122 – LIGHT AND DARKNESS
Jehovah condemns those who make light into darkness, and darkness into light. “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who substitute darkness fir light and light for darkness; who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Is.5:20). This text reveals that there are persons so wicked, which have such pleasure in the practice of evil, that they confuse things, that is, they do evil, thinking they are doing good, and they do good with an evil intention, as a trap to catch the innocent. They justify the evil, afterwards, in order to continue to do it. Solomon declares that these ones do not sleep if they do not do evil, and stay awake at night when they cannot make someone fall (Prov.4:16).When someone does what is good, this people condemn him as being evil. Jesus, when he was accused of practicing evil when he was practicing good, answered, “Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with what is my own? Or is your eye envious because I am generous? (Matt.20:15).
There are people who find pleasure in vice, not in virtue. There are unrighteous people who condemn the righteous for being righteous. There are guilty people who condemn and kill innocent people. There are immoral wise men that manage to change the concept of what is moral, so they cannot be accused. One of their favorite sentences is: “Immorality isn’t free sex, but corrupt politics.”
These things do not make men better. But everything is expected from men: a noble action, or a base and wicked one.
With God, things are different: only good, light, righteousness, love, etc, is expected. Jehovah is the god that calls himself good, righteous and merciful. Well, for Jehovah, light and darkness are the same(Ps.139:12). Let us see:
Jehovah told Moses to say to Pharaoh: “Let My people go, that they may serve Me” (Ex.8:1, 20; 9:1). Pharaoh, hardened by the very Jehovah, did not listen to Moses, but, tired of the curses of that god, after the tenth plague, let them go. Jehovah had said, “Let My people go that they may celebrate a feast to Me in the wilderness” (Ex.5:1). To make the feast complete, Jehovah told the people to plunder Egypt (Ex.3:20-22; 12:35-36). The promises of Jehovah were wonderful. “And Jehovah said, ‘I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey” (Ex.3:7-8). So the promise was to take them from the oppressive yoke of Egypt to do them good, and to take them to abundance and freedom. “I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite” (Ex.3:17). The people believed in Jehovah and left with their eyes fixed in this glorious vision that Moses had transmitted to them. So, the people left with joy and dancing, and with songs of victory (Ex.15:1-19). The feast was the Passover, which was celebrated to glory in the great salvation of Jehovah that led to a new life of freedom, peace, abundance, security and blessings. It was not told to them that they would experience hunger, thirst, and bondage, worst than what they suffered in Egypt. When the people felt the heat of the desert, seeing their women and their little children crying of hunger and thirst, they complained:“And the whole congregation of the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the sons of Israel said to them, ‘Would that we had died by Jehovah’s hand in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat, when we ate bread to the full; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger’” (Ex.16:2-3). “Then Jehovah said to Moses, ‘Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out a day’s portion every day” (Ex.16:4). Jehovah also sent quails to them (Num.11:31-32). The people gathered all they could, and prepared a table in the desert. “While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of Jehovah was kindled against the people, and Jehovah struck the people with a very severe plague” (Num.11:33). In the Psalm 78 we read that Jehovah, with this plague, killed the strongest, the chosen of Israel (Ps.78:23-31).
Jehovah did what was good, and with this god, he brought also evil. With this evil, he destroyed the good he had done, for wherever good and evil go together, good is surpassed by evil. This is why David said: “Darkness and light are alike to Thee” (Ps.139:12). Now, Jesus revealed that light is the good, and that the darkness is the evil. “And this is the judgment, that light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, lest his deeds should be exposed” (John 3:19-20). Paul said: “And do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them” (Eph.5:11). “For you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness” (1 Thess.5:5). To Paul, light and darkness is not the same thing, and the New Testament of Jesus does not agree with the Old Testament of Jehovah. “The one who loves his brother abides in the light and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes” (1 John 2:10-11). Now, Jehovah was displeased with Esau (Mal.1:1-3) and Jehovah was displeased with his people Israel (Ps.78:58-59). Jehovah walked in darkness and thought that he walked in the light. Good and evil walk together, for to Jehovah, they are the same thing, that is, good walks along with evil, and evil walks along with good. In the Law of Jehovah, good and evil walk hand in hand; blessing and curse do, too. “See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you listen to the commandments of Jehovah your God, which I am commanding you today; and the curse, if you do not listen to the commandments of Jehovah your God, but turn aside” (Deut.11:26-28).
To Jesus, sent to us by the Father, good and evil, darkness and light do not go hand in hand. Jesus made separation between good and evil, and light and darkness, and delivered us from the curse of the law, becoming a curse in our place (Gal.3:13). He delivered everyone from the yoke of the Law. “But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter” (Rom.7:6). Christians receive from the Father, now, only good, and not evil, for from God the Father comes only what is good. “Every good thing bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow” (James 1:17). “God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).
The Father does not have anything to do with the darkness of Jehovah, and sent Jesus Christ to this world, his only begotten Son, to reveal that there is no light in the world. When Jesus says, “I have come as light into the world”, he is saying that the light of the Father is in the works of Christ, and that the darkness are in the works of Jehovah (John 12:46).
Verses for meditation: Ex.20:21; Deut.4:10-14; 5:22-24; Ps.18:11; Job 19:6-8; Lam.3:1-2; Is. 9:2; Ps.107:9-10, etc.
BY Pastor Olavo Silveira Pereira