Matthew 6: When the Light in You Becomes Darkness

Introduction

"If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!" At the service on October 4, 2026 at the Mission Évangélique Libre de Liège, the preacher takes this saying of Jesus in Matthew 6:23 as his starting point and asks the congregation a simple question: can a light become darkness?

His answer is yes. There is a true morning star, Jesus Christ, and a false one, Lucifer. Many Christians struggle to tell them apart, hence the confusion that reigns. But, he says, with the Lord's help, the chosen always have the grace to tell the false from the true.

Before entering the text, he reminds everyone that each person is a son or daughter of God, not because they are better, but because God loved them, the way a parent loves a child with all their strengths and flaws. In humanity there is nothing good: only God is good. And God does not ask you to be nice, but to be good. Being nice is an act of diplomacy: the one who is nice today can be nasty tomorrow, whereas the one who is good remains good. "You must be like your Father."

As the message unfolds, he moves through the fall of Lucifer, the sealed book of Revelation 5, the story of Jacob, Jesus' meeting with Nicodemus, and a few images drawn from creation: the vine, the fish, the eagle and the raven. One question runs through it all: what is the source of the light that is in you?

Message Outline

1. A Light That Goes Out: The Fall of Lucifer

The text for the day is Matthew 6:22-24: the eye is the lamp of the body, and no one can serve two masters, God and Mammon. To understand verse 23 properly, we have to ask how a light can go out. If it goes out, there must be a reason.
The preacher recalls a recent message: God is a God of order, and disobeying that order is fatal. God's order is the red line. Adam crossed it, but someone had crossed it before him.
Out of pride, Lucifer wanted to take a place God had not intended for him, a place reserved for God's only Son, Jesus Christ. He disobeyed and became a burned-out star, a fallen angel.
Against this angel of false light stands the true light that God sent: "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness hasn't overcome it" (John 1:5).

2. The Title Deed to the Earth and the Only One Who Is Worthy

The preacher distinguishes three kingdoms: the heavenly kingdom, the earthly kingdom and the kingdom of darkness. In creating Adam, God entrusted the earthly kingdom to him.
Satan disguised himself as an angel of light and made Adam fall. But the title deed to the earth, drawn up in the name of Adam and his descendants, went straight back into God's hands, and he kept it. It is like a house: without the title deed in your name, you cannot take possession of it.
In Revelation 5, a mighty angel cries out: "Who is worthy to open the book, and to break its seals?" No one, in heaven, on earth or under the earth, is able to. The whole world was waiting for a deliverer, a descendant of Adam who could take back this book.
One of the elders says: "Don't weep. Behold, the Lion who is from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has overcome; he who opens the book and its seven seals." He alone had that right: it is Jesus, the true morning star.

3. Jacob and God's Justice

When Jesus speaks these words, he is not addressing a people who do not know God. He is speaking to the Jews, a nation God himself established from a single man: Jacob, from whom come the twelve tribes of Israel.
There are several kinds of justice: that of people, that of nations, that of religions, and divine justice. According to people, Jacob was not upright at all. According to God, he was: "I loved Jacob." Who can tell him no?
God knows his creatures better than anyone. Yet we often think we know better than he does: we hold on to our own sense of justice, we condemn our brothers and sisters and we act as if we had taken God's place. "Let God do his work, for he is almighty."
A human historian writes what has already happened, but God writes history before it happens. From Adam to the end of the world, everything unfolds exactly as God has written it. This is what shows that God is God.

4. Two Morning Stars, Two Sources

According to God, what matters is the source of the light. If the light that is in you is darkness, it is because it comes from a wrong source. Reject it and take the source God has given you: Jesus Christ, the true light.
In Revelation 22:16, Jesus declares: "I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star."
In Isaiah 14:12, by contrast, we read: "How you are fallen from heaven, day-star, son of the morning!" This is the other source, the counterfeit, the one that presents itself as a star of light. Satan himself disguises himself as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14).
Satan is not ignorant. He is very intelligent and very skilled in the things of this world, but not in those of the kingdom of God. God did not fear him: he brought down this angel to whom he had given intelligence and wisdom.
Jesus, who came from the house of David, came to earth into the midst of darkness, and the darkness did not want to receive him. Yet these people were religious, sons of Jacob, the man who had seen in a dream a ladder set up toward heaven, with the angels of God going up and down on it (Genesis 28:12).

5. Nicodemus: Knowledge That Stays in the Night

In John 3, Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews, comes to Jesus by night. He was not an atheist but a learned man of his day. Yet the knowledge he carried was a light that remained darkness. "If the knowledge in you is dark, what good will it do you?"
Jesus answers him: "Unless one is born anew, he can't see the Kingdom of God," and then: "Unless one is born of water and spirit, he can't enter into the Kingdom of God." For the preacher, being born of water means being baptized in water, and being born of the Spirit means being baptized with the Holy Spirit. That is the new birth.
Jesus teaches these basics to a teacher of the law. Today too, many theologians have knowledge. You can think you are a Christian, think you are in God's will, and be led by a spirit that comes from the kingdom of darkness.
Jesus adds that the Son of Man came down from heaven and is in heaven (John 3:13): he is with Nicodemus and at the same time in heaven, which means he is God.
The preacher thinks Nicodemus was a child of God to whom Jesus was speaking directly to the heart. A father can speak harshly to his child, and the child will not run away for that, or else will come back, like the disciples: "Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life" (John 6:68).

6. Born Again: The Vine, the Fish and the Eagle

Jesus is the vine and we are the branches (John 15:5). To be born again is to become a branch of Jesus Christ. The vine lives a very long time, but it needs a source, water nearby. In the prophets, God often calls his people "my vineyard."
The Father is the source and the support. The sea receives everything that comes from springs, streams and rivers, and according to the preacher it covers about 75% of the earth. God's sons are called to become fathers, a source and a support, and God's daughters to become mothers.
In the Church, the Holy Spirit works through the ministers of the Gospel, the elders and the deacons to nourish the congregation. The Church is our mother: we grow up and are fed there. But the head, the source and the support, is Jesus Christ. Your faithful friend is not the Church, it is Jesus.
Who teaches a fish to swim? No one. In the same way, the servants God commissions do not need to go off and study theology: in the sea of humanity, with its customs, characters, languages and confusion, they are led by the Holy Spirit. The preacher applies this to the brothers who are about to receive the laying on of hands as elders.
Born of water and Spirit, you must swim in the sea, but also fly in the sky. The eagle represents the Spirit of Christ, the raven the spirit of Satan. The raven is the only bird that dares to attack the eagle, landing on its back to peck at it. The eagle stays calm and does not defend itself even though it has the strength: it climbs, higher and higher, until the raven can no longer breathe and falls of its own accord.

7. Walking in the True Light Today

Among the weapons God gives his soldiers is prayer. It is not about opening monasteries or houses of prayer, but about praying without ceasing, right where you are: at work without stopping work, at the wheel without stopping driving. That is what it means to be a born-again man or woman.
The preacher points out that the declaration in Isaiah 14 is aimed first at the king of Babylon, who had conquered the whole earth. God gave kingdoms to people, but after the fourth kingdom an empire will come, led by his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The signs of the times are here.
He says he received a message from a brother claiming that a Canadian law would penalize preachers who teach that God does not accept homosexuality or other practices; he cites this message without specifying its source. In his view, the time is coming when those who preach the truth will be penalized, as the Bible foretold. Those who are in the true light will keep walking in the truth.
He concludes with a prayer to say in your heart: "Lord, grant me the grace to believe what you believe and to love what you love."

Key Takeaways

A light can become darkness: everything depends on its source. A light that comes from the kingdom of darkness does not illuminate, it misleads.
There are two morning stars. Jesus is the bright morning star; Lucifer, the star fallen from heaven, disguises himself as an angel of light.
Religious knowledge is not enough. Like Nicodemus, you must be born again, of water and Spirit.
God does not ask you to be nice but to be good, and his goodness comes to dwell in the heart of the one who welcomes him.
Facing attacks, the child of God does as the eagle does: he does not thrash about, he rises higher.

Personal Application

What is the source of what you consider your light: the Word of God and his Spirit, or another voice?
In your relationships, do you try to be nice to avoid conflict, or to be good as your Father is good?
Do you ever cling to your own sense of justice and condemn a brother or sister, as if you had taken God's place?
Like Nicodemus, do you have knowledge without having experienced the new birth?
Facing a spiritual attack, what would it look like for you to "rise higher" like the eagle, rather than thrash about?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "if the light that is in you is darkness" mean?

For the preacher, the light Jesus speaks of in Matthew 6:23 refers to the spirit that dwells in a person. If that spirit comes from the kingdom of darkness, what the person takes for light is actually darkness. Everything depends on the source: you must reject the wrong source and take the one God has given, Jesus Christ, the true light.

Who is the morning star in the Bible?

The message distinguishes two morning stars. In Revelation 22:16, Jesus presents himself as the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star: this is the true one. In Isaiah 14:12, the day-star, son of the morning, fallen from heaven, is understood as Lucifer, the false light. Satan himself disguises himself as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14).

Why does Jesus tell Nicodemus that he must be born again?

Nicodemus was a teacher of the law, a religious and educated man. Yet his knowledge was a light that remained darkness. Jesus reminds him of the basics: being born of water and Spirit, which the preacher understands as water baptism and baptism with the Holy Spirit. Without this new birth, no one can see the Kingdom of God (John 3:3-5).