Darkness in Scripture is night God named, and it is also the realm that hates His light.
On the first day He separated the light from the darkness and called the darkness Night.
After the fall, darkness becomes a name for ignorance, judgment, and the domain of the evil one.
God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. Christ shines, and the darkness has not overcome Him.
Genesis begins with darkness over the face of the deep. God does not leave it undefined. He speaks light, divides the two, and gives the dark a created place as night. That night is not evil. The ninth plague is. Outer darkness is. The hour of the power of darkness at the arrest of Jesus is. The difference is whether darkness is a clock God made or a rule men love. People loved darkness rather than light because their works were evil. The god of this world blinds minds. Paul says the saints were darkness, not only in it, until they became light in the Lord. There is a domain of darkness from which the Father transfers His people. There is a present darkness over which cosmic powers still work. There is a day when the sun will be darkened as a sign, and a city where night will be no more. Darkness, then, must be read with care. Some of it is weather and rest. Some of it is bondage. Some of it is the last judgment. None of it is God’s nature. The Word shines in it. Those who follow the Light do not walk in it.
- Created night is not sin. Loved darkness is.
- Blindness of mind is darker than a room without a lamp.
- The domain of darkness is a jurisdiction; transfer is the gospel word.
- Christ entered the hour of darkness and broke its claim.
- Saints may walk through night. They are not to make it home.
- Judgment uses darkness as a picture: outer darkness, the sun failing, the plague that could be felt.
- The last word is no night there.
- Created Night – Named by God, bounded by morning.
- Loved Darkness – Works hidden because they are evil.
- Blindness – Minds kept from the glory of Christ.
- Domain – A rule from which people are delivered.
- Hour – Given at the cross, and judged there.
- Judgment – Outer darkness; cosmic signs; plague.
- Passing – The darkness is passing away; the true light already shines.
- Genesis 1:2-5 – “The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep… And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night.”
- 1 John 1:5-6 – “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.”
- John 1:5 – “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
- John 3:19-20 – “And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.”
- Colossians 1:13 – “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.”
- Ephesians 5:8, 11 – “For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord… Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.”
- Ephesians 6:12 – “…against the cosmic powers over this present darkness…”
- Luke 22:53 – “But this is your hour, and the power of darkness.”
- 2 Corinthians 4:4, 6 – The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers; God has shone in our hearts.
- Acts 26:18 – “…to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God…”
- Exodus 10:21-22 – “Stretch out your hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness to be felt… and there was pitch darkness in all the land of Egypt three days.”
- Matthew 8:12 – “While the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
- Matthew 27:45 – “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour.”
- Amos 5:18, 20 – “Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord! Why would you have the day of the Lord? It is darkness, and not light… Is not the day of the Lord darkness, and not light, and gloom with no brightness in it?”
- Joel 2:31 – “The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.”
- Isaiah 9:2 – “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.”
- Psalm 139:11-12 – “If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.”
- Proverbs 4:19 – “The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.”
- 1 John 2:8-11 – The darkness is passing away; whoever hates his brother is in the darkness.
- Revelation 16:10 – The fifth bowl: the kingdom of the beast plunged into darkness.
- Revelation 22:5 – “And night will be no more.”
- John 8:12 – “Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.
He named the night. He did not become it.
People loved darkness rather than light because their works were evil.
You were darkness. He delivered you from the domain of darkness.
This is the present darkness, not the forever dark.
The light shines, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Turn from darkness to light. Night will be no more.
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