Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, “I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.” — John 8:12, NASB

The second of the Lord’s “I AM” proclamations in John’s gospel occurs in the midst of a major dispute with the Jewish religious leaders as He teaches in the temple during the Feast of Tabernacles.* The chief priests and Pharisees are galvanized in their rejection of Jesus and His messianic claims at this point, but there remain sharp differences of opinion among the crowds. Using light as a metaphor for the direct presence of God, Jesus makes plain that He has been sent by the Father, is equivalent to Him, and is the only way by which men are saved.

It is surely more than a coincidence that Jesus made this particular I AM proclamation during this particular feast, which included a ceremonial “illumination of the temple” by candelabras positioned in the temple’s Court of the Women, an area which held the treasury where He was speaking. Alfred Edersheim writes:

Light is an unmistakable symbol of God in both the Old and New Testaments. From Genesis through Revelation, light denotes the Almighty’s presence, power and truth while darkness signifies the absence of His truth and the sinful nature of man. By proclaiming Himself the Light of the world, Jesus has claimed to be God. This naturally escalates the conflict with the religious elites who immediately refute the claim. Ever the legalists, they make sure to cite the technicality that there is no one around to corroborate His testimony as required under Jewish law.

God however, does not need the corroboration of man; He knows who He is and from whence He came, and that is that. Still Jesus points out that the Father who sent Him corroborates His divine claim, but since they do not know the Father they cannot perceive His truth. Not only that, but He will later inform them that their father is not God, but the devil—a murderer from the beginning—and as his children they are destined to perform his will. By the end of the chapter they will indeed try to kill Him, but as it is not the appointed time, He will pass from their midst unscathed.

Conversely, those who are of God grasp His truth and walk in its light as true disciples. In the earlier Bread of Life teaching, Jesus compares partaking of the bread to a person’s acts of coming to Him and believing in Him, but here in using the light metaphor, Jesus refers specifically to following Him (Gk. akolouthon) in discipleship. They do the will of their Father, which is to follow in His word. By knowing His truth and accepting His Son, they are loosed from the burden of sin and preserved from God’s righteous judgment. The believer’s obedience to His will and His commandments validates their faith and testifies to their salvation.

Once again, the I AM proclamation is exclusive. He is not a light, but the light of the world. Only through Him is redemption and access to God attainable. That was a hard truth for the Jewish orthodoxy to hear back then, and it continues to be today because of our culture’s all-inclusive views on religion where at best, Jesus is considered one of many legitimate paths to God. The Lord Himself states otherwise, but this is a fact that cannot be grasped by those who are not truly of God.

At the beginning of John's gospel the assertion is made that although the true Light had come into the world, the darkness did not comprehend it. The Greek term katelaben is used, meaning to comprehend or to overcome. Different translations of the Bible will assign one meaning or the other, with both quite accurate when applied in comparison to Christ’s dealings with the Jewish establishment. The corrupted Pharisees walked in darkness, blind to the true things of God and thus incapable of comprehending the Light that had come into the world. They failed also to overcome it; Jesus would accomplish in full the redemptive work that He came to do in His earthly ministry and His gospel endures today, guiding the children of God to their promised salvation.

As Jesus avoids His attackers and departs the temple, He comes upon a man who was blind from birth. Explaining to the disciples that “we must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day,” He miraculously heals the man as a testament to God, stating "while I am in the world, I am the Light of the world." It is a powerful illustration of the transforming nature of God’s holy truth, and the responsibility of disciples to diligently do those works which glorify Him.

Jesus would only remain with them only a little longer, as He would soon fulfill His destiny at the cross and His role as the light of the world would shift to His disciples as His representatives on earth. Followers of Christ are called to be like a light amid the darkness of a fallen world, to share the truth of His gospel, to display good works for everyone to see in order that God may be glorified, and to stand apart from the world so that the righteous nature of a heart changed by God is contrasted with the sinful heart of natural man. This is only possible through faith in Christ and obedience to His instruction. May God grant us the ability to continuously reflect His light in our lives—that we may maximize every opportunity to testify to His immeasurable grace and set His example before the world.