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Salt and Light Living (Ephesians 5:8-14)
56 Plays2 years ago
Salt and Light Living (Ephesians 5:8-14)
Ephesians: Growing in Christ
Sunday Message recorded 19 March 2023
by Pastor Victor Morrison
First Baptist Church
1700 Milam
Columbus, TX, USA 78934
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Transcript
No Condemnation in Christ
00:00:06
Speaker
Well, good morning. Thank you so much for just worshipping the Lord. It's so nice that we can all exalt Him for His sacrifice on the cross for us. Where would we be without the shed blood of Christ? Just this weekend, I was going through Romans 8, and I thought, you know, it's interesting how the beginning of Romans 8
00:00:27
Speaker
Romans 8.1 says that there's now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. And the end of Romans 8 says there will never be a separation from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus.
00:00:42
Speaker
And then I read Romans 8.28 and I thought if he's working all things out together for our good, then there should be no frustration in Christ Jesus. So anyway, I was thinking, thank you God for that song that just exalts the Lord Jesus Christ in such a wonderful way.
Memorizing Scripture Together
00:01:02
Speaker
We are in Ephesians chapter 5. We're going to begin with verse 8 and go down through verse 14. Ephesians chapter 5 beginning in verse 8 and going down through verse 14. You know what's interesting is whenever my wife Jody and I were dating, we would walk around Southwestern Seminary Campus in Fort Worth.
00:01:25
Speaker
And we began to think, what can we do that would enrich our time of just getting exercise walking around this large campus? So what we decided was, why don't we each this week pick out a passage of scripture that we can memorize? And then we'll exchange the verses. And then we'll have two verses down. So we agreed. And we could pick from anywhere in the whole Bible.
00:01:50
Speaker
And what we found amazing was out of the whole Bible, Jodie says, well, the verse that I picked is Ephesians 5, 8, 9, and 10.
00:02:00
Speaker
And I said, you've got to be kidding. And she said, did you pick that verse? I said, no, I didn't pick that verse, but I picked that chapter. And she said, no. And I said, I picked Ephesians 5, 15, 16, and 17. And so don't drill us this week on whether we still remember that. It was way back there. But anyway, Ephesians 5, 8 through 14 is
Living in Love and Light
00:02:23
Speaker
wonderful. It's going to bring up that word that we've been looking at for a few weeks now, the word walk.
00:02:29
Speaker
Of course, when the Bible uses the word walk, it's talking about the way we live.
00:02:35
Speaker
our daily life, our lifestyle. You'll remember that when we went into chapter four, I said it's like we're walking through a gate, through an archway, through a door. And we're going to begin to see how do we live like a Christian? Of course, the blood of Christ makes us a Christian. It redeems us. And we're changed and transformed. But how do we live at work, at school, at home, in the neighborhood, in this community?
00:03:05
Speaker
Well, Ephesians 4 verse 1 says, I urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called.
00:03:14
Speaker
You'll see in Ephesians 4 and verse 17, the apostle Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit said, you know what? You must no longer walk as the Gentiles do. So the way I used to walk whenever I was not born again, whenever I didn't know Christ personally, I should be walking differently. I should be living differently than I did back then. Back then I was taking my cues from the world.
00:03:39
Speaker
But now I take my cues from Christ. As we went into chapter 5, you'll remember last time we were talking about walking in love as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us in Ephesians chapter 5 and verse 2. But now this morning we're going to look at something beyond love, and that is light.
00:04:00
Speaker
walking in the light. In Ephesians chapter 5 and verse 8, you'll hear these words, walk as children of light. And next week, Lord Willing will be in our Bible conference, so we'll take a break. But then when we come back, we're going to go to verse 15 where it says, look carefully then how you walk.
00:04:21
Speaker
not as unwise, but as wise. So we're going to talk about walking in wisdom. So we're just kind of going through the Word of God and learning, how does He want us to walk? How does He want us to live? And so we're looking at that together.
Christian Influence as Salt and Light
00:04:39
Speaker
You know, before salvation in Christ, we were not just living in spiritual darkness. We were spiritual darkness. We'll see that today. But now we are what's called light in the Lord. The Lord's changing our character, and He's changing our whole direction in life. And so our text is going to be in Ephesians chapter 5, verse 8, where He says, walk as children of light.
00:05:06
Speaker
You know, in another passage in 2 Corinthians 6, 14, the apostle Paul asked a great question. He said, what fellowship has light with darkness? Even the apostle John was writing a lot about light and darkness and living in light, living in darkness. If you were to go to 1 John, chapter 1, verses 5 through 17, he reminds us, even today, he reminds us God is light.
00:05:34
Speaker
And in Him is no darkness at all. And that's why He just shoots straight in 1 John 1, verses 5 through 7. And He said, look, this is the way it is. You can't walk with God and walk in darkness at the same time.
00:05:50
Speaker
And the reason is, light represents truth. And darkness represents lies. It represents sin. And so what we have to decide on is, which kingdom am I going to let direct my daily life, the kingdom of light or the kingdom of darkness? And of course, Jesus said in John 3, 19 and 20,
00:06:13
Speaker
that men, that all people on the face of this earth, love darkness rather than light. And that's why people push back and they resist that. But as His disciples, Jesus calls us to live differently in this fallen, sinful world. You know, Matthew 5, verses 13 through 16, these are the words of Jesus.
00:06:35
Speaker
And he's telling us that really we should be influencing our world, influencing our society, influencing the place where we are spending our time each and every week. As a matter of fact, he says you ought to be like salt. You ought to be like light. And what the idea there is, your life
00:06:56
Speaker
The Christ life, following Him and His power, His truth, His love, His joy flowing through us, it ought to make a difference everywhere we go. You'll recall that salt preserves from corruption. Light reveals truth. Both the salt and the light, they're not like what they're going against. You're the salt of the earth, He said in Matthew 5.13, and you are the light of the world.
00:07:25
Speaker
So today, when we look at these verses in Ephesians chapter 5, I want you to know this is a biblical theme. This goes beyond just me picking and choosing. This is something God's already been saying over and over and over again. As a matter of fact, you'll hear him mention light four times in this brief passage that we're about to read. He mentions darkness only twice, but we ought to definitely talk more about light than darkness.
00:07:55
Speaker
You know, there's a big difference between walking with light in the dark and walking without a light in the dark. You probably know what I mean. When I go out to take the garbage out, if it's after dark, I take a light with me. Never know what might be lurking around that garbage can. But Ephesians 5, 8 through 14 equips us.
00:08:18
Speaker
for walking, for living in a dark world. And what it does, it offers us the light of truth. So I want us to listen closely as we learn about salt and light living. Would you stand in honor of God's word? I hope you have a copy of it that you can open up and bring your copy of God's word. But if not, there's a copy in the pew. There's also the words are printed on the screen.
Transformation in Christ
00:08:44
Speaker
But I encourage you to follow along as I read Ephesians 5,
00:08:48
Speaker
8 through verse 14. For at one time you were darkness, but now you're light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good.
00:09:07
Speaker
and right and true, and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible.
00:09:33
Speaker
For anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore, it says, Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you. There's some in our congregation. If you're looking for a memory verse, Awake, O sleeper. It'd be a great one for some of us here. Let's go to the Father of Prayer. Lord, thank you so much for what you want to say to us today through your living word.
00:09:58
Speaker
Lord, teach us, equip us for walking in the light. What does it even mean? And so give us a deep understanding of this text by the help and the assistance of your Holy Spirit. It's in Jesus' name and for His glory that we pray. Amen. Thank you. You may be seated. Why don't we begin where the Lord begins?
00:10:22
Speaker
He begins with a new start in your life and in my life. In my life, that new start began when I was a college student, when I was a freshman at the University of Memphis. But where did it begin for you? Where did you experience this total transformation? It's not that after you trusted Christ, you became perfect, but it's that your life just began to change. You became what 2 Corinthians 5, 17 says, a new creation.
00:10:51
Speaker
What Jesus said to Nicodemus, a religious man, this guy was religious. This guy was moral. And yet to him, Jesus said, you know what? You need to be born again. You need new life. Do you ever feel that you need new life? It's found in Christ. So that's where I want us to start in our discussion about light. I want us to talk from verse 8 about that change, the transformation into light.
00:11:21
Speaker
You see, whenever Jesus changes someone, He changes us, He transforms us all the way down to the core. And that's why I think He uses these verbs, this wording in verse 8 is so clear, isn't it? For at one time you were darkness.
00:11:41
Speaker
but now you are light in the Lord. Isn't that amazing? It's like he's referring to that point in the past where he says, up until that point right there, you were darkness. But since you trusted Christ, you're no longer darkness. No, your identity now is you are light. And so that's why he's gonna tell us, walk as children of light.
00:12:08
Speaker
But I just wanted you to understand how clear it is when he says, at one time, but now, there's been a big change. Has that change ever taken place in your life? If it hasn't, I want you to look closely at this verse 8, because within this verse, it tells us the catalyst for the change. It says, in the Lord, in the Lord,
00:12:35
Speaker
Remember who's writing this, right? The Apostle Paul. How did he come to know Christ? He had a personal encounter on a road to Damascus. I'm not sure where your road is going today. I don't know all the things that are on your schedule today.
00:12:51
Speaker
But all I know is this. I'm so glad you're here today. You're here at this moment. And I want you to know that the same catalyst that changed the life of this man named Saul later to become Paul, the Apostle Paul, this man's life was totally changed by one encounter. He encountered Jesus Christ.
00:13:14
Speaker
in his life completely changed. That's why he later wrote about how Jesus does all the heavy lifting. Maybe you're thinking, well, I would become a Christian, but I really don't think that I could just keep it up for the whole time. Really? Wait a minute. That's not what Colossians 1 13 says.
00:13:34
Speaker
Speaking of Jesus, it said, He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son.
00:13:46
Speaker
It doesn't say you're going to eventually get it down to where you're able to work your way into heaven, where you can work your way into salvation, where you can work your way into God's goodness and grace and favor and all those things. No, it doesn't say that. It says He has delivered you. See, the domain of darkness is too strong for any of us. We can't get out of it. It's like we're in this prison.
00:14:11
Speaker
But only Jesus could set you free. He can transfer you from that domain of darkness.
00:14:18
Speaker
into a glorious kingdom. And that's why we sing with such passion and such joy is because we once were, perhaps where you still are this morning, but you don't have to stay there because Jesus can change your life as well. But then once he does change it, he gives us a new course. We have a new road. There's a new way, a new lifestyle. He says, walk as children of light.
00:14:45
Speaker
Do you know when he says, walk as children of light, he doesn't say, would you think about it? Would you consider walking in light? No, he just cuts it straight. It's like an imperative. It's a directive. It's a command whenever he says, walk as children of light. That's what God is saying to you and to me. That's what he's saying to every one of his children, to every disciple.
00:15:11
Speaker
So when I was looking at this whole passage, it made me think about repentance and it made me think about how this whole thing happens when He changes our life. And if I was to describe it just in a real simple way, I would say that there's a pivot, right? There's a pivot where you're going that way and you pivot and you start going that way.
00:15:32
Speaker
And the pivot is twofold. One is you pivot in direction. And you're saying, you know what? I'm going to turn in repentance from
00:15:42
Speaker
following this sin, and I'm going to turn away from that, and I'm going to go toward Jesus Christ. And that includes a pivot, not only of direction, but also a pivot independence, a pivot in depending on Christ for your salvation, trusting in the Savior, trusting in the finished work of Jesus Christ and Him alone.
00:16:05
Speaker
You know, when we were in chapter one, we saw in verse 18 a prayer that the Apostle Paul was praying for these people in Ephesus. And he said, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened. Have you got light down inside your heart? It's like he says, the eyes of your hearts have been enlightened that you may know what is the hope.
00:16:30
Speaker
which He has called you. Man, so wonderful whenever your life is totally transformed by Christ. So how does one know if they're walking in the light or if they're still walking in the darkness, still moving in the wrong direction?
Exposing Darkness with Truth
00:16:48
Speaker
Well, there's a next couple of verses here, 9 and 10.
00:16:53
Speaker
I think we move now from looking at the transformation from the light into an identification of light. You know, it's incredible these days, the biometric authentication and the recognition of someone's ID. How do people recognize others when they're at a company or so forth?
00:17:15
Speaker
Well, you could do fingerprints. You could do, you know, an iris or retina scan. You could do facial recognition, image voice recognition. You could look at your ears. There's actually a unique shape to our ears. Ear authentication. They can analyze the way you walk, your gait.
00:17:36
Speaker
But the thing is, God says, I know who belongs to me. I know who belongs to me. Verses 9 and 10 describe it all. Look first at the derivation of the light, the derivation of the light. You know, genetics is interesting because it goes down to say, what's your background? Where did you come from? He says, the fruit of the light.
00:17:58
Speaker
If you were to do a spiritual test on your spiritual DNA, would it go back to Christ? Or are you still trying to present to the Lord what Isaiah says, just filthy garments? We're trying to present to Him our own righteousness when the Lord's saying, that's not good enough.
00:18:16
Speaker
It has to be perfect. And none of us in this room, including myself, none of us are perfect. And so that goes all the way back to the Lord. And that's why it uses this word, the fruit of the light.
00:18:30
Speaker
So I was looking at the fruit of the light, and I thought about something Jesus had said. He said, you'll recognize them by their fruits in Matthew 7 and verse 16. You know, what is the fruit of your life? Does it resemble these three things that some call the trio of virtues? I call it the description of light.
00:18:52
Speaker
Here's what he says, the fruit of the light. Well, here's what it is. It is all things that are good, right, and true. Whatever is found in all that is good and right and true.
00:19:07
Speaker
Think about the word good. That word I'm told by the Bible scholars refers to how we treat other people. Since you trusted Christ, if you trusted Christ, it's gonna make a difference in the way you treat other people. Our relationship with others begins to resemble his goodness, his help, his generosity toward us. Now we wanna do it toward others. But the word right refers to our relationship to God.
00:19:37
Speaker
Through Christ, we are made right with our Creator. Before that, we were rebelling against Him. But now we are made right with God.
00:19:47
Speaker
And we see this in the moral choices, the standards that we live by, our integrity. So if goodness was related to our generosity, our kindness, our helpfulness to other people, then being right, the fruit of being right is what we find in Christ when He helps us to make right decisions.
00:20:10
Speaker
But then true relates within. It relates to someone who's telling the truth, someone who's telling the truth with the right kind of motives. And then there's the definition of the light, the definition of the light. Who can define what is truth? You know, today we got a lot of people in America trying to redefine everything. Is anything nailed down? Who gets to finally decide on the truth?
00:20:39
Speaker
You know who does? God. He made us. He sets the standard. He tells us the truth. He's talking about reality. Other people are talking about fantasy and image and spins and all these kinds of things. But the Lord tells us the truth because He's describing reality. And here's what I noticed about lining up with His reality, with His truth.
00:21:06
Speaker
It says that we should be trying to please Him in everything that we do. Try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord if His standard is the one that is really where light is found.
00:21:18
Speaker
We ought to say, Lord, my whole desire and my whole life is just to please You. But notice the process. Notice that we have to prove through learning. I like the way He describes it in verse 10. Try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. It's like it's a journey for all of us.
00:21:37
Speaker
The Lord is helping us understand more and more. Maybe there was a time in your life when you resisted and you fought against God's definitions and against the truth of the Lord, against the light. But now, just like the Apostle Paul, you lay down your weapons. You're no longer beating a bongo drum saying, I'm coming after you. You're saying, I'm on your side. I surrender everything that I am. Wow. I know that it's hard in a canceled culture.
00:22:08
Speaker
to stand with God's definitions, with His identification of life. I understand that it's hard in a cancel culture because someone may cancel you. But the only thing I want to remind you is be far better to have somebody cancel you on social media
00:22:27
Speaker
than for the Lord Jesus Christ to cancel you from eternity. Let me tell you, that's serious. That's eternity. And so all I'm saying is keep your eyes focused on the Lord and say, you tell me what light is. You tell me what the truth is and I will live it out, which brings us to the illumination from light. The next thing I see is verses 11 and 12 and 13 and 14.
00:22:55
Speaker
You know, whenever you see a projector these days that puts a PowerPoint up on a screen, they tell me that the measurement of the brightness of that projector is measured by something called lumens.
Shining Brightly for God
00:23:09
Speaker
You can have 1,600 lumens, 3,000 lumens. It can even go brighter than 3,000 lumens. But I want us to look at whenever God's truth is shining in a life, what does it look like?
00:23:23
Speaker
Let's look at the illumination from the truth or from the light in verses 11, 12, 13, and the beginning of verse 14. The first thing I think if you want to shine brightly with the Lord's light, then you got to take seriously what he's saying in verse 11. There's a prohibition here. He says, take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness.
00:23:51
Speaker
So we have to decide. We have to decide, am I going to say, you know what? I'm going to avoid those unfruitful works of darkness. Romans chapter 1, verses 21, all the way down through verse 32, gives us an incredible list of what would those fruits of darkness be like. What is that involved in? Romans 1, 21 through 32, would tell you exactly what it would be.
00:24:18
Speaker
But there's also a prompt here. And what is he prompting us to do as lights in this world? Well, he's prompting us to expose, to illuminate to the degree that things become visible the way they truly are. And so when I was looking at these verses, I thought, well, look at that, verse 11. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness. But instead, here comes a positive thing. Expose them.
00:24:48
Speaker
For it's shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible. For anything that becomes visible is light. So I got to thinking about all of the ways that we can expose era. We can expose darkness by simply being the light. Turn on the light. Speak the light. Tell people the truth. Some have never heard it.
00:25:18
Speaker
That's why you can go to the Old Testament, you can come all the way through the New Testament, and you know what you'll find happens? The men and women of God spoke truth. Sometimes they had to speak truth to power. They had to speak truth to someone with great authority. Maybe someone in your life is trying to shut you down from speaking truth. But I just want to remind you that Moses spoke to Pharaoh.
00:25:43
Speaker
Daniel spoke to a king named Nebuchadnezzar. Samuel spoke to Saul. Nathan spoke to David. Elijah spoke to Ahab. Elisha spoke to Jehu. Isaiah spoke to Hezekiah, and Jeremiah spoke to Zedekiah. John the Baptist spoke to Antip Antipas, and Paul spoke to Felix, and Jesus spoke to Pilate.
00:26:09
Speaker
We should never be intimidated when it comes to speaking and living the truth, because we're the light. If we go out, if we don't shine, who is going to shine? Who is going to speak? Who is going to deliver the truth that this generation so desperately needs to hear? There's also the prevention of articulating their shameful secrets.
00:26:32
Speaker
It says here, it says, you know what? It is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. I wouldn't even want to stand here and tell you the terrible things that happen across this country in the dark. It's a disgrace. But we ought to say, Lord, help me to know the right way to put the light out there where people can at least hear and know the truth.
00:26:58
Speaker
Well, I want to wrap it up by looking not only at the transformation into light and the identification of light and the illumination from light, but we need to talk about one more thing, the activation of the light. I see that found in verse 14. You see Ephesians 5.14 is like a paraphrase of an Old Testament passage. It's an echo that was spoken long ago saying someday,
00:27:27
Speaker
there's going to be a Messiah coming. And when He comes, He's bringing truth with Him. When He comes, He's bringing light with Him. When He comes, He's bringing this gospel message with Him. And that Old Testament passage was talking about Jesus. And so I thought it was interesting how even in this church building, you know, this church building has lights. Look at the lights that are all around this sanctuary.
00:27:53
Speaker
Do you know what? They're not always on. We have to push a button in order for those lights to come on. You may go through some parts of this building and the lights will be off. I come up here all the time when the lights are off. And I tell you, when the ice maker drops, buddy, it'll make your blood run cold. I'm thinking, hello, somebody down there. But I just want you to know that there is a light switch.
00:28:19
Speaker
in our lives that we have to switch in order for that light that's already in us to turn on and to shine brightly. So I want to describe that light switch with three last words. The first one is this, wake up, awake, oh sleeper. You know, Romans 13, 11 through 14 says the same thing.
00:28:43
Speaker
Wake up, wake up. And you know why it says wake up? Because Jesus is coming back. That's not the only place. First Thessalonians 5 verses 1 through 11 says, wake up. You know why it says wake up? Because Jesus is coming back. I'm telling you, He's coming back. This is not a time for you to live kind of getting drowsy at the wheel.
00:29:05
Speaker
Don't get drowsy at the wheel. The National Highway Association tells us that every year 6,000 people are killed because of someone who fell asleep at the wheel. Liberty Mutual estimates that every day, every day, when you go out there on the road, when I go out there on the road, they predict there's 250,000 people that are behind the wheel and they're really driving just a little bit drowsy, a little bit sleepy.
00:29:34
Speaker
And what would we say to them? Wake up. Wake up. Don't go through this life asleep when you know Jesus. Rise up, it says next. I would put that right after wake up is rise up. Arise from the dead, he says.
Awakening to Spiritual Life
00:29:51
Speaker
You know, Revelation 3, 1 through 6, it's sort of staggering when you think about it because Jesus is speaking to a church. It's in a place called Sardis.
00:30:01
Speaker
And Jesus is speaking to the church and it's a dead church. He calls it dead. And you know what he says to the dead church? Wake up. You got to wake up. In Ezekiel chapter 39 was standing in the midst of a valley of dry, dead bones. And he said, rise up. And you know what? God can raise up those who are spiritually dead.
00:30:28
Speaker
You know, whenever my cell phone dies, what do I do? I just charge it up. I plug it in. I plug it in to the power source. The same way when he says, awake go sleeper and arise from the dead and you will shine.
00:30:46
Speaker
in your own strength. No, it doesn't say that, does it? It says, and Christ will shine on you. You see, He's the only power source that we have. Christ will shine through us. And so that's why we have to make sure that we stay very close to Him, you know, just like the sun and the moon.
00:31:07
Speaker
You know, I'm told that the moon doesn't have its own light source. It just reflects the light that comes at it from the sun. You know, the sun is the brightest light we see. If you were to take the earth and multiply it times one million, you got one million Earths, that's how big that the sun is.
00:31:33
Speaker
The earth is 93 million miles away from that sun. And yet in eight minutes, a beam of light, it's shining so bright in eight minutes it can be here. Someone said that every second the sun produces enough energy to power human civilization for almost 500,000 years. I don't think we realize how bright the Lord made the sun.
00:31:59
Speaker
And yet it's amazing because astronomers estimate that it could be 100 billion to 400 billion stars in our galaxy. And the Hubble Space Telescope suggests there may be, I don't know, two trillion other galaxies in the universe. And you're thinking, wow. But what kind of power can animate the sun and make it so bright and light up the night sky, those stars?
00:32:29
Speaker
I just want to remind you of something that happened to the writer of this book right here, the Ephesians. The writer of Ephesians was the Holy Spirit, of course, but the human instrument was a man named Paul.
00:32:41
Speaker
In Acts chapter 26 and verse 12, he's giving his testimony. He starts giving it. And in verse 13, I want to read you what he said, because these are his true words. This is what Paul saw on the road to Damascus when he saw Jesus. He says, at midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven brighter than the sun. Brighter than the sun.
00:33:11
Speaker
that shone around me and those who journeyed with me.
00:33:16
Speaker
He went on to say something that's very interesting in verse 18 in that same communication of his testimony. He says, God's called me to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins in a place among those who are sanctified by faith in Christ.
00:33:43
Speaker
God changed his life. But it all started when he saw this incredible light, a light that he says, you know what? Even with the sun in midday, that light was brighter than that sun. So don't you know God's got enough light that he can shine through your life no matter how dark it is?
Thriving Under Pressure with Christ
00:34:06
Speaker
Have you ever heard about the Mariana Trench? It's the deepest place I guess they've discovered on the face of the earth. But a team from the University of Washington found that down there in the Mariana Trench, they found 36 snailfish. They were down there at a depth of 22,600 to 26,135 feet.
00:34:34
Speaker
A little bit later, a Japanese team collected another specimen of the Mariana shellfish, snailfish rather, snailfish, and they found it at 26,716 feet. Can you imagine how dark?
00:34:50
Speaker
Can you imagine how cold it would be down there? Imagine the pressure. There's a National Geographic article that says that the pressure that the Mariana snailfish is under would be equivalent to having 1,600 elephants standing on their head. Try that sometime and see how it works out for you. I mean, that's an incredible amount of pressure, the darkness, the coldness,
00:35:19
Speaker
And yet, you know what? That's where those little guys live. They live five miles down. If you were to take 26,716 feet and convert it into miles, it's five miles down. Imagine how dark it is there. And yet God equipped that little guy to stand there and he's only about the size of your hand. And yet that little guy lives in that darkness each and every day. God can give you
00:35:48
Speaker
the strength and the power and the light that you need, no matter how cold it is in your life, no matter how dark it is in your life, no matter how much pressure there is in your life. He causes the internal pressure of that little snailfish to press back on all of that external pressure. Let me tell you, when I extend the invitation
00:36:13
Speaker
What I'm saying is, that's what you have available in Christ. So this song that we're going to sing, it says one thing. I don't want you to pass me by. Oh, gentle Savior, don't walk by me without helping me in what I'm facing in my life. Maybe that's somebody here today. Maybe you've never really thought about him and his light and his love, his forgiveness, his power, his joy, his peace. But today, it's big time on your mind.
00:36:44
Speaker
And the words of this song, they're going to tag you. And I just want you to understand what's happening. The Spirit of God is drawing you. He's drawing you to Jesus, the Son of God, who loves you so much. See, God created you, and you're created for a purpose, just like that little snailfish.
00:37:02
Speaker
And he wants to be the strength in you that presses back on all the other pressures. Let's stand together. Let's pray. If you would like to trust Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you'll have an opportunity because I'm going to be standing down here. We may not finish our conversation today. So we'll just push the pause button and we'll arrange another time that we can finish it. But whatever God's land on your heart, you come today. Lord, thank you so much.
00:37:31
Speaker
that into this dark world you brought the light. I can still remember when you changed my life. There I was, Lord, just a freshman in college. And yet I could sing with Hank Williams, Jr. I saw the light. I could say with the Apostle Paul, I saw a light so bright changed my life.
00:37:52
Speaker
And still to this day, I want to go into dark places and I want to be a light. And Lord, maybe today there's some that are here that are still suffering. They feel so cold. They feel so lonely, so isolated. They're in the domain of darkness. But today Jesus is going to pass this way. And I pray they would say, don't pass me by. I need you, Jesus. Let this be the day that they trust Christ. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
00:38:27
Speaker
This is a ministry of First Baptist Church, located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas.