All things were made through him without him was not anything made that was made.

In him was life and that life was the light of men. Therefore the light shines in the darkness and

the darkness has not, not cannot and will not to all

eternity overcome the light. So what does it mean for Christ to be the light?

That's the question John Piper answers from John 1-1-5 in this episode of Light and Truth.

This sermon was originally preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church on

December 3rd 1989.

Without any preliminaries, let me say that this is the first of four messages on these

18 verses at the beginning of John's Gospel during Advent.

And today we're focusing on the first five verses.

And I think the main thrust of these five verses can be gotten at most effectively by reading them backwards, or at least for me to deal with them in reverse.

And so I'm going to direct your attention first

to verse five.

And it says, the light shines in the darkness

and the darkness has not overcome it. Now I know that some of your versions,

the NIV, the NASB, say has not understood it, comprehended it. I think the RSV overcome it is better for this reason. It can be translated, understood, or

comprehended, or or overtake or overcome.

The one other place in this gospel where this Greek word is used is in John 12 verse 35 and the parallel is so close that it would take extraordinary

contextual constraints on me to give it a different meaning that it has in that

verse.

And that verse says, walk while you have the light lest the darkness overtake you, overcome you.

The threat is that if you don't walk in the light you'll be swallowed up and overcome

...