When God spoke aloud, why did some hear only thunder?

In John 12:27-36, the voice of God the Father booms from heaven — yet the crowd dismisses it as thunder. In this study, Dr. Toby Holt explores why people explain away even the clearest signs from God.

As the cross draws near, Jesus prays, “Father, glorify Your name,” and the Father answers audibly from heaven. Some in the crowd say it merely thundered; others think an angel spoke. Dr. Holt explains that people often demand proof from God and then refuse it when it comes. Jesus says His coming death will judge the world, defeat its evil ruler, and draw people to Himself: “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” The cross is how the King draws His people home.

Questions this study answers:

1. Why did some hear God’s voice as only thunder? Because a hard heart can explain away even a clear sign. People often want proof, then dismiss it when it is given.

2. What did Jesus mean by being “lifted up”? He was speaking of the cross. His death would draw people from every nation to Himself.

3. What did the Father’s voice confirm? That Jesus was walking the path God had set, and that His death would glorify God and rescue His people.

“And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” — John 12:32 (NKJV)

Speaker: Dr. Toby Holt is the President of New Geneva Theological Seminary, a Reformed seminary in Colorado Springs. He is known for clear, down-to-earth Bible teaching, and his sermons have been downloaded more than 1.9 million times on SermonAudio.

Listen and go deeper: This sermon is part of the John Explained study from New Geneva Theological Seminary. Find more verse-by-verse teaching across the Bible at newgeneva.org. To support this teaching ministry, visit newgeneva.org/give.

[gentle music] During the course of Christ's ministry, his Father's voice was heard from heaven on three separate occasions. In today's study, we'll focus on one of these events from John 12, the time when the Father's voice boomed forth for all to hear just prior to his Son's death and resurrection.

There are professing Christians who think that all roads go to heaven. Now, let me change that up for a moment. There are professing Christians, and I'm going to use air quotes because I want you to understand the distinction. There are "professing" Christians who believe that all roads, or at least other roads, go to heaven. Amongst professing Christians, that means people in pews like ours, amongst professing Christians, people who attend churches on Sunday morning and the like, amongst professing Christians, 25%, one in four, believe that all roads, or at least other roads, go to heaven. Do you believe that?

I should hear more no's.

No.

Dear heavens, no, we do not believe that. Now, amongst professing Christians, 52%, a majority, 52% of people who say Jesus is Lord believe that you access him in the future, that your salvation is hinged based upon your work, something that you do. So you have 25% that say, "You know, Christianity could get you there, but so can this religion and that religion and the other thing." And over 50% say, "Yeah, Jesus gets you there, but he gets you there alongside things that you do to somehow merit it, earn it, and the like." Time doesn't exist for me to linger on this point as much as I would like to, but here's what happens if you believe either of those things. Here's what happens if you take Jesus and say, "He's the means to heaven, and, I don't know, the outer space spaghetti monster, belief in him, it'd also lead me to heaven." If you believe two things, this religion, that religion, this religion, this cult, what have you. If you think that it's all equal, all leads you to heaven, what does that do? It does two things. Number one, it neuters the gospel. If you can believe in the outer space spaghetti monster or any other variations, any other cultic beliefs, any other religion under the sun, Baal, Molech, Asherah, they're all the same thing. If you can believe in any of that stuff or any modern beliefs and deities and the like as a substitute for that, then that doesn't mean anything at all. So belief in anything outside of the singular means of salvation through the person and work of Jesus Christ has the net effect of neutering that of any value. But the second thing that it does, which is at least, and probably more egregious, is this. To believe that something else can or does save you, that robs, that steals from the glory of God. You understand what happened on the cross? God the Son came down, was born in a manger, stinky manger, lived the perfect life for over 30 years, and then willingly went to a cross. And when he was on the cross, the punishment for your sins was laid upon him, and he died under the wrath of the Father in your stead. Now, of course, he didn't stay dead. Three days later, he arose. He sits at the right hand of the Father for now. But understand this. If you think that something else can save you, it has the net effect of robbing and stealing from that and stealing from the glory of the one who went to the cross. There's any number of reasons why we don't believe that other roads can or do lead to heaven. If you hear such a thing from any other belief system, and if you hear anything from another belief system that puts your works as somehow equivalent or on top of that, again, it steals glory away from God and it places it on man. Which is why a lot of people like it. People want to have some sense of ownership and that, "I accomplished something. He made it possible." Right? "God made it possible, and then I did the rest." As if God somehow did all this stuff on Calvary to die and be resurrected and go up to heaven, and right now he's sitting there at the 50-yard line in heaven, waiting and watching on you to see what you're going to do with it. As if he did 99% and you do one. Eh. Not the gospel. And

yet, you heard the statistics. A lot of people believe it. The start of the new year, I want to establish at the outset that it's not the way it works. This year, every time you see that table, this time, every time this is open and read, it's to promote the person and work of Jesus Christ in all its fullness and nothing else. Nothing else above it, nothing else in place of it, nothing else as a substitute for it. All right. Let's take a look now at this text that resonates with this greater point. Let's look at verses 27 through 28, and then we'll work our way through, and we'll see how everything we're going to see in today's passage just doubles down, triples down on this idea that Jesus is the only way. Let's look at verse 27. And this is Jesus speaking. "Now my soul is troubled. And what shall I say, 'Father, save me from this hour?' But it's for this purpose," this purpose, the cross, "this purpose that I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name." And then a voice came from heaven. This is only the third time this happens that a voice comes from heaven. So it must be significant, right? Then a voice came from heaven saying, "I have both glorified it, and I will glorify it yet again." All right. For this purpose, I have come to this hour. And in our study of the Book of John, you've noticed that the idea of the hour, the hour that was coming, comes up multiple different times. We started back when we did the miracle of changing the water into the wine. Remember? When Mary says for Jesus, "Hey, maybe you can help us out here." "Woman, my hour has not yet come." Right? This idea of his hour not yet being or not yet coming, it comes up time and time and time again. Here, however, we see that the hour is nigh. The hour has come. "My soul is troubled. What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour. It's for this purpose that I came to this hour." Even several chapters earlier, the hour was not yet come. John seven, the people, the Pharisees sought to take him, but no one laid a hand on him because his hour had not yet come. Well, here he uses the language to explain it's come.It's here. It's at the door. Now, furthermore, beyond the fact that the hour has come, Jesus establishes here, he says, "This is the whole reason I came." He had done a lot of cool stuff. If you had followed Jesus around across the three years of his public ministry, you had seen stuff that no one had ever seen before. You had seen miracles that people thought couldn't happen, couldn't exist. I mean, dead people just don't rise. Lame people just don't walk. Blind people don't just see. And he did this stuff all the time, and on top of that stuff, he cast out demons. He cast out demons in a way that everyone recognized that's exactly what he'd done. For three years, he'd been doing all sorts of amazing stuff, stuff that no man in the history of this planet has done. But here's the thing, none of that

would save you. None of that would save you. None of it would save Peter or Paul, James, John, none of it. None of the miracles, none of those miracles would do it. However, there was something that would. There was something that would happen. For all the things that Jesus did, for all the laughing he did, crying he did, teaching he did, talking he did, miracles that he did, none of that would save people, but there was something coming that would. There was a singular work above all other works, a singular work that defined the singular hour which he had come to this planet in which to serve and minister and act and lay down his life, and it was coming right around the bend. So in these verses we see, "Father, what should I say? Save me from this hour?" And for the benefit almost of the people around him, he goes, "No, no, no, no. Guys, this is why I came here. Should I tell the Father, 'Save me. Pluck me out of this'? Guys, I'm not looking forward to this. My soul is troubled." To say his soul is troubled, that's our English understanding of it. The more you parse the words, it actually kind of means my soul is repulsed, horrified. Not just troubled like, "I wonder how I'm going to pay my taxes this year," or something like that. Not just troubled along those lines, just horrified at what's about to happen. But he says, "Guys, I'm not going to go to the Father and say, 'Take me out of here,' because this is why I came. The stuff you've seen me do, God bless it. He's used it. Lazarus over there is walking around because of something I came to do, but I've come to do something much cooler, something much more important, something much more necessary, and it's coming up." In fact, this whole trip into Jerusalem, it's for the last time. That whole story he just told the Greeks and the Jews there about the wheat coming to die, he says, "It's me." He keeps telling them this, and they never seem to believe that. Now, with that said, why was his soul troubled? Sometimes theologians linger on that a little bit and they say, "Well, hold the phone here." Has anyone ever read, in this room, has anyone ever read Foxe's Book of Martyrs, just out of curiosity? I see some hands. Foxe's Book of Martyrs. Oh, that's a hard read. That's a difficult read. Why? Think of the title, Foxe's Book of Martyrs. It's a record of the martyrs of the early church, or many of the martyrs of the early church, and the means and way in which they met and faced their death. But the purpose is not this macabre thing to explain gruesome ways of dying or being tortured or what have you. That's not the point. The point is to demonstrate how they faced this death. And as you read Foxe's Book of Martyrs, you'll notice something interesting, that many of the people who faced their death on behalf of Jesus Christ, they went to their own death singing,

confident. They walked to their own crosses. The funeral pyre was lit on their own back, and as it was lit, they would sing and pray and have a peace and a serenity. Now, here's the thing. If these individuals, these people like you and I, could go to their own death singing, then why do you think Jesus Christ was troubled and horrified and repulsed? And why in the Garden of Gethsemane did he sweat like big drops of blood? Why? If all these saints, like men and women like you and I, went to their death singing, what's the deal with him? Why was he so troubled? Well, here's the thing. For all of the death and dying that saints have been doing across all the ages, no one has faced a death like Jesus Christ. Now, what do I mean by that? Well, we don't have time to unpack the totality of the cross, but we know this much. What happened on Calvary was not simply the passing into the next life. You and I, when God eventually calls us home, it's going to be like that. Dying is no good, but death's going to be easy. Death is going to be like that, and we'll be transported into God's presence. But think of Jesus. When he went to the cross, everything got dark. And while he was on the cross, in a way that we don't fully understand, our sins were imputed to him as if he's the one who did it. And then what happened? And then the wrath, cup of God's wrath, the Father's wrath, was poured out on him, the Son. You and I don't have words to even attempt to understand it, but one thing that was helpful to me, another pastor shared this. He said, "One of the hardest things for you and I in this life, one of the hardest things we could ever experience, is to lose someone you love, to watch them slip from your hand into eternity. One of the most difficult things you can experience." But here's the difference. On Calvary, it wasn't simply a death in that sense, but God the Son, what happened with his relationship with God the Father is that they didn't slip hands and let go, but God the Son was forsaken for that moment by He the Father. "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" And the wrath of God was turned out against the Son, because when the Father looked at the Son, it pleased the Father to crush the Son, which is what we see in the Book of Isaiah. What Jesus faced, no man has faced, and he knew it was coming. Have you ever had to go to the dentist, and for the day or two beforehand, you just live in dread of what's going to happen? I've told this story before. I won't linger on it, but when I was young, I had this great fear. I had an overnight experience at a friend's house. My friend Warren, oh, my stars, Warren had been to the dentist only a few weeks earlier, and Warren, the next day, I'm supposed to go to the dentist. I'm sleeping over at his house. It was kind of a weird dynamic because when kids slept over at this house, they slept in all these different rooms. So I was placed in this one room all by myself for a sleepover, which seemed kind of weird, but I'm in this room all by myself for a sleepover. My friend has filled my brain with all the scary things that were about to happen at the dentist because he told this story of his experience at the dentist as if the drill was eight feet long, and the needle was like a tube they put in their mouth. I thought I was going to die. I literally thought I was going to die. It was the worst night I've ever had. To this day, I guess God's been very kind to me because that was the worst night I've ever had of sleep. It's that night. I didn't even sleep. I just dreaded it. I dreaded it, I dreaded it, I dreaded it.It was far worse than the actual experience. But I felt every moment. Before I even felt it for real, I felt it there at night. I felt, I anticipated it. Dear heavens, what Christ anticipated, knowing exactly what was going to happen. Not a false understanding of what was going to happen, knowing exactly what was going to happen. Of course, his soul was troubled. As a side note, I need to close the loop on that story. You know what was interesting? I prayed harder than I'd ever prayed. Up until that point in my life, I had never prayed the way I prayed that singular night. And what was fascinating, and it's one of the few times when I look at my own life and I say, "I think a miracle occurred." Because what happened was, the next day I did go to the dentist, but the whole time I'm super anxious about what's going on in my mouth. Every tool, everything he does, even the little mirror, ah, going, all of it's freaking me out, and I'm very attentive to what's going to happen, and I'm anxious about the needle. The needle, the needle. That's what I thought was going to be the worst thing because I hated needles. Well, he gets around and he does the thing, and all my mind recalls is that at the end of this process, he says, "I'm all done." And I'm like, "What?" And then so as you know, ah, I'm trying to talk through my mouth, but I ask him, "What about the needle?" "Oh, we did that." And God as my witness, I was attentive to every instrument going in my mouth. I never knew, never knew that anything had gone in there. I don't recall any words about it. I don't recall anything happening, and I don't remember any pain from it. It was the best experience I've ever had in the dentist chair, and it was the one I prayed up the most. For what it's worth, God listens to prayers of little eight-year-old children in the dark, scared. I've always looked back at that and remember the time when God listened to the prayer of eight-year-old me and was responsive. And I know that it hasn't changed. Whatever the case, Jesus here, he's troubled with a troubling that transcends any troubling we've ever felt. So what does he do here? What does he do? Well, he says, "I'm not going to run from it. I can't run from it. This is why I'm here." And so he says the opposite. He says, "Instead of running from it, I will embrace it. Father, glorify your name through what I do, through the road to the cross. When I'm lifted up, glorify your name." And at that moment, the most wonderful thing happens. It's, again, the clouds burst, the voice comes down, the Father's voice is, and it says this, "I have both glorified it, and I will glorify it again." This is in Greek, the word doxa, glorify, glory. This is why we get doxology, the doxology in church. This is what's going on, the glorification of the name of God. Let's look at the next few verses, verses 29 through 34. Now therefore, the people who stood by and heard it, listen to this, how weird their response is. The people who stood by and heard it said what? They said it had thundered. They said it had thundered. And others said, "An angel has spoken to Him." Now, Jesus answered and said, "This voice did not come because of me, but it came for your sake. Now is the judgment of this world. Now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I'm lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself." Now, this He said, signifying by what death He would die. And the people answered Him and said, "We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever. How can you say the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?" Let me stop there and mention something. You and I, when we hear the word lifted up, we go, I think that means something like the cross. It's probably what he's referring to. In their context, they knew exactly what he was talking about. Jesus was saying he was going to be crucified. And by saying he was going to be crucified, it was definitely going to be a Roman thing because the Jews didn't crucify anyone. Number one, they couldn't under Roman law. But number two, even if they could kill someone, they didn't use crosses. They stoned people. You weren't lifted up. You were thrown down, cast down, cast over the edge of something so your legs broke, and then stones were pelted down upon you. But Jesus here says, "Son of Man must be lifted up." All right. Let's go back to this voice. Now, there's four questions we could ask about this voice from heaven. Number one, what was it? Number two, who heard it? Number three, what did they hear? And number four, how did they respond? Well, the first question, what was it? It's answered in the text. This is God's voice. God the Father speaks at this time. So who heard it? Well, what we see here is that everyone heard it. Everyone heard the voice speak. But C, what did they hear? Well, that's more open to dispute here. What exactly did they hear? They said, at least some of them said, "Well, maybe we heard thunder." Others thought, "No, I think it was the voice of an angel." There seemed to be some discrepancy about exactly what they heard. And then the fourth question, how did they respond? Now, let me tell you, there's different views on this. Some people think that what happened there was a voice comes down, and the only one who understood it was Jesus. Maybe his disciples, maybe his disciples. That's what some believe, and they think that the others, it was like, you ever watch Charlie Brown, watch Charlie Brown the cartoons? And anytime an adult speaks on the phone, it's like wa, wa, wa. Some people think that's what happened. Wa, wa, wa. They just hear something like that, thunder, it's an angel speaking or something like that. Here's my view. I think they all heard the voice of God, and I think they all heard it audibly in a way they could understand it, but I think many rejected it. Now, why do I think that? Well, what did Jesus say? He said, "This voice was not for me only. In fact, it wasn't even principally for me. This voice was for your sake." When the Father says that he glorifies his Son, we'll glorify him again. Some people's response, maybe through the hardness of their hearts, maybe because they were still blinded by Satan, maybe they didn't understand at all. I don't really know. But some people, they chalk it up to, gosh, the rumble, a jet engine went and fired something. And that's the propensity of man. Every time Jesus did a miracle, what did the people do? Well, they chalked it up to some explanation. Dear heavens, biblical scholars, I'll use the air quotes again, biblical scholars still do that to this day. They'll say, "When God parted the Red Sea, the Red Sea really wasn't that deep. It was pretty easy to go from A to B." They'll try to take the miracles of Jesus, like he didn't really walk on water. It was some parlor trick or something. They'll try to change what happened, or at least the substance and meaning behind what happened, to negate it of it being miraculous. Well, that's sort of what's going on here. The people hear the voice of God, and the response of some is saying, "Nope, not God. Nope, nope, nope. It's thunder. It's thunder. You rubes, you really believe that was God's voice? Give me a break."Sometimes thunder sounds like the voice of God. Yeah. So that's sort of what they explain here. But something's kind of interesting, though, when you think about this. You have the voice of God booming forth, booming forth just prior to the greatest victory this world has ever known, and we're going to see that in just a moment. Remember what Jesus is going to say. He's going to say, "This voice didn't come for my sake, but for your sake. The judgment of the world is here. The rule of the world is going to be cast out," and the like. So that's what he's about to say to explain this voice. But remember in that ancient context, what happened when one nation went against another nation? What happened just before a mighty victory? What happened before something was going to be conquered? Remember Jericho? Remember trumpet blasts? Throughout antiquity, when one nation was about to seize victory, when one army was about to face another, one of the principal things that would occur was that there would be trumpet blasts to announce the coming victory and, frankly, to intimidate the enemies. But with that said, giant sounds like that throughout scripture, including Jericho, implied the coming and imminent victory of God himself. And when Christ returns, what's going to happen? The trump shall shout, right? The trumpet blasts will occur at that time. Well, here you get something even better than a trumpet. Before the greatest victory this world has ever known, instead of just a mere trumpet booming forth, the voice of God booms forth. And then Jesus says, "It wasn't just for my sake, it was for your sake." It's for all who are listening. And gathered around him that day were Jews and Greeks. He says, "This is for your sake, that you might know and remember."

The trumpet blast is nothing compared to the voice of God booming and glorifying the Son at this time. So what does Jesus say in this text? Well, again, verse 30, he said, "The voice didn't come for me, but for you. Now is the judgment of this world. Now the ruler of this world will be cast out, and if I'm lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself." All right, so the voice of God was the preamble to three things here. Number one, the judgment of the world was nigh. The judgment of the world had come. God's law would be fully exonerated and fulfilled in a very real sense there on Calvary. But secondarily, we see Satan's defeat. I thought about lingering on this particular concept above and beyond everything else that we see in today's text because we sometimes skip over it. Jesus is here saying what's going to happen on the cross is not merely my paying for your sins. What's going to happen here is that the tyrant of this age, the prince of the power of the air, the one who's been ruling the hearts of men... Remember when Jesus talked to the Pharisees, "You are of your father, the devil. It's his will that you want to do." On Calvary, Jesus says, "That tyrant, he's going down. Victory will be had on this particular day through what I'm about to do on the cross." If you think of a jail cell, if you have prisoners within the jail, one of the individuals they're most anxious about in the jail is the warden because the warden has the ability to administer additional punishment, and the warden really is the one in charge of incarcerating them. Well, it's as if God the Son is looking at the planet Earth, and it's as if he's saying, "This is prison planet, but I have come to set the captives free." And what happens on Calvary will have the net effect of knocking over the walls of the prison and allowing the prisoners to be liberated. That's what's going to happen. Only it's far more than that. It's not that Jesus came to knock down one wall of the prison, but to flatten the whole thing. And if that happens, if the prison walls are flattened and the prisoners run free, how afraid are they at that point of the warden? Not much. Here he says that the ruler of this age will be cast out. He's defeated. His power is done. I'm the one who holds the power of death and Hades in my hand, and this ruler will be cast out. The ruler or the prince of the power of the air, he will be cast out. And that's one of several castings out that will happen. If you look in the Book of Revelation, the final casting out of the devil will occur where? In the lake of fire. He'll be cast into the lake. So here on Calvary, this is what Jesus says is going to happen. And the third thing Jesus says is going to happen is that people are going to be drawn to him. "If I'm lifted up from the earth, when I'm lifted up, when I'm lifted up," he says, "it's going to be like the bat signal. All of planet Earth's going to see this and be drawn to me." Remember the concept of the bat signal shines in the sky and it gives everyone hope and everyone sees it and they know that there's this virtuous warrior for justice that's out here? Well, this is far greater than any bat signal. When Jesus was lifted up, the victory that would occur on Calvary would be so victorious that the implement he was put to death upon, the cross itself, would 2,000 years later no longer be looked at as an implement of defeat, but an implement of what? Of victory. I see a cross on your robe. Why? It's not a symbol or a sign of defeat. You wear it why? Because it's a sign of victory. And Jesus says, "What's going to go down on Calvary is going to be the greatest victory, and it's going to draw all peoples to me like the greatest bat signal ever known." Now, the people, they hear this, right? They're hearing this stuff, and it's not like this is the first time he said this stuff. He says it a lot. They just kind of tune him out a whole lot. Remember when Peter, he tried to explain this to Peter, and Peter says, "Nah, I don't think it's going to ever happen to you." People regularly didn't understand or expect what Jesus was going to say, but he regularly explained that this had to happen. But they're confused here in these verses. They answer him, and they say, "Wait a second. Jesus, Jesus, we have heard from the law that the Christ, the Messiah, remains forever. So how can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up?" And it's like their brains break right there. How can you say the Son of Man must be lifted up? And they draw the conclusion you must not be the Son of Man, because that's what they ask him. They say, "Who is this Son of Man? We heard that the real dude, when he shows up, when the real guy shows up, it ain't going to be on no donkey. When the real guy shows up, he's not going to go to no cross. He's not going to be lifted up. Rather, rather, he's going to be victorious in all the ways that we would fully expect him to be. What is this? How can you say the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man? Because it can't be you." This is why in 1 Corinthians 1, Paul would talk to the Jews, and he'd say this. He'd say, "You know what the cross is to you? It's a stumbling block because you can't get over it. You don't understand that the whole Old Testament anticipated this is exactly what had to go down. Have you not read Isaiah 53? You've not studied, read, understood, accepted what had to happen," and because of this, to the Jews, the cross is a stumbling block to this day, and that's true 2,000 years later. A stumbling block to this day, and Paul goes on to say and to the Greeks, it's just foolishnessCross? Really? For the Messiah, the Son of God came down to a cross? Born in a manger, rode in on a donkey, went to a cross. Can't be the right guy. Paul says that's what the world believes. The world is dead wrong. All right, let's look at our final verses, verses 35 and 36. "Then Jesus said to them, 'A little while longer the light is with you. So walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. For he who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of the light.' Now these things Jesus spoke, then He departed and was hidden from among them." On Calvary, a number of different things happened, but one of the things that happened was that it became this bone-chillingly dark. Now, why is that interesting? Well, here's the thing. The greatest light that the world had ever known came to mankind, walked, breathed, and dwelt amongst them, and then collectively, mankind went over and turned off the light switch and put Him on a cross. See this? The greatest light. Light is revelatory, right? I've explained before, when I go into that kitchen, if I don't turn on the light, I'm going to stumble on that stool. It happens every single time. I'm slowly learning turn on the light. But that said, the light is revelatory. It leads you, it teaches you, it shows you the right path. When you have a good idea, if you draw a cartoon of you having a good idea, what do you draw above your head? A light bulb goes on, right? Lights give us illumination. They teach us, instruct us, and what have you. Well, Jesus is saying in these last two verses, verses 35 and 36, He says, "Look, I'm the light. You've been following all these other guys all over the place." Then the greatest light mankind could ever have, God himself, God in the flesh, came and stood in front of you, looked you in the eyeball, and you heard His words from His lips to your ears. You have the greatest access to light that any man, woman, or child has ever had. What you going to do about it? The light's not going to be here long. What are you going to do about it? Well, we know what the people would collectively do about it. They would turn off the light.

And that hasn't changed over the ages. What did Paul say in the Book of Romans, at the start of Romans? He says, "This is natural to us. We hate the light." We hate the light. We're like bugs scurrying about. Our sinful nature doesn't like to be exposed. So Romans 1, what does Paul say? He says, "Since the beginning of the world, God's invisible attributes have been clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, so that they're without excuse, because although they knew God, they didn't glorify Him," doxa, "glorify Him as God, nor were they thankful, but they became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened." Earlier in that same chapter, Paul says, you know what man does? He suppresses the truth. He turns off the light. He turns down the dimmer switch. Jesus is standing in front of people and saying, "Hey, you have the light. What are you going to do about it? The light isn't going to be here always." Now, what light this morning-- Let me close with this thought. What light have you been given? What light do you have? Well, the light we have, principally, comes through a couple different means. Number one, it comes through God's Spirit. God's Spirit instructs us, teaches us, convicts us, leads us. Number two, it leads us in what? The Word. God has given us His Spirit in our hearts, has given His Word right in front of our eyeballs, and beyond that, in real space and time, He sent His Son. In the person and work of Jesus Christ, God was made flesh and dwelt among us. If there's a greater light you could ask for than what He's given us, I don't know what it is. It's just so weird because we keep asking Him for more. It's like, "God, if you would just write your plan for me in my alphabet cereal, that would be great. If you would put it in the clouds, I think I'd respond." No, you wouldn't. You could see God's plan for your life written in the clouds, and you know what you would do with that 10 minutes later? You would chalk it up to some celestial weather meteorological event, some odd thing by which the clouds came together to give you this word or this message. You would find a way to deny it and suppress it. Mankind would. "I think it was thunder. I think it was this. I think it was that." You have the light. This morning, if you're on the outside looking in at all this stuff, if you're on the outside looking in, this morning, you, through the presentation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the opening of His Word, His Spirit's presence in this very room, this is as light as it gets. When you hear, when you see, when your heart has this light shine upon it, how do you respond to this? Does it motivate you and convict you and cause you to want to respond in some substantive way? Or do you find yourself turning from that? Collectively, mankind turns from it. But you're not responsible for mankind as a collection. You're responsible for you. This morning, the light of God has been shined onto your heart, into your ears, and into our collective presence. How will you respond? How do you respond? You still have the light. There's still time. So use it. Let's pray.