“For when you see Me, you are seeing the One who sent Me. I have come as a light to shine in this dark world, so that all who put their trust in Me will no longer remain in the dark.” (John 12:45-46 NLT)
Knowing there is a Light and walking in that Light are two very different things. Knowing about Jesus and hanging out with Him and His people is not the same as putting your trust in Him.
You’ve likely heard of the Great Blondin, who walked across Niagara Falls on a tight rope. The story is told that his manager asked the crowd: “Who believes the Great Blondin can push a wheelbarrow across the rope?” And the crowd erupted with enthusiastic applause and affirmation. Then he asked: “Who will be first to climb in?” And the crowd was silent.
Until our belief becomes personal it won’t become impactful. It’s easy to cheer for that which costs us nothing. It takes little effort to recognize and affirm the Light, the challenge is to make the decision to walk out of the crowd and climb into the wheelbarrow; to walk out of the darkness into the light of the only One who can change us and enable us to become the person God always envisioned we could become.
Light isn’t simply the absence of darkness, it’s the presence of opportunity to see and understand things – about ourselves, about Jesus, about the Bible, about life, and about a million others things that remain entombed in the darkness of our heart and mind until we allow the light of Christ to illuminate and inform us.
It’s interesting to me that darkness cannot stand in the presence of the sun. We may close our eyes or retreat to a dark place that blocks the light, but we can never destroy or eliminate the light. The light of Christ’s life is like that. We may close our mind to the Truth which He is – not just what He taught – but our spiritual blindness will never extinguish His presence, not only from the world, but even from ourselves.
There is an eternal relationship between light and darkness, not only figuratively, but literally. God has always existed. He is eternally present; thus, His light has become evident in everything He has created, including you and me. There exists in each of us the capacity to shine as light or darkness; good or evil; love or hate.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said: “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.“ Even on our best days, in those moments of seeming greatest clarity, we can still do, say, and think things that are completely contrary to who God made us to become.
We have a dark side that only the illumination of the love of Christ can dispel. And the irony is, unless and until the Holy Spirit resides in us and enables us to “tame” that dark side we are hopelessly lost and helpless to defeat it on our own. In our desperation we often turn to judging and criticizing others as a means of making ourselves look and feel better, but as Dietrich Bonhoeffer said so well: “Judging others makes us blind, whereas love is illuminating.”
Are you walking in the Light of Christ’s life and love today? It never ceases to amaze me that Jesus died when I was at my worst, when I was helpless and hopeless to find my way out of the darkness of my own soul. One of the many values of the light of God’s Holy Spirit abiding in us and working through us as His son or daughter, is His relentless effort to show us the parts of our heart and mind that are still enshrouded in darkness. It’s a difficult journey to walk in the light, but one that will pay eternal dividends.
Food for thought.
Blessings, Ed 😊
Walking With Jesus 