Hidden Lamps

Hello, everyone. Let's continue on in our conversation about the kingdom parables that we just got started in this little series. In my mind, they are without a doubt the richest of teachings about this deep and beautiful reality of the kingdom of God. This is Dave Scherrerrer. I'm the founder of 100 Fold Ministries, and here at 100 Fold, we are committed to seeing the gospel of the kingdom celebrated and proclaimed with all boldness. That's how Luke, the author of the book of Acts, summarized the work, the life work of Paul in Acts 28, verse 31, where he was preaching with all boldness and without hindrance. So you found your way to kingdom offerings here at 100 Fold, our podcast environment. So you should grab your Bible or your phone app and turn with me to Mark chapter 4. Let's look at another one of Mark's kingdom parables. This is Jesus confronting a kingdom problem, and that's the problem of a hidden light. So let's read this together. Mark chapter 4. We're going to start in verse 21. And Jesus said to them, Is a lamp brought in to be put under a bushel or under a bed and not on a stand? For there is nothing hid except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light. If any man has ears to hear, let him hear. And he said to them, Take heed. Take heed what you hear. The measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given to you. For to him who has will more be given, and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. That kind of reminds me of the parable of the talents. We're going to get into that in a couple of weeks. So you read this parable, this little story, really a one verse parable about a lamp, and you say, Oh, this is easy. This is easy to figure out. Jesus is saying that we are to be light, and we ought not to hide our light. That seems obvious. Figuring out these parables, wow, it's easy. I mean, the number one thing on a lamp's to-do list is to let their light shine. I'm not sure there's anything else on a lamp's to-do list. In verse 21, Jesus asked, Would anyone light a lamp and then put it under a basket or under a bed? And the answer is, of course, is of course not. Lamps are placed on a stand where its light will shine into darkness. So Jesus is referencing a little handheld olive oil lamp that you could find in any house of that day. It consisted of a small pitcher, or really a saucer with a little handle on it on one end, and the pitcher would be filled with olive oil and there'd be a little wick either floating in it or set into it, and you light that wick and it would bring light. In order to maximize the light of the little lamp, the lamp would be set on a lamp stand or on a shelf that would protrude from the wall, and then the light could go out through the entire room. So for obvious reasons, no one would place a lamp under a basket or under a bed because it would hide the light and the lamp would not fulfill its purpose. So in our head we kind of stop and we say, Well, Jesus's point is clear. Those who have received the light of the gospel are not to conceal it, but rather they're to let it shine through them for others to see. Okay, that's great. Except that I don't think that's the point of the story. I think there's more. I think there's a lot more to this story, and it's not actually about you and I shining brightly. I mean, that's a big part of the Bible for sure, and Jesus calls us the light of the world, and that's all for real. But that is not Jesus's point in this story. Remember what he said, if you have ears to hear and eyes to see, that makes me think that he wants us to look deeper. And since this parable follows the parable of the sower in Mark chapter four, I floated in our last podcast that the parable of the sower has Jesus as the one who is sowing the seed. It's autobiographical in a way. And just like that one, I think this one is an autobiographical parable as well. This is a story about the true light of the world. Jesus is telling a story about himself. He is the light in the parable. How did Jesus say it? He said, a lamp is brought into a room. So let's look at that for a minute, because the word brought is an English translation of the word Erechomai, which is best translated comes. So a more literal translation of the Greek would say the lamp comes into a room. Sounds to me more like a person than an object. In this story, I believe the lamp is a person who is the source of the light. This is part of what is helping us understand the mystery of the kingdom. This is why we have to have ears to hear and eyes to see. Jesus is letting us know that when he came into the world, he brought the light. John said as much. The disciple John wrote in his gospel, the true light who gives light to everyone was coming into the world. And so here's the kicker. When he goes on, Jesus talking about this parable, he says, For there is nothing hid except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light. In verse 23, he says, If any man has ears to hear, let him hear. And he said to them, Take heed. Take heed what you hear. The measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given to you. The measure of what? The measure of the light, of the kingdom, of the revealed kingdom of God that you begin to understand. For to him who has, verse 25, will more be given. And from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. So let's try and understand this. As a lamp, our job is to reveal what is hidden, what cannot be seen. Jesus says, For everything that is hidden will eventually be brought into the open, and every secret will be brought to light. See, that's what this lamp is doing, is bringing to light a secret, a hidden thing. You know, when most commentators speak of this verse, they jump to the conclusion that this idea of all these secrets being made known, well, that's a personal holiness commentary. And so we say things like, Wow, we better be careful. My sins are going to be revealed to everyone. We don't want to be shamed. We better be holy. And all that may be true, but that is not the point here. Remember the context of these stories. These stories are kingdom stories, and Jesus is helping us to understand something that has been previously a mystery, a secret, that is being brought to light in these parables. And so Jesus, as the king of that kingdom, once before was hidden. The nation of Israel didn't understand that there was a king coming to bring glory to himself. The word secret in the New Testament is a little bit different than how we understand it. We understand secrets kind of like, I'm going to tell a secret about you, and you tell a secret about me. In the Greek, the word for secret is mysterion, which is what we get the word mystery from. So the secret in this case refers to a truth of God that was previously hidden or veiled, but now is becoming revealed. So it's about something that wasn't fully understood, but is increasingly clear. It's a secret or mystery because it's not fully known. And so that's the secret that's being revealed is the coming of the kingdom of God. You see, before the Incarnation and before the public ministries of Jesus, the kingdom of God wasn't understood. We had some information, but it was veiled in the Old Testament. When Jesus came, he began to make the secret of the kingdom of God increasingly clear and understandable. We began to see him as truly king of that kingdom, especially if we have eyes to see and ears to hear. So as a lamp of God who lives by kingdom truths and shares kingdom truths with others, we take this secret, the secret of God's kingdom, and bring it to light. And the truer we are to this commission, the brighter we shine, the more light we have. And as Jesus says, the more we hide the lamp, the more we hide the light, even what brightness we have will be taken away. Powerful words. So we live into the secret of the gospel of the kingdom, making it increasingly clear by sharing God's truth and Jesus' saving love. And by that we are we are contributing to the extending of the kingdom of God now until he comes. Now, I have so much more to say about this. We're going to continue to look at these parables. So thanks for joining us here at 100 Full Ministries. And I'd like to invite you back to the website to explore the little section on our homepage that says the kingdom of God is like. And that's a doorway to some modern parables and some Bible verses to kind of get us thinking a little bit more about what the kingdom might be in a fresh manner. So think about that and come join us again at 100 Full Ministries and we'll talk some more at Kingdom Offerings about these beautiful parables of Jesus. Peace to you.