
can't understand what the darkness is.  Proverbs 4:19 "But the way of the
wicked is like deep darkness."  John 3:19, "This is the verdict: Light
has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because
their deeds were evil."  Ephesians 5:8a and 11, "For you were once
darkness, but now you are light in the Lord...Have nothing to do with the
fruitless deeds of darkness."
Those passages help us to understand that the darkness referred to is the
realm of sin and the destructive force that sin is, including the horror
of eternal death and damnation.  It is because of this darkness that the
light  has been promised and is coming.  God wants to put an end to our
greatest problem!  He wants to end the darkness that Satan, sin and death
have brought into our lives.  He wants to bring us light.
Now please do note that the light of this verse is called "your light."
What is most fascinating about this is that the light is clearly defined
in the text.  The light does not emanate or begin with us but comes from
an outside source and yet the light is called ours!  The force of this
pronoun can be seen.  We will possess this light.  We will be given this
light.  In other words all the properties, all the marvel and goodness of
this light comes into our possession.  And now it is clear that we need
to fully grasp just what this light is.
Listen to what the verses of this chapter say.  "Your light has come, and
the glory of the Lord rises upon you...the Lord rises upon you and his
glory appears over you...Then you will know that I, the Lord, am your
Savior, your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob...the sun will no more be
your light by day, nor will the brightness of the moon shine on you, for
the Lord will be your everlasting light and your God will be your glory."
It is in these words that we see who and what the Light is.  The Light is
the Lord our God, our Savior and our Redeemer.  The Light is the Mighty
One of Jacob, he who had been promised as the Anointed One of Israel.  In
other words, the Light is none other that Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Isn't that exactly in keeping with what we know of Jesus?  He is no mere
boy, no mere prophet who is just given the words to say.  Jesus is the
Lord.  Jesus is the Son of God and the exact representation of the
Father.  He 1:3 tells us that, "The Son is the radiance of God's glory
and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his
powerful word."  Jesus is the light that has come.  In John 1:1-4 we
hear, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things
were made, without him nothing was made that has been made.  In him was
life, and that life was the light of men.
This whole prophecy is about how God is going to take care of the problem
of sin.  He is not going to put the burden and the work on us...We can
not do it!  He is going to take the burden on himself.  He is going to
defeat the darkness.  He is going to be our Savior and Redeemer.  He is
going to take care of the problem in a way that mankind couldn't even
dream of.  He is going to win the victory and then give us that victory
purely out of grace and love.
Here is where the Christian faith radically departs from the rest of the
world's religions.  The world's religions are about what you must do and
how you must appease the demands of the gods in order to earn their
favor.  Pure Christianity proclaims that you could never appease God,
never meet his demands and so God in pure love and grace took every step
and action needed to secure your salvation despite you.  I can't help it
that so many Christian churches want to preach work righteousness and
that they want to teach a message of what you must do in Jesus in order
to be saved.  That is not the message of God.  The message of God is that
He has done it all.  He has made atonement and He has granted eternal
life.
He did all of this in his Son Jesus.  Jesus came to die as the atoning
sacrifice for our sins.  He came to pay for our sins and appease the
righteous demands of his Father under the law.  Jesus then gives us His
righteousness and perfection.  In the book of Revelation, where the
multitude of white robed saints is seen before the throne of God, the
question is asked, "Who are they?  The answer given is, "These are they
who have...washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the
lamb."  It is in and because of Jesus that we are given eternal life.
Later on in the book of Revelation another picture of God's heaven and
our eternal destiny is given.  These words are used there, "There will be
no more night.  They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of
the sun, for the Lord God will give them light."  Did you note that this
is the same picture that Isaiah gave?  Our salvation is of and from the
Lord and what He has done.
No wonder we are urged, "Arise, shine!"  God has promised and sent His
Son as the Light of the world.  It is the light of salvation, the light
of God's love being poured out upon us.  It is the eternal light of
heaven promised in Jesus and given through the forgiveness of sins.  It
is the light that leads and grants wisdom, the wisdom to see the
difference between light and dark.  It is the light that is the beauty of
Jesus, the wonder of his grace, the sureness of his promises and the
light we get to reflect as God's forgiven children.  Yes, arise, shine,
YOUR LIGHT, Jesus has come.  Amen.