Let us turn again to God's Word
in the portion we were considering this morning here in the Gospel
according to St. John chapter 3 and I'll read
verses 9, 20 and 21 The text we were considering
earlier, here then in John 3, 19-21. And this is a condemnation. Light is coming to the world
and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds
were evil. For everyone that doeth evil hateth the light,
neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved
or discovered. But he that doeth truth cometh
to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they
are wrought in God. As I said this morning, we do
have a contrast here between two characters in a sense it's
not dissimilar to the portion we were looking at a couple of
weeks ago on that Lord's Day morning when we considered the
words at the end of Isaiah 50. And there in verses 10 and 11, the child of heaven, contrasted
with the child of hell, the child of heaven walking in darkness,
the child of hell walking in a light that he had kindled himself,
and yet he would have that sorrow of being ultimately rejected
by the Lord God. Well, there's a contrast here
also in the gospel as we read these words. between one who
loves the light and one who hates the light of course the contrast
is evidence by the use of that little conjunction at the beginning
of verse 21 the word but everyone that doeth evil hateth
the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be
reproved but he that doeth truth cometh to the light that his
deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God. The context, if I remind you
briefly of the context here, it's this discourse between the
Lord Jesus and a ruler of the Jews, a man called Nicodemus. I'm sure it's a passage we're
all so familiar with. The great portion where the Lord
emphasizes the necessity, the importance of the sinner being
born again, born from above. But now the Lord graciously enters
into discussion with the man. This man had come under the cover
of darkness because he was a ruler, he was a member of the Sanhedrin. and he obviously doesn't want
others to know that he is consulting with this man Jesus of Nazareth,
so he comes in the dark. And as I said this morning, here
at the end of the chapter, the Lord speaks of darkness and of
light. It's interesting because In these
words that we've read, the text from verse 9 through 21, you
may notice that five times we have the word light. There's
a certain emphasis really upon the light, the importance of
the light, as previously the Lord speaks of the necessity
of the new birth. So here He emphasizes the light,
and of course He is that One who is the light. I am the light
of the worlds he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness
but shall have the light of life those words that we read just
now in chapter 8 verse 12 that great I am statement amongst
other statements that the Lord makes as he comes to be the one
who will reveal God the great Jehovah the I am that I am and
so we said something this morning with regards to how God is light
and in him is no darkness at all and with the coming of the
Lord Jesus we have that full and that final revealing of God,
God who at sundry times and in diverse manner spake in times
past unto the fathers by the prophets, that in these last
days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of
all things, by whom also he made the worlds, who being the brightness
of his glory and the express image of his person. always the express image of God
is the brightness of the glory of God in Christ we have the
the final revealing of God and we see it here in the previous
verse, verse 18 and those words at the end of that verse he that
believeth on him that is on the Son is not condemned but he that
believeth not is condemned already because he hath not believed
in the name of the only begotten Son of God the only begotten
Son of God that one who has revealed God so full that there can be
no further revealing of God and so of course you don't need me
to remind you that Mohammed is a false prophet there's no prophet
after the Lord Jesus Christ He is a fulfillment of the prophetic
office that we have in the Old Testament Scriptures. In these
last days God has spoken by His Son. And God can give no greater
revelation of Himself than in Him who is the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. We have the coming
of the light, as it were, the final revealing of God, and we
remarked this morning that with Christ it's an extensive revelation,
whereas the revelation of God in the Old Testament is very
much confined in a certain sense to the nation of Israel. They're a typical people, of
course, a type of the true Israel of God, but how God favored them. He showeth His word unto Jacob,
His statutes and His judgments unto Israel. He hath not dealt
so with any nation, and as for His judgments they have not known
them. For you only have I known, He
says through Amos, addressing the children of Israel, you only
have I known among all the families of the earth. But now the revelation
reaches beyond Israel, reaches to the Gentile nations I am the
light of the world, is what Christ says. A light to lighten the
Gentiles. That's what we have, it's something
that is final, but it extends now to all the peoples, all the
nations, every tribe, every tongue, every people over the face of
the earth. And as it is extensive, so it
is also, we said this morning, that that is inward. It's an
internal revelation of God. He that followeth me shall not
walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. Oh, there's
that light that is life-giving in the souls. It's a light of
grace. In thy light shall we see light. What a revelation
it is when God is pleased to shine into the heart of the sinner. that God who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness. That's what God does in creation.
He but declares the word, let there be light, and there is
light. And God who commanded that light to shine out of darkness,
Paul says, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the
knowledge of His glory in the face, that is, in the person.
in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And how Paul knew it,
he pleads God, he says, to reveal his Son in me, or that in shining,
that inward revelation that comes into the soul of the sinner.
This is that light then, the light of God, the final revelation
of God, an extensive revealing of God reaching out even to the
Gentile nations and that that is wrought in the very heart
of the sinner. And it's all the manifestation
of the glory of God in the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
yet men hate it. All of us by nature, that's our
fallen nature, we hate it. What is our condition as we come
into this world? We're alienated from God, enemies
in our minds. Without exception, we're born
dead in trespasses and sins. And how solemn are the words
that the Lord speaks here in the text. Light is coming to
the world. Men loved darkness rather than
light because their deeds were evil. for everyone that doeth
evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his
deed should be reproved. But, and it's this 21st verse
that I really want to turn to and center your attention on
this evening for a while. What a word is this? But he that
doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest,
that they are wrought in God. Hating the light, we might say,
is the mark of one who is dead in sin, dead in unbelief. They
hate the light. But what we have here in verse
21 is the mark of one who is a believer. or that we might,
as it were, bring our own souls to the test of this particular
verse in. Are these words true of me tonight? Are these words true of each
of you? Are we those that fit in with what the Lord is saying?
He that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may
be made manifest. that they wrought in God. If we're not in this text, there
is nothing of salvation in our souls. Coming to the light, and
that's the theme that I really want to take up tonight, coming
to the light. And what is this coming that
the Lord is speaking of? What does it mean to come to
the light? Well, it is not something physical
or bodily. We might, in a sense, be outside
and it might be a black, dark night and then we come into a
room that's full of light. Well, that's a physical experience,
isn't it? It's something that we know in
our body. We're in the darkness and we
come suddenly into a place where there is much light. But that's
not what's being spoken of here. The word surely is to be understood
in a spiritual sense. The coming to the light is what
is involved in faith. It's the coming of faith. Isn't
faith spoken of in terms of coming? Remember what we read later in
chapter 6, and there at verse 35, "...he that cometh to me,"
says Christ, "...shall never hunger." and he that believeth
on me shall never thirst. And they're parallel statements
that the Lord is making and He's speaking in terms of satisfying
appetite or satisfying thirst. He that cometh to me shall never
hunger. He that cometh to me shall never
thirst. But He doesn't say that, does
He? He says, he that believeth on me. And if we compare the
two statements, obviously the believing is equivalent to the
coming. Coming to the Lord Jesus, coming to the light is faith,
it's believing. And we can examine ourselves,
can we not, with regards to whether or not it's something that we
have ever done in our lives. The Lord says, here in the text
that the one that does truth comes to the light and he comes
for a purpose in order that his deeds may be made manifest that
they are wrought in God. Well let's think for a little
while about this coming to the light and what's involved in
thus coming. The light discovers something
to us And here there is a two-fold knowledge in a sense that is
communicated when we come to the light. First of all we come
to some knowledge of ourselves. We come to some knowledge of
ourselves. You see, sinful self must be discovered. We must know what we are, where
we are. We're told, aren't we, in the previous verse, that the
one that does evil hates the light, neither cometh to the
light, lest his deed should be reproved or, as the margin says,
discovered. When we come to the light, something
is made known, something's discovered with regards to what we are and
where we are. we refer this morning to those
words in Ephesians 5.13 all things that are reproved are made manifest
by the light for that that maketh manifest is the light that's
what the light does it discovers if we are in a sad filthy condition
maybe it's a filthy night and we're out in this awful weather
and we're soaked through and maybe we're walking through some
dark woods and we're covered over with all sorts of muck and
we're in such a dreadful state and then we suddenly come to
a place where there's a great light and we're aware then of
what our condition is We were unaware of it previously, in
a sense, we couldn't see what we were, but when we are brought
into the light then we see ourselves. And what is the state of man
by nature, the heart of man? We're told how the heart of man
is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can
know it? Or what can we know of ourselves
and the real state of our hearts as unbelievers it's a very sink
of iniquity but God knows the heart I the
Lord know the heart I search the rinds he says to give to
every man according to the fruit of his doing and now God does
reveal us reveal ourselves to us here in his word isn't that
what God's word is? in a sense it's likened onto
onto a looking glass, a mirror that's how James speaks of it
the natural man sees himself in that looking glass as it were
goes his way and forgets what manner of man he is now God uses
his word, he uses the law oh there's a ministration of the
law isn't there? it's that ministration of condemnation it's the ministration of death,
we learn our dead condition, our filthy condition what thing
soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law
that every mouth may be stopped and all the world become guilty
before God all by the law is the knowledge of sin but then there's something more
than the law here in the Word of God, there's the Gospel And
of course it's in the Gospel that we have the fullness of
the lights. And we see something more of
the real condition of our souls in that fuller light of the Gospel
than maybe we realize in the Holy Lord of God, although the
Lord is there to be the ministration of condemnation. Think of the
language that we have There in Zechariah chapter 12, I will
pour upon the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem
the spirit of grace and supplications. And they shall look upon me whom
they have pierced, and mourn for him as one mourneth for an
only son, and grieve for him as one grieveth for a firstborn
child. Oh, how we see the awfulness
of what sin is in the sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ. when
our eyes are open to what it was that he had to endure and
not just the contradiction of sinners against himself, but
when he bore in his holy person all that wrath of God against
sin. All law and terrors do but harden,
all the while they work alone, but a sense of blood-bored pardon
soon dissolves the heart of stone. How true are the words of Joseph
Hart in that hymn. when we look upon the one who
has been pierced all we see what we are, we see what sin is that
God must punish the sin and in order to save the sinner he will
punish that sin in the very person of his only begotten son the
son of Islam that one who was ever delighting himself in the
presence of the Father What a remarkable revelation then it is of ourselves
to see that. And of course a spiritual man
desires that God would show him that. He wants God to search
him and to know him. He wants to know that what he
has in his soul is truly the work of God. Search me, O God,
and know my heart. Try me and know my thought, says
David. see if there be any wicked way
in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." Is that how we
come to the Word of God? As we read here in the text,
"...he that doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may
be made manifest that they are wrought in God." It's not just those words in
the 139th Psalm, is it? So many times the psalmist cries
to God that he would judge him and examine him and prove him. Again, the words of Psalm 26,
Judge me, O Lord! Examine me, O Lord! Prove me!
Try my reins and my hearts! That's the prayer of the godly
man. He wants to know the truth concerning himself, concerning
the real state of his soul, in the eyes of a God of eyes too
pure to behold iniquity, a God who cannot look upon sin. And then when we come to the
New Testament, those words of the Apostle writing in 2 Corinthians
13, examine yourselves. Where do ye be in the faith?
Prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves,
he asks, so that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobate? Oh, is Jesus Christ in you? Is
Jesus Christ in me? It must be so. Jesus Christ in
us, that's the hope of glory. It's Christ in you. But look
at what we read here in the text. He that doeth truth cometh to
the light. What is this doing? What is this
doing of the truth? Well, it is not self-righteousness. It's not works. It's not legalism
that is being spoken of. The Lord is dealing with a man
who was of the Pharisees. He was of the Sanhedrin. He was a ruler. And remember Phariseeism clearly here in the
New Testament is associated with that spirit of self-righteousness. That was Paul, wasn't it? Before
his conversion to Christ, he was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. And what was his boast? Touching
the righteousness which is of the law, blameless. He really
thought he was blameless. He lived the life of a Pharisee.
He was a man obedient to the commandment of God. Well, it's not Pharisaism that's
to be understood by this reference to doings and deeds. He that doeth truth. What are
we to understand by this expression? if we're not to think in terms
of a man who does something to help himself, to save himself,
to present himself as righteous in the sight of a holy God. It
is that inward spiritual conflict that comes to those who have
really come to the light. When they come to the light What
do they find? They find themselves full of
all manner of uncleanness. They're confronted by that dreadful
monster which is sin. And they see the need to mortify
all these deeds of the body. It's that sort of good fight
of faith that's going on within the souls of these people. They're steadfast, they're unmovable,
they're always abounding in this work of the Lord. They're not
doing something righteous to save themselves. They're so conscious
that there's nothing in themselves. And they're struggling with themselves.
And it's all that good fight of faith. And so the knowledge
that they have here is not simply by coming to the light they have
a knowledge of themselves. They have that, they're sinners,
they see that, they feel that, they struggle with that. But
it leads to this, they have a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what they need, they
need to come to that light, they need to come to the light himself,
even to the Lord. He says, doesn't he, in that
prayer of the 17th chapter, this is life eternal that they might
know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. How can the sinner know that
God who is of eyes too pure to behold iniquity, that God who
cannot look upon sin? How can we know God? We cannot
know Him apart from a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
one that God sends. and Christ comes of course to
accomplish a work he has sent on a mission and his work is to do the will
of the one who has sent him and to finish his work and that's
what they need to have a knowledge of that salvation that is in
the Lord Jesus Christ it's the end of themselves then
and it's that looking to Christ and trusting Him in Christ alone
for salvation and that's that feeding upon Christ we've referred
to it many a time the language that we have there in the sixth
chapter where Christ again declares himself I am the bread of life he says Oh, they
feed upon that bread, they feed upon Christ, they eat his flesh,
they drink his blood. They know a real union with Christ,
an experimental union. And so they enjoy communion with
him. He is real to them. It's Christ
in them, you see. It's the life of God in the soul
of that sinner. This is what we see here then,
the light. It's the light that shines in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's all that exercise of
soul that is involved in saving faith that is being spoken of.
He that doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may
be made manifest. And it's not his own doing. It's
nothing of himself. that they are wrought in God
and so turning in the second place to the works that are spoken
of here these works that are said to be wrought in God what
does that mean? this final clause which is so
important to a right interpretation and understanding of what the
deeds are their deeds It's doing that is wrought in God. Two things. It is that that is
in accordance to the will of God and it is that that is in
the power of God. It's according to the will of
God. Oh, remember what we have in
that ninth chapter of Romans, that great chapter on God's predestination
His great purpose of salvation Romans 9.15 he says to Moses
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion
on whom I will have compassion so then it is not of him that
willeth nor of him that runneth but of God's that showeth mercy. Therefore hath he mercy on whom
he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth." Now observe
in those words there's an emphasis upon the will of God. This salvation
is all according to the will of God. And again, what Paul
is writing there in the 9th of Romans is simply echoing the
words of the Lord Jesus. The same truth is declared by
Christ in the course of his ministry. These apostles of the Lord, their
ministry is but the extension of Christ's ministry. They're
not saying any new thing. They're only saying those things
that were there in the ministry of the Savior Himself. And the
Lord says there in John 6, 40, This is the will of Him which
sent Me, that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth on
Him may have eternal life. This is the will of Him. the
father that sent the son all this that is wrought in God
is according to the sovereign will and pleasure of God of course previously in this
chapter as we remarked this morning we have that great section on
the necessity of the new birth And now that's such a sovereign
work of God, the wind. Christ uses that analogy of the
wind and the circuits of the wind. And doesn't Solomon in
the book of Ecclesiastes make mention of those circuits of
the wind? And Christ uses it as an illustration, as it were,
of the sovereignty of God In the new birth, the winds, he
says, bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but canst not tell whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth.
So is everyone that is born of the Spirit. Or a man is born from a bath.
It's a sovereign work of God. We're told, aren't we, in the
opening chapter, concerning these who are born again, which were
born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the
will of man, but of God. It has nothing to do with men
and man's will and man's free will. All this work is the work
of God. And that's what's being spoken
of here at the end of the text. They are wrought in God. He that doeth truth cometh to
the light that his deeds His doings, his deeds, are manifest
that they are wrought in God. They are all in accordance with
the goodwill and pleasure of God. But as they are in accordance
with God's sovereign will, so they are also wrought in the
very power of God. Again, think of the words of
the Lord Jesus there in chapter 6 and verse
45 it is written in the prophets they shall be all taught of God
every man therefore that has heard and have learned of the
Father cometh unto me it's written in the prophets
it's written back in Isaiah all those who are going to be saved
they are taught of God And the Lord is saying, every man that
hath heard the Father, every man that has been taught of the
Father, he will come to Christ, all that the Father giveth me.
He says, shall come to me. The Father gave Christ to people
in the Eternal Covenant when there was that Council of the
Trinity. that great covenant of redemption
between Father, Son and Holy Ghost that covenant in which
the Son who is equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit and yet the
Son willingly becomes the servant of God and he comes to do all
the will of God and to accomplish and to finish the work that God
had given him to do but he has that promise in the covenant,
all that the Father giveth me. Or we can say, behold I and the
children which God hath given me from all eternity as a people
that the Father has given him to redeem, all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me and he that cometh to me I shall
in no wise cast out. The work is wrought in God what
was accomplished by the Son of God cannot be in vain. Those that He died to save, they
shall and will be saved. You know, even when Peter makes
that great confession at Caesarea Philippi, Thou art the Christ,
the Son of the Living God. Or you know the passage, that
great passage in Matthew 16, where the Lord, He doesn't need
to find out by asking the disciples. He knows what's in the hearts
of all men. But He says to the disciples, who do men say that
I am? Who do men say that I am? This
is Jesus of Nazareth. Who do they say that I am? And
the disciples tell Him what is the opinion amongst the people. This is the prophet, this is
Elijah. and ultimately the Lord says,
Whom say ye that I am? And then Peter's confession.
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God. And what does
the Lord say to that man? Blessed art thou, Simon by Jonah,
flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which
is in heaven. Oh, it's a revelation from God.
It's a revelation that came into the soul of Peter, just as that
revelation came into the soul of Paul, as he says there in
Galatians 1. Flesh and blood haven't revealed
it, Peter. It's the work of my Father. It's
something that is wrought in God. It's God's work. It's God's
Word in the soul of the sinner. And it is God alone, you see,
that can work that faith. What is faith? By grace are you
saved through faith and that not of yourselves? It is the
gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should
boast. It's faith of the operation of
God. That's how it's spoken of in
Colossians. Colossians 2.12 Faith of the operation of God. It's something wrought of God. It's the exceeding greatness
of His power to usward who believe. Remember the language of Ephesians
1.19. Not just the power, not just
the great power, but the exceeding greatness of His power to usward
who believe according to the working of His mighty power which
He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. or
what God wrought in the Lord Jesus Christ in raising Him again
from the dead declared to be the Son of God with power according
to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead
when that sinner is born again when adoption becomes an experience
in the soul of that man he knows he's a son of God how is it?
It's something that is wrought of God. It's wrought of God,
it's God's work. Oh, is that what we want to know,
that there has been such a work of God accomplished in us, wrought
in our souls? We love the truth, we want to
come to the truth, we want the truth to test us and try us.
We want to know that we have that that is really the work
of God. He that doeth truth cometh to
the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that they are
wrought in God. And you know, it's interesting
because the verb here, cometh, it's in the present tense. It's not just when we first come,
it's not the first coming of faith. it's the continual coming
of faith it's always the way of faith there's a keep on coming
in that sense we keep on coming we keep on coming work out your
own salvation says Paul with fear and trembling for it is
God it is God which worketh in you to will and to do of his
good pleasure Always that what we want friends, that we want
God to be working in us. We want to know that we are continually
experiencing what it means to be living that life of faith.
We are ever learning something more about ourselves and what
we are. But also, thank God, we learn
something more about Jesus Christ and who He is and what He has
done. Oh, what a blessing! What a blessing
if we're brought to that, to grow in grace, and in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. You know, there's a sense,
isn't there, really, in which the whole passage, I believe,
centers in what we have at the end of verse 18. Believing in
the name of the only begotten Son of God. That's what we must
be brought to all the time. believing in the name of the
only begotten Son of God, and all that that name declares to
us, the Son of God, the Son of Man, the Son of Mary, thou shalt call
his name Jesus. Says the angel to Joseph who
was betrothed to Mary and she was with child of the Holy Ghost,
thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people
from their sins. He that believeth on him is not
condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already, because
he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God."
Have you come to that? You believe in the name of the
only begotten Son of God. This is the condemnation that
light is coming to the world and men love darkness rather
than light because their deeds were evil. For everyone that
doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light,
lest his deed should be reproved or lest his deed should be discovered. You shy away from that light.
You despise it, hate it. You want to turn away from it?
Ah, but, but he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his
deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. Oh God,
grant that verse 21 might be your experience and my experience. Oh mighty please God then to
bless his word to us. Amen.