What does this mean for us?

Jesus said, “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12). H also said (Sermon on the Mount), “You are the light of the world.” This is a different matter. Do you suppose he means me? If so, to whom am I supposed to shine? There’s an awful lot of darkness in the world these days. In fact, darkness seems to be everywhere. On what should I focus my light, or should I just let it shine, like the song we used to sing, “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.”

In any case, how does one argue with Jesus’ assertion, “You are the light of the world”? Where our light shines is up to us—either by choice or default. We can put it under a bushel basket, but it’s still shining (just covered up). Or we can put it on a lamp stand, where it will light up the whole room. Or we can put it on top of City Hall, where it will illuminate the whole community. Or maybe the Pentagon—could it penetrate as far as Afghanistan? At 186,000 miles per second, how long would it take? One thing is sure, you don’t chase darkness with more darkness.

The Anabaptist light has been shining now for over 480 years, while in the early days many forces tried to extinguish it. One mood these days would turn down the Anabaptist light and turn up a more popular neon light or restrict the light to shine only under a cultural basket. The truth is, the effectiveness of Anabaptist light will not be measured by how bright our light shines behind the wagons. It will be measured by how well it spotlights Anabaptist core values: discipleship, nonconformity to the world and agape love.

Discipleship

Jesus did not come as a politician, CEO or any power figure. He came as a show-and-tell to demonstrate how we should live. He then died to make it possible.
For the Anabaptist, faith is more than a belief in the birth and death of Jesus. It is a daily commitment to the life of Jesus within us.

Nonconformity to the world

Paul wrote: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds” (Romans 12:2).

God is petitioning us to embrace a different system of values than practiced by the secular world around us. Notice “the renewing of your mind.” The wiring in the brain has made some new connections. What we used to think made sense now is foolishness.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians: Do not deceive yourselves. If any one of you thinks he is wise by the standards of this age, he should become a ‘fool’ so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. “For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength” (1 Corinthians 1:25).

The woman who “wasted” a year’s salary on perfume for Jesus’ head (Matthew 23:6-7) did not make sense to worldly values.

The world cries, “Vengeance”; Jesus says, “Forgive.” The world climbs ladders for success; Jesus achieves success by being a servant. The world seeks power; the Christian finds power through the humility of Christ.

Agape love

For those who speak English there is only one word for “love,” and it has to cover the whole waterfront—from Hollywood and sex to pumpkin pie and everything in between. The New Testament gives us a choice of words, so we can talk about brotherhood, family, God and some other things. The most important is “agape”—the love that goes first, goes all the way and has no limits. This is the love God has for us. Jesus used agape when he told the young man that to love God was more important than all the laws and prophets (that’s a mouthful when talking to a Hebrew in those days), and he added that the second most important was to love your neighbor as yourself. Then he ratcheted it up to, “Love your enemies.”

I suspect God would click his heels if every Anabaptist congregation had a reputation for, “Behold, how they love (agape) one another.”