Light vs Darkness – Joe M Nathan A Dariusz G

This transcript was generated automatically. Its accuracy may vary

Short Summary

The panel discussion explored the biblical symbolism of light and darkness, emphasizing light as representing God, truth, life, and goodness, while darkness signifies ignorance, evil, and absence of these qualities. They analyzed key scriptures highlighting the responsibility to share the light of God’s truth despite opposition and the dangers of a darkened understanding caused by ignorance and hardness of heart. Practical applications focused on combating misinformation, fostering unity, and cultivating goodness, righteousness, and truth in daily life as a defense against spiritual darkness.

Long Summary

Detailed Summary of the Panel Discussion on “Light versus Darkness”

Panel Introduction and Structure
– The panel topic is “Light versus Darkness.”
– Participants: Brothers Nathan Austin and Darius Gurjean.
– The discussion is divided into three parts:
1. General use and symbolism of light and darkness in Scriptures.
2. Detailed examination of two assigned scriptures: 2 Corinthians 4:4 and Ephesians 4:17-20.
3. Practical applications of the scriptural teachings on light and darkness in daily Christian life.

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### 1. Symbolism of Light and Darkness in Scripture

Darius Gurjean’s Opening Explanation:
– Emphasizes human sensory perception—light and darkness as metaphors tied to physical reality.
– Describes an experiment: in a completely dark room, nothing can be seen until light is introduced.
– Darkness symbolizes “nothingness” or absence of light; light symbolizes life, understanding, beauty, harmony.
– References Genesis 1: “Let there be light,” highlighting light as God’s first creative act and a symbol of order emerging from chaos.
– Key theological statement: “God is light; in Him there is no darkness at all.”
– Darkness represents not just physical absence of light, but spiritual absence of life and truth.

Nathan Austin’s Contributions:
– Highlights Genesis 1’s portrayal of light as order, darkness as chaos.
– Quotes and references:
– Psalm 27: “The Lord is my light and my salvation.”
– Exodus 13: The Lord as a pillar of fire guiding Israel.
– 1 Kings 8: The glory of the Lord as light in the tabernacle.
– Ephesians 5:8: “At one time you were darkness, but now you are light.”
– Explains light also symbolizes moral/ethical truth, understanding, and salvation.
– Notes the overlap in symbolism: light as knowledge and goodness; darkness as ignorance and evil.

Additional Scriptures and Symbolic Contrasts:
– Isaiah 5:20: “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness.”
– Ecclesiastes 2:13: Wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness.
– John 1:4-5,9:
– “In him was life, and that life was the light of men.”
– “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
– Jesus as the “true light” shining into human imperfection.
– 1 Thessalonians 5:4-5:
– “You are all children of light and children of the day. We are not of the night or darkness.”
– Emphasizes light as knowledge of God’s plan vs. darkness as ignorance.

Scientific and Metaphorical Insights:
– Darkness is absence of light; it cannot be physically created, only the absence or blocking of light.
– Black color is absence of color, white is the combination of all colors.
– Analogy of Swiss cheese holes to symbolize nothingness/absence (darkness or evil).
– Darkness and evil are thus defined as absence of goodness and light.

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### 2. Examination of Assigned Scriptures

2 Corinthians 4:1-6 (Focus on Verse 4):
– Paul’s ministry is to present truth boldly and humbly.
– Verse 4: “The God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.”
– God “said light shall shine out of darkness,” showing the light of knowledge and truth in Christ.
– Discussion points:
– Spiritual blindness affects the mind, not just physical eyes.
– Jesus as the image of God and true light.
– Satan, “God of this world,” blinds minds to prevent seeing gospel truth.
– “Seeing” means understanding and perception, a mental and spiritual activity.
– Analogy of “light pollution” — too much false or confusing information obscures true light.
– Ezekiel 32: Darkness covering the earth as a prelude to God’s judgment and restoration of true light.

Ephesians 4:17-20:
– Paul commands believers not to walk as Gentiles do, in futility of mind and darkened understanding.
– Darkness symbolizes ignorance, hardness of heart, and alienation from God.
– The passage warns against moral impurity and spiritual blindness.
– Connection to Ephesians 5:8-9: Believers now walk as children of light, producing the “fruit of the light” (goodness, righteousness, truth).
– Emphasizes daily spiritual participation and mental renewal to avoid the emptiness and darkness of the unredeemed mind.
– The discussion includes how darkness can be caused by blocking or absence of light, reinforcing the metaphor.

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### 3. Practical Applications and Exhortations

Doom Scrolling and Modern Challenges:
– “Doom scrolling” defined as compulsively reading bad news or negative content online.
– Modern information overload creates “visual noise,” making it difficult to discern truth.
– This is likened to “light pollution” that obscures true spiritual light.
– The adversary uses overwhelming misinformation to confuse and blind minds.

Witnessing through Fruit of the Light:
– Brother Darius shared a personal story about helping an elderly neighbor as an example of demonstrating the fruit of light: goodness, kindness, and righteousness.
– Emphasizes that actions reflecting light (goodness, righteousness, truth) are effective witness over mere words.
– Highlights the importance of understanding and teaching God’s goodness as the foundation for moral and ethical decisions.
– Raises concerns about technological advances (AI, genetic modification) and the need for divine wisdom to guide moral choices.

Dealing with Misinformation and Division:
– The modern world is rife with misinformation and disinformation, leading to division, distrust, and anarchy.
– Isaiah 62: “Darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people,” describing the spiritual state of the world.
– Satan’s strategy is to divide humanity and believers alike through falsehoods.
– Encouragement to not let Satan separate believers from truth, brethren, or God.
– Calls for unity among Christians to combat spiritual darkness.

Mind Renewal and Filling with Light:
– Importance of daily filling the mind with spiritual truth and light to prevent emptiness and vulnerability to darkness.
– Memorization of scriptures and positive spiritual material as practical tools.
– Encouragement to focus on unity, humility, and continual learning to grow in light and truth.
– Quote: “Understand what you see, because you only see what you understand.”

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### Closing Reflections

God is Light and God is Love:
– Both are metaphors describing God’s nature.
– True understanding of God involves loving action, not just knowledge.
– Transformation happens when light (truth and love) is enacted in daily life.

Unity and Humility in Seeking Truth:
– Avoid starting with preconceived conclusions; instead, seek truth together.
– “I may be wrong, you may be right, and together we get closer to the truth.”
– The path of the righteous shines brighter as one grows in truth.

Final Encouragement:
– The panel hopes the discussion has been “enlightening,” encouraging all to walk in the light of God’s truth, goodness, and love.

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Key Bible Verses Mentioned:

– Genesis 1:3 – “Let there be light.”
– Psalm 27:1 – “The Lord is my light and my salvation.”
– Exodus 13 – The Lord as a pillar of fire.
– 1 Kings 8 – The glory of the Lord in the tabernacle.
– Isaiah 5:20 – “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light…”
– Ecclesiastes 2:13 – “Wisdom excelleth folly as far as light excelleth darkness.”
– John 1:4-5, 9 – Jesus as the true light shining in darkness.
– 1 Thessalonians 5:4-5 – “Ye are all the children of light and the children of the day.”
– 2 Corinthians 4:1-6 – God shining light in our hearts and the blinding of minds by Satan.
– Ephesians 4:17-20 – Walking not as Gentiles in futility and darkness.
– Ephesians 5:8-9 – “Walk as children of light… fruit of the light is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth.”
– Ezekiel 32 – God’s judgment and darkening of the heavens.
– Isaiah 62: – Darkness covering the earth.

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Summary: 
The discourse comprehensively explores the rich biblical symbolism of light and darkness, contrasting God’s light—truth, life, goodness, and understanding—with darkness as ignorance, evil, and absence of truth. The panelists illustrate how spiritual blindness is a real barrier imposed by Satan to prevent people from receiving the gospel. They encourage believers to actively cultivate the “fruit of light” through knowledge, righteous acts, and unity, while resisting the confusion and division caused by misinformation and the metaphorical “darkness” of the world. The discussion ultimately calls for humility, continual learning, and loving action as the practical means to walk in the light and avoid spiritual darkness.

Transcript

As has been announced, our panel topic today is Light versus Darkness. Joining me are brothers Nathan Austin and Darius Gurjean. We’ll divide the subject into three areas of discussion. First, a general question. How are the contrasting symbols of light and darkness used in the Scriptures, and what do they symbolize?

Second, we’ll examine in detail the two specific scriptures assigned to us and listed on your convention program. 2 Corinthians 4, 4 and Ephesians 4, 17, 20. Lastly, we’ll explore practical applications of these scriptural admonitions and exhortations which frame their warnings in the symbols of light and darkness. So let’s begin.

My first question is, how are the contrasting symbols of light and darkness used in the Scriptures, and what do they symbolize? Quote a scripture or two with brief comments as examples. Darius, please start us off. Well, I have a scripture, but I have to start relating to what brother Rick was just talking about, and also yesterday, Brother John, George, excuse me.

You know, language is for our benefit. When Jesus said, my words are the spirit and they are alive, he meant what he said. So I want to explain something before we start which relates to the metaphor. The metaphor. Brother Russell talks about this as human, or Brother George says, we are terrestrial.

We are earthly creatures. We can understand things because we have the five senses. The touch, the hearing, the vision, and everything we have in words relates to those sensations of those five senses. So this metaphor I would like to explain to you by saying, let’s talk about what is light and what is darkness. So.

So imagine the following experiment. That you’re in the dark room, there is no light at all. So you’re looking at. What do you see? Nothing.

Then you bring a light and you light the bulb, and then what would happen? The light will travel very fast. It will hit the object, and then the reflection will go to your eye, and eventually something will happen in your visual cortex, in your brain.

Why is this important? Imagine the. Now I have perfectly dark or black ink, and perfectly dark or black ink would be painting the flower. So look what this hand is doing.

It’s painting it perfect black.

Now the image disappears. You don’t see anything. You shine the bulb. Nothing. You shine hundreds or thousand bulbs, nothing.

Because darkness is nothingness. There is nothing there. Only the light brings into life, into our understanding, things which are important to us. To conclude, I would say this. In the beginning, there was chaos.

And what did the Lord say when he created the world? Let there be light, and there was light, and it was good. So what I would like to say is the following, and this is the message we have heard from him and announced to you.

God is light. In him there is no darkness at all. Darkness is nothingness. Light is everything. Life, principles, beauty, harmony.

This is life. So this is from me as an introduction from physics, so to speak. Thank you, Professor Gujean, for that scientific explanation of light and the Scriptures, starting with, I think, at the top, God is light. A good place to start. Nathan, your thoughts?

We’ll have a little bit of overlap here. For one, Brother Darius already mentioned in Genesis, the first chapter, I think we have a good initial description of the difference between order and chaos. In the beginning, you know, God formed everything and he separated the light from the darkness as one aspect of his creative act. So Genesis 1, I think, highlights that. One way we can look at light and dark is this order and chaos duality.

Also, Brother Darius mentioned the Lord as light, and I want to bring up a couple Scriptures very briefly. I won’t read them in their entirety, but Psalm 27 refers to the Lord as my light and salvation. Exodus, the 13th chapter. The Lord is represented as a pillar of fire by the tabernacle.

And then we know in First Kings, the eighth chapter, it references the glory of the Lord in the holy within the tabernacle, and these are all aspects in which we envision the Lord as being represented by light, and then in addition to that, we have this other aspect that’s often seen in the Scriptures that could be moral or ethical, it could be understanding, it could be truth. It comes. It’s a little.

They sort of overlap. But one scripture in Ephesians 5, at one time you were darkness, but now you are light, and then we see a few others. I won’t necessarily read them, but Romans 13, John 3, and then of course, our theme texts. Thank you, Nathan, for expanding the broadness of these two symbols.

I’ll add a few of my own and then ask if there are any more comments on this first question. Light in general symbolizes good in its various forms, while darkness in general symbolizes evil in various forms. A good example of scripture is Isaiah 5:20. Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil that put darkness for light and light for darkness. Isaiah 5:20.

Another symbolic contrast in light and darkness is wisdom versus foolishness. Ecclesiastes 2:13. Then I saw that wisdom excelleth folly as far as light excelleth darkness, and my favorite, I think it’ll be on the screen, is in John chapter one, the context of the scripture Darius brought to our attention. This is John chapter 1.

Verses 4, 5 and 9. In him speaking of Jesus was life, and the life was the light of men, and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not? That was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. Jesus in his human perfection was the light that shined into the world of darkness, of human imperfection.

And so now you know why I chose hymn number 297 to open this panel discussion. Just one more light symbolizes the knowledge of God’s plan versus the darkness of ignorance. First Thessalonians 5, 24 and 5, and this has also already been quoted several times in this convention. 1 Thessalonians 5, 2, 4, 5.

For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. But ye brethren are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light and the children of the day. We are not of the night, nor of darkness. Any other comments or questions, Scriptures before we move on to our next section?

Just one addition. That light is real physical thing. Darkness does not exist, really, because it’s a perfectly black or dark means vacuum disappears. It’s absence, and I think it’s important to understand because eventually in the kingdom there will be no evil.

There will be none of these things which we observe today, and I’m not saying that we don’t observe them, but in itself they don’t have any value and will cease to exist. But the light will ask for ages. Yeah, very good. Darkness is the absence of light.

You know, when children paint with colors, you ask, well, what is the color? Black. They can paint with black. They’ve got a little bottle of black ink or black paint. Black is the absence of any color, just like blackness is the absence of any light.

What color is white? White is the combination of all colors. You know the old or very young person’s trick of taking a prism and breaking up white light into its composite colors. White light has all the colors, black or darkness has none. Good, good observation.

Similar analogy is Swiss cheese. The holes in the Swiss cheese. You see them there, right? But what are they? Nothing.

Nothing. That’s exactly what darkness and evil is. Absence of goodness or the absence of cheese. Absence of goodness. I like cheese.

Okay, let’s move on to the second of the three parts of our panel discussion today. The two scriptures that were assigned to us, so you’ll see them printed on your program. Nathan, please read 2 Corinthians 4, not just verse 4, but the context in 2nd Corinthians 4, 1 6, and give us your thoughts, particularly on verse 4, Nathan. All right.

2nd Corinthians 4, starting with verse 1. Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God, and even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but. But Christ Jesus as Lord and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus sake.

For God, who said light shall shine out of darkness, is the one who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

The first thing that comes to mind or came to mind while I was reading that and thinking about this conversation, it reminded me of the scripture of us as the light of the world. You are the light of the world, and I thought how that is not a hidden light. It’s a light we’re responsible for sharing, even though God has blinded the sight of many, and if we look at verse six, you see that phrase, God hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.

So there’s an explicit statement of light as the knowledge of God’s glory, and perhaps this is truth. Understanding many things.

I like a good start. Light is truth. We have the obligation of sharing it, since we have the privilege of having it. Darius, your thoughts on this particular passage. I highlighted here that what the God of this world is doing, he’s blinding the mind.

Not eyes, but minds. That’s an interesting statement, right? You blind the mind and you may even look at things. They look at Jesus, and what did they say?

He blasphemed God. They didn’t see because mind was blinded. So the light of the gospel, the glory of Christ, is the image of God. So my definition what it is God. We sang about Jesus.

This scripture says gospel, the glory of Christ. There’s no contradiction here because what we have is the image of the Father. So when we say Jesus is the light of the world because he reflected the Father. So I see a beauty here and the contradiction with Satan, who is blinding And I think it’s an important subject. I like that thought of blinded minds as well as blinded eyes.

Because you remember when Jesus ascended, he said to the people, you’ll see me when I return just as you saw me. Isaiah said, what did he mean? You would see me with the little eyes? No, you would see me with your minds, with your mind’s eye, and we sometimes say there’s an expression, there are none so blind as those who will not see.

It’s because their minds are blind, not necessarily their eyes. I like what Nathan said, that seeing or light, and seeing means understanding. Sometimes it would have different aspects which relate to our perception, and I think, you know, the Lord said, do not judge unrighteous judgment according to vision. Judge justly.

Someone wisely said, and this is a saying which I loved for years, understand what you see, because you only see what you understand. I will repeat, understand what you see, because you only see what you understand. Sometimes our blindness meet. We are so focused on one thing that we don’t see anything, the sign. So seeing relates to mind, the perception, the heart, etc.

It’s. It’s really beautiful, and I think that when I think about God of this age, this is another type of blindness, and what do you see here? Now remember when the Lord created sun, the moon and stars, the Earth are lights.

They were for signs for days. They were directions. They were something which would help us to orient, and this means I don’t know where to go, and those of you who are interested in astronomy, you probably know, you know that the pollution of the sky is a real thing.

That’s why observatories are in the desert climate where humidity is low. There’s. There’s no lights from the city because there’s so many different lights, right?

No wonder for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light, and what Satan does is as a God of this world, by showing a different light, he will detract from the true light of this world, from Jesus and the Father. Yeah, very good. I like that thought of seeing what you understand and understanding what you see. Because as you pointed out before, we are human beings, we are of the flesh.

We are terrestrial, we have five senses. Now, the sense of sight or vision is focused. We see what we look at, hearing. We hear everything around us, in front of us, behind us, to the sides. But that sight by which we see light is something very focused.

And so we have to train ourselves to focus our sight and see the light that God wants us to see. Do you have a follow up, Nathan. I do. I just want to add to Brother Darius picture of light pollution. It really resonates with me right now because the thing about light pollution, that is the challenge is the thing that you’re looking at, you can’t see because of all the other things that overwhelm it or maybe even look the same.

And so that makes a lot of sense to me right now because I don’t know if you have this experience, but I’m trying to read what the news, if you want to call it that, or whatever’s coming in the feed on my phone. I don’t even know what to listen to and what to believe because I’m being overwhelmed with garbage, and I feel like that’s kind of what that light pollution analogy tells me is when, when there’s just, and it strikes me as a really great tool of the adversary. If, if I can’t deceive them, I will just keep throwing garbage until they can’t tell what to pay attention to.

But there’s good news here, and the good news is, and I quote here from Ezekiel, where Satan is compared to the whale or the big sea monster which is mudding the waters, and what the Lord says about this is, when I extinguish you, I will cover the heavens and darken their stars. I will cover the sun with the cloud, and the moon will not give its light. All the shining lights in the heavens, I will darken over you, and I will bring darkness upon you, Earth.

So darkness is a preamble or introduction to seeing the true light, and we have the promise that he will be darkened. The God of this world will be darkened, and this is in Ezekiel 32. All right, very good.

I like Nathan’s comment. Your comment about, I’ll call it visual noise. You know, we say how with our hearing, I mentioned before, it’s, it’s, you see, you’re. You hear everything around you, and if there’s noise, it drowns out the signal, as scientists would say, that you want to hear. I guess there’s visual noise as well.

I said our vision is very focused, but what we look at can also be confused with noise, and I’m going to pick up on that comment too, about when we get into practical applications of light and darkness around us in the world today. But first, on second Corinthians 4, 1 6, let me give my own take, and I think in these verses we see Paul’s typical logical, orderly presentation of his argument. Here’s Paul’s argument, 2 Corinthians 4:1, 6, verse 1 says that we, all of us, like the Apostle Paul himself, have, by the grace of God, a ministry, a job to do.

Verse two tells us that our job, this ministry, is to present God’s truth in simple honesty, which will make our message more acceptable to those who hear us. Verse 3 says, if we neglect that ministry, this job we have to do, or if we do it poorly, those who might have been helped by receiving this precious truth, this gospel truth of God’s plan, will not receive the salvation they might otherwise have because we did our jobs poorly or not at all. Verse 4, the key text that was on the screen and Brother Nathan did a fine job of analyzing it, warns us that Satan opposes our efforts, trying to prevent the light, the gospel truth of God’s plan from enlightening the minds of those who are in ignorance. Verse 5 repeats the point of verse 2 by stressing the importance of humility in our witnessing, and then lastly, verse six harkens back to verse one.

You see kind of a folding mirror image pattern in Paul’s argument. Verse 6 hearkens back to verse 1 and summarizes our commission, our ministry, our job. We have been given the light of truth, which brings with it the responsibility of sharing that light with others who are yet in the darkness and blindness of Satan. Quite a strong passage. I commend the Convention Committee for assigning us this important passage.

Darius or Nathan. Anything else on second Corinthians before we move on? No? All right. We have a second scripture assigned to us.

Ephesians 4, 17, 20. Darius, please read the verses and start our discussion. Yes. So I tell you this and insist on it in the Lord. I want to pause here.

There were occasions where Apostle Paul said, I don’t have a commandment of the Lord regarding marriage, but I think I have the Lord’s spirit, and I recommend to you here, he says, so I tell you this and insist on it in the Lord. So it’s a different statement that you must no longer walk as Gentiles do in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardness of their hearts.

Having lost all sense of shame, they have given themselves over to sensuality or practice of every kind of impurity.

But this is not the way you came to know Christ.

So I think that this scripture relates to futility of human mind, philosophy, whatever you want to call it. I am a little bit reluctant to say futile philosophy. I said it. I Know, but philosophy is love of wisdom. So I cannot against that wisdom, cannot go against wisdom.

But there is this propensity in human mind that they will do analysis, paralysis. They will do things, enjoy themselves, play with it. There is this danger which is the danger of darkening the understanding which the Lord said. Futility of their mind and in their thinking, the ignorance which leads to hardness of their hearts. Serious danger for all of us, in my judgment.

You know, that I added another scripture. I don’t know if you want me to quote it now or in a moment, because this idea of light and thinking or mind which can be blinded is also continued in chapter 5 of Ephesians and in verse 8 and 9, especially Apostle Paul talks about the fruit of light. Now, your Bible may say fruit of the spirit, but don’t believe it. It’s light. I checked all the manuscripts.

It’s light. Now, there is no contradiction when you say spirit, because I think it’s the same. But no mistake. Fruit of delight is all goodness, righteousness, and truth, and in my judgment, we all have to learn goodness, righteousness, and truth.

That is coming from. From the Father. I have to admit, Darius, when you first said you wanted to talk about Ephesians 5 and you told me that light has fruits, I didn’t believe it, and I sort of pushed back a little because, you know, when we talk about fruits, what do we talk about? Fruit of the spirit.

Fruit of the spirit, Fruit of the spirit, Fruit of light. But I have to say, Darius convinced me. Good argument. I like it, and in so many of Paul’s writings, and when I get my turn to talk about these verses in Ephesians 4, we find that his arguments connect not just in a few verses, but in a few chapters.

And I think there’s a connection here that you brought out to our attention between Ephesians 4 and 5. Nathan, your comments on anything else on Ephesians 4, verse 18, the part about being darkened in their understanding? I got thinking about the initial description Brother Darius gave about the physicality of light and the fact that darkness is the absence of light, and, you know, a good example is if I wanted to bring darkness to this room or to a corner of this room, one option is to turn off the lights. The other option is to shadow it by blocking the light.

Right? That’s how you get darkness, and you either remove the light or you block the light, and so I was imagining that these people are having their understanding darkened, and it’s not that they have the light.

They don’t have the light. That’s what I’m really trying to say. The light has been blocked from entering them, and thinking about that in that way was an interesting new perspective to me. All right, very good.

Yeah. Light not only being the absence, darkness not only being the absence of light, but also a shadowing, a blocking of the light. Yeah, good concept. I’ll give my own thoughts on this passage here, and once again, we see the Apostle Paul’s orderly logic, and it spans multiple chapters.

If you went back to the Context of Ephesians 4, 17, 20, and looked at Ephesians 4:1, 16, leading up to our key verses, Paul exhorts the brethren to unity, unity, unity of the faith, unity of the spirit, unity in love, in peace, and in the one hope of our calling, and so forth. These are in the first 16 verses of Ephesians 4, and achieving this unity is what Paul means when he says, walk worthy of the calling which you have received, and so then in verses 17 to 19, Paul continues his exhortation to walk worthy by pointing out the opposite of walking worthy in unity, namely to walk as the Gentiles walk, and he lists three specific characteristics of walking unworthily, as we’ve seen in these verses.

One, vanity of mind, two, a darkened understanding through ignorance caused by blindness of heart, and three, being beyond feeling. These are the opposites of walking worthily. Briefly, the first characteristic, walking unworthily, is vanity of emptiness or mind. The meaning is clear. There’s the old expression, nature abhors a vacuum.

But, brethren, Satan loves one. If we don’t daily fill our minds with spiritual thoughts, Satan will offer helpful suggestions. So don’t walk in vanity or emptiness of mind. The second characteristic mentioned is a darkened understanding through ignorance caused by blindness of heart. But I left out a key phrase.

The key phrase is in verse 18, being alienated from God. That’s part of what it means to walk unworthily, as the Gentiles were literally alienated from God. The Greek word for alienated. There is a non participant, a non participant, and the exhortation is clear. Be a daily participant in your walking worthily, in the unity that Paul described in the first part of Ephesians 4.

Lastly, the third characteristic of walking unworthily is the result of indulging in the first two characteristics that I’ve already detailed. The result is lascivious uncleanness, greediness, in one word, sin, and so, once again, the warning is clear. If we don’t daily fill our minds with spiritual thoughts, if we don’t daily walk the walk as a Full time participant. Then, as Proverbs 16:25 puts it, there is a way that seemeth right to a man, but the end of the way is the way of death.

Any last comments before we move on to the third and last part of our discussion, Practical Applications. I think we may have some time still yet. So because I wanted to go ahead to ask you a question, I thought only I got to ask the question. No, no. Would you agree with me that the ways in which we can be blinded or we can sin is infinite?

In other words, Fred Russell makes the point that we don’t study the error to tell the truth. The best vaccination against evil and error is to delight and fill with what you said those proper principles, and I am thinking that the blindness, the light, they all relate to mind how the man thinks in his heart. So he is, and Nathan related to the.

You know what we see in the media. If you pump the sewer to your mind, you’re going to have the side effects. I think we are kind of going towards the practical now. But I wanted to to stress this thought, that darkening of the understanding hardness of heart. The brothers were talking about this and I have to relate to the first welcome address because I think that the fruit of the light mentioned by the Apostle Paul, goodness, righteousness and truth are those strings on which we are weaving.

And there is infinite number of ways you can multiply goodness, you can multiply righteousness and truth, and if we understand how to do it, we are getting a passport or visa to eternal life. We are learning the principles of the Father, which in a new situation, and we have plenty of new. We have artificial intelligence, we have the technology which we don’t know the side effects. But if we master those principles of goodness, righteousness and truth will have no fears.

So those are the strings which are going to be weaving because they lead us to the Father. I like what you said and I want to respond to the question. If I understood your question as you put it and asked if I agree. Your question was there are so many ways which darkness can assail the light, and so of course we have to be on guard of all of them.

And I like that thought because it’s true. The light of truth, the light of righteousness as we defined it in our earlier discussion is very focused, very narrow, very specific. Darkness, by contrast, is nothingness. The absence of those very narrowly focused specific ideals and concepts and principles, and it reminds me of a discussion we’re having in our homoclesia.

We’re studying volume five of the word shield, oblivion, and oblivion is like this almost incomprehensible expanse of nothingness, and it’s a good contrast with the very focused, precise, desirable aspects of life. I like your question. I agree with it.

Nathan, any response? Just thinking back to something you said earlier. You were talking about nature, of course, a vacuum, and you talked about the vacuum if there’s darkness in your mind and the importance of filling your mind with light, and I just wanted.

I think that’s exactly. It gets back to the concept of Swiss cheese and the holes being the absence of light, and so the only way to solve that problem is to fill our minds with light, and I. I just really like that image. Okay, thank you very much.

Anything else before we move on to part three? There is. Nathan taught me some time ago, doom scrolling, and this is what I meant. If we start looking and studying exactly what type of sensuality, practice of impurity, we are not gaining anything.

Put the right things in. That’s right. We have to memorize. For me, practically speaking, that means memorize the psalm, memorize the scripture. I will tell you practically what we do.

We have 30 minutes drive to the meeting. On the way to the meeting, we always try to learn one, which is a new one to practice our memory that provides for a material which will awaken later on, and you wouldn’t believe how helpful that is. Very good. Well, I think that is an excellent segue into part three of our discussion, which is practical applications of these concepts of light versus darkness.

We’ve analyzed how the symbols are used in scriptures. We’ve analyzed the two specific scriptures assigned to us. So now, in the time remaining, what are some practical applications and scriptural exhortations regarding symbolic light and darkness in the world today, but also especially as they affect our Christian walk, and Nathan, I’ll ask you to start, and you may want to explain for the oldsters in the room what doom scrolling is. Yeah, so that’s when you go to your feed on your phone and you read something and then you say, let’s see what else is going on today.

Oh, I didn’t know that an ostrich could do that, and sometimes it’s bad news and sometimes it’s funny videos, but you just, you can’t stop yourself and that’s doom scrolling.

So to the practical applications.

One thought actually just came to me as we were up here, a good example. I was thinking about the distinction between order and chaos. We’re also talking about understanding, but I think it’s important for us to consider the darkness not only in compared to truth, but also like things we should be doing, things we shouldn’t be doing. The costs of certain things and actions that we might take, and I was reminded I am a. I like to read science fiction fantasy type content because it often is thought provoking in a way that a lot of fiction is not.

For me at least, and I was reminded of a short story for those who are familiar with Ursula Le Guin. This is a short story by her and I will do. I’m sorry, I’m going to ruin it for you. I’m going to skip to the surprise at the end.

But it’s a really interesting story about this sort of utopia, and it’s this marvelous place where they’re having a festival except for the people who can’t stand it anymore and they have to leave, and the reason they leave is because all the joy and marvelous wonder of this civilization, there’s just one catch. It’s paid for by the misery of one child who’s kept in darkness and kept in hunger, and the story is really moving to me because I think it gets to our human nature.

As long as my needs are met, I can overlook these other things, and it’s really hard for us to see those things we talked about, the way we focus our attention. Sometimes there’s darkness or I don’t want to know about that. I want to focus on these things, and as long as our needs are met, well, I mean there’s costs but you know, life isn’t perfect and it’s a shame, but the kingdom will make it right.

It’s dangerous and there’s no easy answers, but that’s the first thing that came to mind. I have more, but I want to give opportunity to talk, so let me just piggyback on, and Nathan’s mention of Ursula Le Guin, who may not be familiar to many of you, but she is regarded as the premier female science fiction writer of our time, and she often framed her science fiction, her futuristic stories in Moral dilemmas of our time, and she was honored she was featured on the 2 ounce postage stamp by the United States Postal Service.

So if you ever buy a stamp for a two ounce envelope, I don’t know if they’re still available, but you might see Ursula Le Guin’s picture on a two ounce stamp. Darius, your comments? Well, I think it is a serious topic. Extremely serious. We observe darkness and the results of evil behavior every day.

That’s why this doom scrolling in the mass media catches the attention of people because the Uglier the things, the more people will click and pay attention.

I cannot talk to my neighbor and witness to him and tell him about the light, because I may. I may try to do physics, but I can fail miserably and then someone will have to correct me. Richard probably will, but I can talk to them about the fruits, and I will give you an example. I had a neighbor who was good but didn’t like me too much.

And I was thinking, what can I do with this? Or how can I. One day I’m walking Saturday and I see he’s trying to load a big engine on a platform, and the guy was in his 80s and I was thinking, how is he going to do it? I think he can use my help.

I spent six hours loading this on things and after some period of time they started talking differently. I think that the Fruit of the Light is the best witnessing topic for us because in this cacophony of different stories, horrors, etc. When I come and I talk with my friends at work, what is goodness? Tell me what is good? Because you know, when you have a clique of thieves, for them, good is a new technique to steal.

Is this good? You have to seriously consider what is good, and my definition of this goodness, which comes from understanding of the Father, is you’re creating things which will always lead to more good. Remember how the Lord was creating the world? He created light and it was good.

He created other things and it was good. Step by step. Goodness of the Lord brings more goodness, and today, talking of about AI, the difficulty is everyone is afraid. What is the technology going to achieve for us?

We can genetically modify ourselves. Terrible. What the AI is going to do and what they are trying to do. They are trying to hire philosophers who will advise them ethically what’s moral, what’s immoral. They’re not going to get anywhere there until they come to the principle of Lord’s goodness and understand really well.

So I found among my colleagues at work discussion about goodness, who Righteousness and truth are really good mechanism to talk and to introduce people to the goodness of the Father and the beautiful plan, the beautiful future. But unless they see fruitage, they are not going to listen to you because they’re going to be thinking, oh, that’s one of those conspiracies on the Internet every good. I like your story about your witness experience with the older gentleman and I’m approaching 80 myself, who had to lift that motor. There’s an old expression that people may not necessarily remember what you said to them, but they will remember how you made them feel, and you made that man feel good, and you made him feel noticed and you made him feel like you wanted to help him.

And so I think that helped him. Then listen to what you had to say. Our time is rapidly passing. Let me do my own observations of practical applications and I’ll come back to Nathan if you have an addition, and my observation or my example of practical applications of light versus darkness harkens back to something Nathan said earlier about the visual noise or confusion that we see in the world around us today.

And if you’ll indulge me, I’m going to go a little bit long. I hope I don’t use up all of our remaining time. But thinking of light as a symbol of truth, the truth, not just biblical truth, but the truth of everyday living. I have been dismayed by the volume of misinformation, disinformation and outright lies being disseminated in the world today, and I’m sure I’m not telling you anything you’re not all very well aware of, but as I look back on how did we get here from where we were, you know, again, I’m an advanced senior citizen.

I look back and I remember when I was a teenager growing up, my mom and dad and I in our home would watch the nightly news broadcasts, and a few of you may be old enough to remember Walter Cronkite, if any of you know that name. He was the dean of the network newscast and he always ended his nightly broadcast with this expression, and that’s the way it is, and we believed him and we knew that he told it the way it was.

Well, fast forward to our modern times and it’s not so much today. You know, back then, to have a job as a journalist was a normal calling. It was almost like being a doctor or a teacher. It was something worthy that people could aspire to as a good career. But today, the newscasters, so called, I think, are in cahoots and in league with those in power and those who are wealthy who tried to bend the perception of the people that they are talking to to believe that the world is the way they want us to believe, the way the world is and not the way the world actually is.

To me today, the news media have devolved into a new world of mass communication that I highly recognize or know how to navigate. Rather than being watchdogs as they were in the old times that I mentioned before, the news media today are complicit with the rich and powerful, and it leaves me bewildered Wondering what? What is the truth of any particular circumstance that you’re reading? Just the common everyday things about the war in Iran or the economy, everything else that affects our daily lives.

What is the truth? Can I trust what I’m hearing or reading online? The truth and lies look the same.

Here’s the bottom line. Isaiah 62 is fulfilled in our day, and Isaiah 62 says, for behold, the darkness shall cover the earth and gross darkness the people. The darkness of lies is overcoming the light of truth in the world today, and the result of that darkness and confusion and misinformation and disinformation.

Overspreading the truth is the dividing and the redividing of people into smaller and smaller tribes who associate with each other and are distrustful of everyone else because they don’t believe the same so called truth or share the same worldview. Here’s the important point I want to make on that. This dividing and redividing of the world into smaller and smaller distances, distrustful tribes is the precursor of violence, which we have already seen in many of the news accounts, and anarchy, which is not far off. Now, all of this is nothing new. You’ve all seen this.

So why am I spending so much time talking about the degradation of the world, which is a necessary progression leading to the destruction of the old order and the establishment of the kingdom. Here. Here’s why I’m taking the time to talk about this. Satan divides the world through this misinformation and disinformation that leads to violence and will lead to anarchy, and here’s my point.

Satan will try to divide us with misinformation and disinformation and outright lies about the true doctrines of truth, about our brethren and about ourselves and our relationships with God. Don’t let Satan divide you from the truth, from your brethren, from our Lord, from our Father. I had more scriptures to cite, but I won’t. I see our time is just about up. I’ll ask Darius and Nathan if you have any closing comments before we must conclude.

I put mine on the screen. God is light and there’s no darkness in Him. Please remember that, and another one which follows also in the same epistle. God is love.

That’s another metaphor. But notice, whoever does not love does not know God. Seeing, mind, understanding. It’s all about how we think.

If we transform our thinking by filling it with the goodness of the Lord. It’s wonderful. But the Lord Jesus defined what understanding is. Unless you show action, you understand what it practically means and you make it into an act it’s information without transformation. But if you get information which makes you different, makes you act differently, the light of the Father is being enacted in all our actions.

Very good, Nathan. Closing words, very briefly. I don’t remember who said it, but we see what we want because we’re so focused on what’s important to us. I think that’s an important thing to consider. That is a danger.

You don’t start with the end and then make everything fit. That you don’t start with what you want and then say, as long as that’s okay, I don’t care how I got there. I think that’s an important thing, and this gets back to, I think, your point about the importance of unity.

What’s the line? We both can’t be right, but we could both be wrong. Don’t go in assuming you’re right. Don’t go in assuming that you have to convince somebody. We’ve talked about that.

The version I like is I may be wrong, you may be right, and together we get closer to the truth. Because one of those factors which you mentioned is when we know we have the truth, the whole truth and the only truth, because then what is left? Let’s convince all those infidels that they’re wrong, and the wars were based on the fact that I have everything, when in fact, Brother Russell pointed to this.

The scripture says, the path of the righteous, the longer, the farther you go towards, the day shines brighter and brighter. We know partially, and we will eventually learn the true light, and back to that. If I need to learn something from you, I can’t learn that something from you if there’s a reason that we’re separated and we don’t speak. So thank you.

Very good. Well, thank you very much, Brother Darius and Brother Nathan, for your preparation participation. We’ve analyzed the symbols of light and darkness used in the Scriptures, examined the particular scriptures given to us as our assignment, and also discussed some practical applications and encouragements, exhortations and warnings in those scriptures. I’d like to also give a special thank you to Brother Darius for providing the illustrations on the screen and to the audience. The three of us hope that our discussion of this subject has been.

Wait for it. Enlightening.

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