Come to the Light
Most of us in the Western world, and especially those in the church, can recite mankind’s original sin. Do you remember it?
It was Adam & Eve’s failure to trust God’s love for them. Instead, they believed the lie of the Serpent leading to direct disobedience of God’s explicit word not to eat of the tree of life.
Now, do you recall what the second sin was? …It was the cover up!
“They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden… and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.” (Genesis 3:8).
And why did they hide?
”I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid…”
Adam & Eve were afraid of being found out in their sin & shame. Unfortunately, just as their original sin has been fully inherited by every human born since, so has the tendency towards the second.
When you and I fail to trust God’s goodness & therefore sin, the default reaction of the old man within us is to do what? Hide it. Justify it. Minimize it. We run to perceived safety in the darkness of the trees surrounding the garden, and hope no one will find out just how ugly and dirty our hearts really are. But there is a better way.
In 1 John 1, which we quote every Sunday during the assurance of pardon, the apostle shows us the danger of the cover up, and the blessing of honesty with God and critically, with one another.
If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins…
The key concept here is that walking in darkness equates to saying we have no sin, which is a lie.
Walking in the light = fellowship with one another = confessing our sins.
Pastor Dane Ortlund makes the case that “walking in the light in this text is honesty with other Christians.” So we confess our sins to God privately of course. But do we believe the gospel enough to confess our sins to one another, in concrete terms? If not, we’re still walking in darkness, running to the trees. What are we afraid of? The same thing Adam & Eve were — being found out as shameful sinners in front of our brothers & sisters.
But the amazing reality of the gospel is that as we confess our sins to one another, we bring them out into the light where they die and we open the channels of our soul to receive mercy & joy. Life group is such a critical piece of this. All of us are sinners. Cities Church, don’t hide in the darkness. Let’s bring our sins into the light, confess them to God, and trust Him enough to confess them to one another, that we may be healed. And this definitely reminds us of our need to confess our sins, so pray with me.
Father, we confess to you that we often walk in darkness, stumbling on the lonely road with our sins hidden from others. Even if we confess to you, we try to keep up appearances with other Christians, hoping they won’t see how bad we are. God this is a great evil. We confess this and our individual sins to you now.
And now Father, would you turn the eyes of our souls to Jesus, who always walked in the light. As the Light of the World, Jesus walks into our hearts and banishes the darkness, cleansing us and freeing us to admit that we are sick and in need of the Great Physician. Thank you for the blood of Jesus that truly cleanses us from ALL sin as we walk in honesty with you & our fellow believers. Give us more grace to trust you enough to be honest with one another. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.
