Christians Love Light

I John 1:6 - If we say we have fellowship with Him (God), and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

"Light" and "darkness" are terms frequently employed in the Bible to emphasize the extreme contrast between God and Satan and between those things that God loves and those things that Satan loves. God loves truth, of which He Himself is the sole author. Satan is the "father of lies," the author of all untruth. God loves holiness and righteousness, of which He is the source. Satan is the originator of sin in rebellion against God. There simply cannot be a greater error than to attribute darkness to God or light to Satan. To say, for instance, that God is "for" a woman's right to choose to murder her unborn child or that Satan is behind attempts to eliminate abortion from the realm of legal protection is to misrepresent God in the grossest terms. It is blasphemy. It is to call God "Satan" and Satan "God." The same kind of thing occurs when it is suggested that God looks the other way when husbands cheat on their wives because He understands that "men will be men." Nonsense! God is extremely plain: fornicators and adulterers He will judge (Heb. 13:4). There are almost innumerable other ways in which light and darkness are regularly confused and misrepresented in our culture. We desperately need a more accurate sense of what a big thing it is to God to be misrepresented!

In this regard we also need a much more accurate understanding as to the transformed characters of all those human beings who have received God's special grace in Christ. That transformation is asserted in Ephesians 5:8 - "For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord." By nature these people very much loved darkness. They preferred to live in the realm of untruth and fleshly indulgence. They were fond of telling each other that if something seemed natural and felt good and did not "hurt" anyone, God approved. The fact that God's law forbade what they were doing was deliberately ignored. But when God's grace came and made Christ precious to their hearts, all this changed. The light of God now exposed their dark thoughts and practices and they repented of them. In the light of Christ (the light of the world) they recognized the beauty of God, the excellence and desirability of all that God commanded, and the harmfulness of all that God forbade. Not perfectly but with resolve, they began pursuing light. In the words of the text at the beginning of this article, they began walking in the light where God is.

Our day is a day of accommodation, even within the church. It is simply not politically acceptable to make discriminating statements concerning human character and behavior. However, God makes many such statements in His Word and we would do well to heed them. I John 1:6 is a plain example. If we profess to know and love God while our lives are marked by the love and practice of darkness, we are lying to ourselves and others. God causes His children to love Himself and on that account to love light and hate darkness.

Do you need for Christ to produce that transformation in you? Call upon Him to do so! No one can do it except Christ! And He is willing!