Walking in the Light

[xDICEx]

WALKING IN THE LIGHT
SIN, FORGIVENESS, CLEANSING, FELLOWSHIP, LOVE, AND JOY


John, in the first verses of his first epistle, declares to us, in the terms of “that eternal life”, what his and God’s purposes were in writing these words to us. These then are his words: “1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; 2 (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us 3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.” John’s meaning in his readers “having” this fellowship is first: real and true fellowship with the Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. We might say: to know the living God. Next, our fellowship is also with him and other true believers with him: “us”. Both of these possessions are aspects of one and the same true fellowship; we might say with John: “4:16 hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” If you love God you will love those begotten of God: “5:1 Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him.” With actual, real and divinely mediated fellowship, love is his aim.

Secondly, John adds: “4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.” That is, that our joy lies in this fellowship and love, and ours as well as John’s is filled up in the true outworking of it. Joy here is of an objective quality in that it has reality in the finished work of Christ on our behalf and in the promises of God which in Him are aye and amen. Joy also has a subjective, or better yet a progressive quality in our being filled up in it through the fellowship which we are to have as children of God walking through this world unto its end loving and being loved unto the return of Christ.

Subordinated to these purposes, then, John declares unto us “CHRIST”: from the beginning heard, seen, looked upon, and handled, the word of life: manifested, witnessed, that eternal life which was with the Father and manifested unto us. The eternal life of the Son and also through his incarnation, life, death, burial, and resurrection on our behalf the eternal life of believers both now and in the age to come is the content John’s words proclaim unto us. Eternal life is the substance of which walking in the light is the experience. “5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” And this walking in the light along with that fellowship John’s words are aimed at is what fills up Christian joy.
Note the conditional sentences, the “if/then” sentences, of v.6 and 7 that apply the truth: God is light and that in Him is no darkness. Their truths are expanded in the next verses.

The text for this study is drawn from the words which follow: “8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.”
The negative tenor and the words in v.8 are previewed in the negative words conditioned in v.6 where John had said, “If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth:” Deceived people can not do the truth. The claim of fellowship is, at that point, a lie requiring, as fellowship does, walking in the light. Walking in the darkness being the reality, fellowship is contradicted in doing not the truth. Thus John says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Also the tone of the positive condition in v.9 are struck first in v.7 “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin,” which positive condition is a contrast with the condition of v.6. Contrasted to a deceived denial of sin, confessors experience the Living God in fellowship forgiving and cleansing them. Apparently, walking in the light as He is in the light is the context within which confessing our sins and experiencing personal cleansing and forgiveness is the experiential content. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Additionally then, the negative condition of v.10 deepens the contrast: self righteous people not only deceive themselves not having Christ’s person with them nor His words in them, but they also dishonor God making God out to be a liar, the elaboration of: “lie and do not the truth.” There is no truth, fellowship, Love, or divine joy in darkness; there is only denial, deception, disobedience and dishonor, no mater how well intentioned and self righteous any poor man may of himself be. Judgment must and will follow; this is sober warning. The issues at stake are as eternal as God himself. “If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” Doing “good” in our own mind does not count. Like the man who reached out to steady the ark, he still died by the hand of the Lord (2 Sam.6:3-9), “3 And they set the ark of God upon a new cart, and brought it out of the house of Abinadab that was in Gibeah: and Uzzah and Ahio, the sons of Abinadab, drave the new cart. 4 And they brought it out of the house of Abinadab which was at Gibeah, accompanying the ark of God: and Ahio went before the ark. 5 And David and all the house of Israel played before the LORD on all manner of instruments made of fir wood, even on harps, and on psalteries, and on timbrels, and on cornets, and on cymbals. 6 And when they came to Nachon's threshingfloor, Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of God, and took hold of it; for the oxen shook it. 7 And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Uzzah; and God smote him there for his error; and there he died by the ark of God. 8 And David was displeased, because the LORD had made a breach upon Uzzah: and he called the name of the place Perezuzzah to this day. 9 And David was afraid of the LORD that day, and said, How shall the ark of the LORD come to me?”

There are several phrases in John’s text we must give some sort of account for: first as to what they precisely mean, and next as to what they mean to ourselves. What does it mean to say we have fellowship with Him, that we have no sin, or that we have not sinned? What is sin? What is walking in darkness and walking in light? What means this: lying, doing not the truth, deceiving ourselves, making Him a liar, truth not being in us, or of His word: it not being in us? What does “as he is in the light” mean? And what does it mean to confess our sins or to be forgiven us our sins and cleansed from all unrighteousness? And how are Christ’s attributes of faithfulness and justice involved in these things. Lastly, what does this have to do with eternal life, love and joy?

In the following post I'll try to answer some of these. DGB

 

[xDICEx]

In John’s gospel life is equated with light: in Him was life and the life was the light of man, the true light that lightens every man that comes in to the world. Above, life/light is the very premise that the whole of the conditional considerations vs.6-10 is founded upon. This basic truth about God and Christ: “This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all,” is not the sole attribute of God John infers from, but it is the foremost in his argument. The negative statement: “in Him is no darkness at all” sharpens this absolute truth for the clear-cut thinking that applies and infers from it in the verses that follow.

Our first question is, then, what is this light that God is, and what is our walking in it? The light God created on the 1st day of creation which illumines the day and divides from the darkness of night has as its original pattern this attribute: that God is light. In it is no darkness, being divided from the darkness. Sun, moon, planets, and stars did not exist until the 4th day when the primordial light was made to dwell in them. This primordial light, without the torch bearers that carry it, still divided day and night, light and darkness, over the 24 hour periods of day 1-3. Where there was light there was no darkness, day and not night. Where there was no light there was darkness, night and not day. On day 4 it was commissioned unto the heavenly bodies and given to rule from there over the night and the day in greater and lesser degrees, thus ameliorating the radical darkness of night giving night-lights as it was and furnishing a chronometer for created time. Darkness is not conducive to human labor, knowledge, or comfort in the Bible. A horror of great darkness is more than once mentioned. Men’s minds are darkened as they retain not the knowledge of God in them. We work in the day and not in the night where no light shines. Before the creation of physical light, darkness was over the face of the deep fittingly for it was formless and void, shapeless and empty, useless for man and devoid of the intelligent designs of God’s handiworks. Light’s creation changed all that: the Holy Spirit’s brooding over the face of the waters, flourishes over the next 7 days of creation ending with the double declaration, that it was very good. Light gets the creative work going, allows it to continue, and shines it up in the end.

Leaving for the moment that created light, what is the light that God is? Moreover what is the darkness of which there is none in Him? The Bible mentions the light of the knowledge of God in 2 Cor.4:6 “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” Remember John equates the light of man with the life of the Word, Jesus the son of God, “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.”: Since God is the living God, having a personal relationship with Him would be light. Paul in his passage equates this heart shining light as the knowledge of God, in fact the glory of God, and posits: that it is in the face of Christ. A face to face relation is a personal relation where both people are manifest before the eyes of each other.

This is what the Bible calls knowing, and also why many Bible teachers make a distinction between factual knowledge and experiential knowledge. God is omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient, infinite, eternal, self-existent, distinguished and separated from his creation, and a trinity of infinite persons indivisible in the heavens. If this is what we know about Him, what finite man among us could see him let alone know Him as He is, know him personally? Accordingly, John says, in ch.1:18 of his gospel, “No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.” Later he records Christ’s words in ch.10:15, “As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father.” Luke records a similar thread in his 10th chapter, “21 In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight. 22 All things are delivered to me of my Father: and no man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him. 23 And he turned him unto his disciples, and said privately, blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see.” The infinite triune persons know each other: the eternal Son was made the man Jesus: a person in the flesh we can see and know: thus, we can know God in the face of Jesus Christ. Do you not see how this must therefore be a personal relationship? Because this knowledge involves revelation, divine work not man’s, it is called blessing. The infinite life, knowledge, and being of God are known infinitely only in His persons unto himself: in Him is light and in Him there is no darkness at all. Yet because Jesus can know you and be known by you, Paul and John have said what they said.

All that God is in His self knowledge of Himself and all things is light; not that created light that dwells in the sun and stars, but like it, the full understanding, knowledge, and truth of who He is absolutely and personally. God’s infinite life is in Himself and of Himself, I Am that I Am. Where the truth of who God is in His person and works is not manifest there would be darkness. This is what John meant when he wrote, “1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 The same was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” (John 1). Light created reveals the works, wisdom, and power of God as He created the heavens and the earth and arranged their government from eternity to eternity. Christ glory reveals the lack of holy work, wisdom, and power in fallen human enterprise, exposing our sin and rebellion against His government of us, exposing a horrible element of sin, ubiquitous in our fallen natures, as well as our vane self-righteous acts. The righteousness of man is as filthy rags.

One cannot know God without knowing what God knows about oneself. God is holy and will not condone sin: He is a consuming fire. Walking in darkness and doing not the truth is incompatible and inconsistent with fellowship with God who is light. In Hebrews 4 it says, “12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” This gives weight to John’s saying, “8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” If one is having a personal relationship, fellowship, with the Lord Jesus Christ, the word of God, then one’s experience will be like Psalms 139, “1 O lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. 2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. 3 Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. 4 For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether. 5 Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it…” God is a spirit and those who worship Him must worship him in spirit and truth: this statement of our Lord was not negligent of Proverbs 20, “27 the spirit of man is the candle of the LORD, searching all the inward parts of the belly.” So aware of this couplet, the knowing of God and the truthful knowing of ourselves, Paul takes the one kind of knowing for the other kind by assumption in Galatians 4, “9 But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?” If we know Him face to face, whose eyes are as a burning flame of fire, then, we will see our sins as He sees them, and they will become exceedingly sinful in our eyes a well. (Rom. 7:13).

 

[xDICEx]

What does “the no darkness at all” add to the point? Man’s understanding may be darkened; not so God’s. Human counsel can be darkened; not so God’s. A man’s conscience may be seared as with a hot iron; yet God remains a consuming fire. We can be deceived and deceive others; yet God regards the truth of it all, untarnished by flaw or change. We can be ignorant of our sins; God cannot be. Man can darken from his mind the fires of judgment, but God beholds the wrath piled up against the day of wrath and righteous judgment of God. Sinners justify themselves; yet their destruction from the Lord lingers not. You see, in Him is no darkness at all. We may lament our ways, even change the patterns of our behavior, but in darkness we self-deceivably and ineffectually resist the tsunami waves of our nature. Our best efforts are actually our worst. Where God says, “There is none righteous no not one,” we content ourselves with self righteousness. We believe His love will recognize the good we have done or intended, and let us slide by in the judgment; we contradict His true love that laid upon His Son the iniquity of us all. We make Him to be a liar, who says, the soul that sinneth it shall die. In all our ways we merit destruction, death, and damnation. A holy God will be a partner to none of these things. If He actively knows you face to face, then, you will discern in His word your estate before his eyes. Why else did Adam and Eve seek to hide? Just the prospect of his personal presence, evident in the hearing of His voice, sent them into hiding.
God’s word defines sin. John says later in chapter 3, “4 whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.” God’s word, His law is life and light. The Holy Spirit applies this to believers’ spirits, their hearts, and their minds as they walk in the light, and because of “no darkness at all,” they become aware of their sins. This is what a holy God will do in your fellowship, expose your sin. He opens the scriptures to your understanding, His word lives and powerfully acts. He will know you. Those who are not known in this way are none of his, “22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? 23And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. 24 Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:” (Matt.7:22-24).

Walking in the light as he is in the light is the condition of two things in verse 7. One, is “we have fellowship one with another,” and the second is “and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” Remember fellowship is a two sided coin. On the one side is a face to face relationship with Christ and on the other side is fellowship with other believers. Both sides are God’s work in His children. Christ said they will not come to the light, because their deeds are evil. This is true. But our text is not written to call sinners to repentance and salvation. It is written to believers whose sins are already forgiven by the atoning sacrifice of Christ, people walking in the light so that they might have fellowship and joy. They have come to the light; being drawn by God, they are walking in it; but they still sin. They see sin as it is however; the light manifests it, they repent and Christ applies his atoning blood to the cleansing from all sin.

Dealing effectually with sin is an essential element of a believer’s life walking in the light, so also for fellowships of believers with one and other. Individual as well as corporate, both succeed only in the personal presence of Christ. Without walking in the light, forget about it. In darkness, alone: we fall and in groups: we crush one and other with human bondage and oppression. The word “all” here, spoken in reference our sins, astonishes me! How wide, inclusive, and intensive must this searching cleansing ministry of Christ in our midst be? There is no sin excluded in the word. God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. To love the brethren and being forgiven, cleansed before His eyes, this is joy.

Walking in the light is walking in the personal presence of Jesus Christ, spiritually being known. Walking in the light is walking in God’s word, scripturally being searched. Walking in the darkness is walking in the absence of either of the above. Without faith it is impossible to please God. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. God gives to each a measure of faith. We do not affect this out of our own goodness, maturity, wisdom, submitting, determination, or will power, but by His active mercy upon us, He effects us. It is His blessing, His revelation, and we are always humbled by it. Because it humbles us in the dust, it becomes our strength and hope; He will save His people from their sins. Otherwise, all we are too successful at hiding ourselves and at blaming others.

Having fellowship with Christ and walking in the light are then synonymous. The falsification of the one becomes the falsification of the other. John’s text mentions several falsifications. 1st To walk in darkness, v.1:6; 2nd saying we have no sin, v.1:8; and 3rd saying we have not sinned, v.1:10. 1st To say one has fellowship is falsified by walking in darkness: as to fellowship, it is a lie, thus as to a walk, we do not the truth, v. 6. 2nd To say we have no sin falsifies light: it is self deception and manifests the fact that the truth is not in us, v. 8. 3rd To say we have not sinned falsifies fellowship by making God who is light out to be a liar, manifesting that His Word is not in us and despising the forgiveness and cleansing that comes only from his presence even though founded upon his finished work as the lamb of God.

So then, as we walk in the light we do sin. This has a first order importance in John’s letter. This sin affects fellowship and joy. Christ seems far away, and our conscience condemns us. We are subject to assault by the enemy of our soles. We need divine assurance as to the state of our soles; fleshly confidence will not avail. If our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts. This is where “faithful and just” comes in. This is where our Lord, present with us, forgives and cleanses us from all sin. Under His searching light we confess our sins; not fleshly guilt, but spiritually and Biblically illuminated conviction leading to heart repentance. So then, what is this forgiveness spoken here by John and what is this cleansing?

First, the forgiveness and the cleansing both are routed in the person of Jesus Christ, in his attributes of Faithfulness and Justus. He was completely faithful to the will of his Father in making an eternal, effectual, and complete payment for sin satisfying the just condemnation of death upon us through the holy wrath and eternal decrees of God. That this work was finished and completed for all of time in his one act upon the cross is evident in his cry, “It is finished”, and in the fact that He was raised again for our justification, (Rom.4:25). Moreover this priestly act is developed with great detail in the book of Hebrews, (10:12) “But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;”
So it is not just absolute forgiveness or even absolute cleansing that our text is about. But rather, it is about an experiential searching kind of application of the Blood in our personal walks with Christ, walking in the light. In His face we are comforted, as in the absence of his face we are distraught, just like the bride in the Song of Solomon. Because he is faithful and just, and the work is complete, in our relationship with him He applies in our hearts the known forgiveness and applies the blood of his death. The living word takes flight through refreshed unfeigned faith, and confidence raises the slain sinner through the worthy lamb back into the overflowing streams of life freely given by Grace. This is only how our first love can be restored. Always in every way: worthy is the Lamb which was slain. When we love him our joy is made complete. Isn’t the immediate knowledge of his love of us the fountain of our love to him? This is His personal cleansing and forgiving, and it is not so wrong, that we must have these from his very countenance. The flesh cannot please God; the true worshipers of God must worship Him in spirit and truth.

Sanctification is absolute in terms of position but it is progressive like maturity in its outworking in our lives. Forgiving one another and bearing one another’s burdens are ubiquitous in fellowships because He who is the light fills all in all. No mater what ones maturity, forgiveness and cleansing is the fire of our love and joy. In many ways the more mature the saint is, the more sin in himself he is aware of and also the more that saint needs the restoration of his first love. Let us say with David, Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. DGB

 

[joy-messiah]

i like ur observation about light so much, may LORD bless u with more light

 

[xDICEx]

i like ur observation about light so much, may LORD bless u with more light

Dear brothers and sisters please pray for Joy. She is a persecuted convert in Pakistan, oppressed, sought against, and at times in hiding. She and her two children, also saved, God has to date providentially cared for their dire needs...She recently lost her job and no longer has access to the internet. She can and does text from time to time to give me updates on their situation. They have even had a Bible study in their apartment. Mary, her daughter is now in surgical training in a local hospital. John, her son, has been teaching himself Hebrew and Greek so he can read the original manuscripts of the Bible as he is finishing up high school, a Muslim school where God has protected him in amazing ways and increased his faith and trust in divine intervention and protection. Joy tells me, God has given john a gift to understand scriptures and bring out their meanings (the land needs a such a man).
They live on the knife edge of necessity and danger, yet God has been faithful to his word: I will be a comfort unto the widow and a father to the fatherless. Hold them up before the throne. God bless you all.