Walk In The Light

Isaiah 2:5: “Come and let us walk in the light of the Lord.”

I just went to turn on my laptop, and today (unusually) the sun was shining right on it very brightly through the window. As the very bright rays of the sun hit the laptop I saw something I don’t normally see – that it was covered in fingermarks and dust.

This was a shock. Every day before I turn on my laptop, I use an old paintbrush that I keep beside me just for the purpose, to brush the visible dust off the keyboard and screen. I do like to keep the laptop clean of dust and avoid a buildup especially between the keys.

Despite this daily routine, I now find that immovable dust is still lingering on the laptop, and the more I brush, the more I just swish that dust a little further away, to land on my mousepad and desk.

I wasn’t fully aware of this. It was the bright sun that brought it to my attention. I thought I was clean, but I wasn’t. That is my point.

God IS Light

Our own perceptions can be misleading. We can think we are doing okay, but God’s light brings something to our notice that we had overlooked.

That is precisely why we need to pray and be open to his rebuke, to read the bible and heed what it says, and to keep dusting that dust off our vulnerable human bodies and minds, daily at the very least.

Even then, we start to get lazy, and careless, and overlook (or really do not see) that the offensive “dust” is building up.

Then suddenly, as with my laptop, when the brightness of God in all his holiness and purity shines on our lives we suddenly see just how MUCH we need his cleansing! All those things that were invisible in the semi-darkness of our ordinary daily lives, those things that tend to get overlooked or don’t seem important, fool us into a perception of cleanliness that in fact is a lie.

I’m not speaking here of salvation, but Christian living.

Our human lives in this world are like any electronic device that attracts dirt and dust. It’s unavoidable, but it doesn’t mean we can just ignore it, leave it to build up, hoping nobody notices. As Christians – already cleansed and washed, and knowing that we are loved by God – we have no need to fear the light.

This is why Jesus said that godly people come to the light:

“The light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” (John 3:19-21)

So it should be a joy to come to God, and invite his scrutiny. We need to allow him to remove the dirt!

Daily Forgiveness

Why do we need to confess our sins if they have already been forgiven in Christ?

“Positional” forgiveness, or judicial forgiveness, is that which is obtained by every believer in Christ. … When Jesus said, “It is finished,” He meant it. Our positional forgiveness was obtained then and there.

Ephesians 1:6-8 tells us that God has removed the sins that offended him, because of the blood of Jesus, which washes us. This judicial [legal] forgiveness is referring to salvation, in which God has taken our sins and removed them from us “as far as the east is from the west” (Psalm 103:12).

The difference between Ephesians 1:6-8 and 1 John 1:9 (in which we are urged to confess our sins) is that John is dealing with what we call “relational,” or “familial,” forgiveness — like that of a father and a son.

For example, if a son does something wrong to his father — falling short of his expectations or rules — the son has hindered his fellowship with his father. He remains the son of his father, but the relationship suffers. Their fellowship will be hindered until the son admits to his father that he has done wrong. It works the same way with God; our fellowship with Him is hindered until we confess our sin. When we confess our sin to God, the fellowship is restored. This is relational forgiveness.

Our sins are forgiven at salvation (positional forgiveness), but our daily fellowship with God needs to stay in good standing (relational forgiveness). Proper fellowship with God cannot happen with unconfessed sin in our lives. Therefore, we need to confess our sins to God as soon as we are aware that we have sinned, in order to maintain close fellowship with God. [Source]

The bible shows us how to go to God for the initial cleansing that takes place when we accept the Lord, but forgiveness doesn’t stop there.

When Jesus taught his disciples how to pray, part of what he recommended was “forgive us our trespasses” as well as “keep us from temptation and deliver us from evil” demonstrating the need for day by day cleansing.

Walk In The Light

We are not promised a sin-free existence, nor immunity from temptation. Yes, we are cleansed, forgiven, enabled to stand before God “accepted in the Beloved” (Eph 1:3-7) but we need to do daily maintenance to avoid offending God and causing a cloud of displeasure to arise between us, spoiling our fellowship.

We are called not just to receive the Light in the first place, but to WALK in that light.

“Walking in the light” is directly related to following Jesus, who said, “I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life” (John 8:12). To “walk” is to live one’s life. …

The apostle John … writes that Jesus is “the true light that gives light to every man” (John 1:9). In 1 John 1:7 he says, “If we walk in the light as He [God] is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.” …

Our Christian duty is to live in the light God gives: “Now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8). When we walk in the light, we cannot walk in darkness. [Source]

In Your Light We See Light

As with my laptop, we only see the real situation in the light. Psalm 36:9 – For with [God} is the fountain of life; in your light we see light.

Not Cleansing But Hoarding

On the other hand, the same Psalm speaks of the attitude of the wicked:

There is no fear of God before their eyes.
In their own eyes they flatter themselves too much to detect or hate their sin.
The words of their mouths are wicked and deceitful;
they fail to act wisely or do good.
Even on their beds they plot evil;
they commit themselves to a sinful course
and do not reject what is wrong. [Psalm 36:1-4]

Some people just don’t care! Just like a person who lives as a hoarder, never having a clean-out, never discarding the rot and the dirt, existing in an ever-growing pile of discarded garbage and filth, but not noticing and not caring – “they flatter themselves too much to detect or hate their sin”.

In their own eyes, they are doing fine, they are righteous, even “christian”, but they don’t let the rays of the SUN of God shine into their personal mess and reveal the dirt.

Confess your sins daily

Instead of just bumbling by in the darkness of this present world, hoping for the best, we should go to God daily, let the brightness of the glory of God shine in and trust in God’s promise “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” [1 John 1:9]

Let the LIGHT shine in today!

• Why Confess Our Sins?
• Salvation Versus Daily Forgiveness