Some of the physical properties of natural light:

1. It’s an actual substance.

2. As a substance, light is influenced by its own weight, being pulled by gravity.

3. As a substance, light exerts a measurable force when it strikes an object.

4. Light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles (300,000 km) per second.

5. Even though it is a real substance, light itself is invisible.

6. It only becomes visible --
a. When it's the source of light (as a luminous object--the sun).
b. When it's reflected off something (an illuminated object--the moon).

7. The brightness of any light depends upon:
a. The brightness of the source itself.
b. The distance of the source to the observer.


In the Bible, we have some interesting revelations, concerning the nature and Presence of God. The Bible says, for example, that "God is light and in Him is no darkness at all." (1 John 1:5b)

And again, we see God described in this way: "He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. It is He alone who has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see; to Him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen." (1 Timothy 6: 15b & 16)

There is more, but this gives us the basis for the following exchange between Moses and the Lord God of the Exodus, the bringing up of Israel out of Egypt. Moses has gone up onto the mountain to be with the Lord, and to receive God's commands again (the first tablets having been destroyed). Moses is praying, and the Lord has granted some of his requests.

The Bible record says:

And Moses said, "Please, show me Your glory."

Then the Lord said, "I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." But He said, "You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live."

And the LORD said, "Here is a place by Me, and you shall stand on the rock. So it shall be, while My glory passes by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with My hand while I pass by. Then I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back; but My face shall not be seen." (Exodus 33: 18-23)

And in the next chapter we read:

So he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. Now it was so, when Moses came down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the Testimony were in Moses’ hand when he came down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him. So when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. (Exodus 34:28-30)

Several OT prophets saw the likeness of God displayed for them in visions in various ways. But in the passage above, Moses wants to see the real thing. He is in the very presence of God, and he now wants to see the God of Israel. And the Lord of heaven and earth is willing to let Moses to see a physical representation of His Presence.

But God spares Moses from seeing the actual face of God. The reason given is simple: no human being can see God and live. God is perfect light, unapproachable light. There are no shadows in Him, nothing to dim or diffuse the light of His glory. That light represents God's genuine righteousness, His holiness, His infinite glory, wisdom, and power. And I believe that the very nature and essence of God's essential being is radiant with a true and visible light. The "unapproachable light" in which God is said to dwell is the brilliant radiance of His own glory.

No human being can even begin to see God as He actually is, and live. To face God is to be simultaneously judged by His own absolute and infinite perfection -- His very nature and essence.

To actually see God, as He fully is, is to be stripped bare of all imperfections and sins -- all that's not as He is. And for anyone living on earth, that means instant annihilation, total destruction. We would simply cease to be. I believe that with all my heart. And that's another reason why Jesus had to come to earth. Not only does Jesus cover us from God’s "wrath" -- taking away all that is wrong with us, so that we're not consumed by the unveiled Presence, the face of God when we finally do see Him -- but Jesus also came here to unveil for everyone, the true nature of the invisible God.

God has been revealing various aspects of His nature to human beings from the very beginning. He has spoken and worked many great wonders to show us His power and might, to reveal His hatred of evil and His faithfulness to right the wrongs we do on this earth. All unrighteousness is an act against the very nature of God (and therefore an act against the universe itself, since the universe only exists by the will and power of God) and must be undone or reversed or righted again.

God Himself is the one who makes all things right. Just as Jesus made things right for those whose lives He touched wherever he went, while He walked the earth. (the dead were restored to life, the unclean lepers were made clean, the lame and blind were made whole, the demon-possessed were set free, etc.) Now I'm wandering, so I need to get back to the point.

Jesus is the eternal Son of God, eternally issuing forth from God. Jesus is the express image of the Father -- the Mind and essential nature of God fully expressed and revealed. John called Christ the logos (translated as Word) for this very reason. Truly then, Jesus Christ was God among us, and He is God among all who trust in Him today. When we have seen Jesus, we have seen the Father.

The glory of God's Presence, which was largely hidden from Moses, is not hidden in Jesus Christ. After Moses had been with the Lord for 40 days and nights, his own face glowed with the light of God, as the passage says above. But in Jesus Christ, the glory of God is revealed for all to see.

John the apostle said of Jesus, "And the Word [logos] became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only son, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14)

At one point in Jesus' ministry, the brightness of His glory was even revealed physically, for the inner circle of His disciples to see. The Bible says: "Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white." (Matthew 17:1& 2)

Publicly, the Lord Jesus Himself said, "I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness." (John 12:46)

And again, He says: "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life." (John 8:12)

God is light on many levels. And in His infinite nature, the essense of God cannot be seen by mortals. That is, we cannot see God and live. But in Jesus Christ we can see the truth of God, the power and love of God, the grace of God in forgiving sins, the mercy of God for an entire world lost in the darkness of self delusions and ignorance.

Jesus is not a mere reflection of God's brightness, but is the very essence of the brightness of God's glory come down among us. Jesus Christ is the mind and heart of God, revealed at last, without the dimming effects of human nature (human sin), or the dilution caused by human failures.

A New Testament letter (to the Christian believers in Colossae) says:

"giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He [Jesus, the Son] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers -- all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross." (Paul to the Colossians, 1:12-20)

Jesus, then, is the light of God to all humanity. He is the very nature of God revealed most perfectly to us. If we have seen Him, we have seen God, because He is the radiance of God's glory -- the light of God.

It's no wonder then that the Gospel of John opens with these words:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing has come into being. In him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it...

The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth...

From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known. (John 1:1-5, 9-14, 16-18)

The light of the world is Jesus.                                  

Jim