There is a strong link between light and good as opposed to dark and evil. The aim here is to explore these aspects of the nature of Jesus. The account of the transfiguration will be the main passage.

1. God is Light

The apostle John provides us with a valuable view of Jesus. He knew Jesus as a man, he saw Him transfigured, and he encountered the risen Jesus, and then was face to face with the ascended, glorified Jesus. He was best friends with Jesus the man, even leaning on him during meals, but when he encountered the transfigured and ascended Jesus he fell face on face as though dead. So when he describes Jesus to us we would do well to listen. Here is how he describes Him in one of his letters.

1 John 1:5 We proclaim to you the one who existed from the beginning, whom we have heard and seen. We saw him with our own eyes and touched him with our own hands. He is the Word of life. 2 This one who is life itself was revealed to us, and we have seen him. And now we testify and proclaim to you that he is the one who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then he was revealed to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy.

5 This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. 6 So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. 7 But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.

God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. Once in worship the Lord showed me that He sees all of the spectrums of light (visible and invisible to the human eye), He can see colours we can’t, if He wants He can overlay  it with a heat map; but beyond that He can see the thoughts and motives of the human heart. Light reveals, and God can see everything!

2. The Transfiguration

The transfiguration is a remarkable event; in it the light of the divine nature in Jesus shone through His human body. Before that, He tells a crowd that He is the light of the world with particular reference to seeing God’s way in this life.

John 8:1 Jesus returned to the Mount of Olives, 2 but early the next morning he was back again at the Temple. A crowd soon gathered, and he sat down and taught them. 3 As he was speaking, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. They put her in front of the crowd. 4 “Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?” 6 They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against him, but Jesus stooped down and wrote in the dust with his finger. 7 They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” 8 Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust. 9 When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. 10 Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” 11 “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.” 12 Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.”

Below is a harmonisation of all the passages about the transfiguration (Matthew 17, Mark 9, and Luke 9).

• Six days later Jesus took Peter and the two brothers, James and John up a high mountain to be alone and to pray.
• As Jesus was praying, the appearance of His face changed and shone like the sun and His clothes became dazzling white – far whiter than any earthly bleach could make them, as white as light.
• Suddenly Elijah and Moses appeared and were talking with Jesus about His exodus from this world which would be fulfilled in Jerusalem. They were glorious to see.
• Peter and the others had fallen asleep and when they woke up they saw Jesus’ glory and the two men standing with Him.
• Peter blurted out “Lord, it’s wonderful for us to be here! If you want, I’ll make three shelters as memorials—one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He said this because he didn’t know what to say because they were all terrified.
• But even as he was saying this, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and terror gripped them as the cloud covered them.
• A voice from the cloud said “This is my dearly loved Son (My Chosen One), who brings me great joy. Listen to him.” 
• The disciples were terrified and fell to the ground.
• When the voice finished speaking, Moses and Elijah left.
• Jesus came over to them and touched them, He said “Get up, don’t be afraid”. They looked up and only Jesus was there.
• As they went back down the mountain, Jesus commanded them “Don’t tell anyone what you have seen until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”
• So they kept it to themselves, but they often asked each other what he meant by “rising from the dead.”
• The disciples asked Jesus about Elijah coming before the Messiah. Jesus said that that was true but that he had already come and wasn’t recognised but abused. The disciples realised He was talking about John the Baptist.

God wants us to know Him. Often we’re happy to pursue knowledge of Him as love, Saviour, etc., but tend to avoid those areas we’re fearful of or don’t understand. Make it your ambition to know as much of God’s character as possible, even those areas that we might think will be uncomfortable – they will always be worth it.

3. God is good

There are various things that are associated with light in the Bible – one of those is goodness. There is no darkness or evil in God, He is light and good.

Psalm 34:8 Taste and see that the Lord is good. Oh, the joys of those who take refuge in him!

James 1: 17 Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow.

2 Peter 1:3 His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

 4. Living in the Light / Practising the Truth

1 John1:5 This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. 6 So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. 7 But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin

If we live in the light there will be purity, clarity and clear vision which should result in practising the truth. James says that you can see that faith is present in a person’s life by the actions they take, and in the same way, if someone is living in God’s light there will be evidence which the Bible calls “practising the truth”.  The question is “How do we live in the light?”

5. Have your Heart Flooded with Light

Ephesians 1:15 Ever since I first heard of your strong faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for God’s people everywhere, 16 I have not stopped thanking God for you. I pray for you constantly, 17 asking God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to give you spiritual wisdom and insight so that you might grow in your knowledge of God. 18 I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.

When we ask the Holy Spirit to flood our souls with God’s light we begin to see what He sees. On one occasion He showed me that driving above the speed limit wasn’t fulfilling His will and was aggravating my soul, keeping me out of peace. Lying damages my soul; it creates darkness and shadow, whereas truth sets me free. The positive effect of His light is that I can understand His Word and promises to me more clearly and as result I can walk more closely with Him and enjoy all that He’s provided for me.

6. God’s Light causes Me to see People as He does 

For me, one of the confusing things about the 1 John passage was, But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other. What did light have to do with how I related to other people? Then the Holy Spirit reminded me of this passage:

 2 Corinthians 5:16 So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! 17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

God’s light causes us to see people how He sees them – think how different life would be if you saw everyone you encountered as Jesus sees them. What if we actively sought the Holy Spirit for His view of the person standing in front of us? Instead of being bored, annoyed, saddened or infatuated, what if our first response was to ask the Holy Spirit to flood us with His light so we could see them as He does. How different our responses and prayers would be.

Jesus is the Light of the World. His light doesn’t just reveal salvation, it reveals who God is, it reveals the path we should take, it reveals our innermost motivations, it reveals His truth, and it reveals who other people really are.