Living in Shadows or Sunshine?
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
The unexpected happened in 1977. New York City, the town Frank Sinatra crooned as the city that never slept, went dark.
And it stayed dark for two days.
Something happened when this, one of the world’s largest cities experienced that kind of blackout. Out of the shadows came evil. It had complete freedom in the dark. Arson and looting swept through the city until the lights came back on.
The world has experienced a spiritual blackout in many ways. Evil, just like in New York City, spreads. Murder, rape, theft, mayhem of all sorts comes out to play in the darkness. And this is done with the sun shining in the sky.
The reason is the darkness is spiritual. It dismisses sin as a fallacy and pronounces each has his own code of conduct.
And in the darkness you find death but in the light you find life. What does life in shadows and sunshine look like?
John describes a stark contrast, more pronounced you could not find because nothing is more different than darkness and light.
Light and Darkness
Light and Darkness
John has a pressing aim. To deliver a message.
This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.
He says that the message he has is something delivered by revelation. It is not discovered by human insight. You only get it if you hear the word of God, not the wisdom of man.
His message is clear and from it all of 1 John will unfold.
The Light
The Light
This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.
God is light. It doesn’t say God is like light. It is not a simile or a metaphorical expression but a description of the essence of God. He is light. As light, God does many things.
Light Exposes.
Light Exposes.
We lived on the Gulf Coast for enough years to know one thing. When you flip on the light in the middle of the night, you probably will see roaches scatter. Light shows off what is in the dark.
God will show your true character, your actual belief, and your unveiled motives. For those who think they can hide their lives, God exposes it.
Light Illuminates
Light Illuminates
For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.
Paul echoes John. When light comes, it brightens the world. It gives knowledge you can have no other way.
The false teachers claimed the right of illumination. They “knew” and could tell others what to do. This has been true ever since, embodied in people like Jim Jones or David Koresh.
Yet, the knowledge needed to live for Christ comes from God, not some kind of human philosophical system or some self-ordained revelation.
The Darkness
The Darkness
Opposed to that is the darkness. Darkness is where evil lurks.
The New Testament says two things about darkness.
It is the place of immorality.
It is the place of immorality.
John in his gospel says that evil loves darkness.
This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.
Thieves work at night because they can accomplish their villany. If you watch the news, the morning reports detail the murders, robberies and other felonies that happen in the dark.
And even if they are not in the physical dark, they love to be kept in the spiritual dark. Most hide sins, from the extra-marital affair to Bernie Madoff. Sin occurs out of sight.
The enemies of Christ hide in the dark.
The enemies of Christ hide in the dark.
Paul tried to capture what was happening out of physical sight. There are things happening we cannot understand. For Paul, he says they are of darkness.
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
The spiritual powers opposing Christ cloak themselves in the spiritual darkness. And it is apparent. Since God is light, his enemies are darkness.
John takes this basic premise—that God is light and there is no darkness at all and applies it to the Christian life. He starts with life in darkness.
Wandering in the Dark
Wandering in the Dark
John contrasts lifestyles through a series of conditional statements that begin with that little but consequential word “if.”
“If” expresses the possibility and probability that these beliefs are held and practiced. This is not a hypothetical of what might happen in some weird universe out there somewhere. Instead, it reflects the language of the false teachers. Some suggest that John is even quoting them directly.
Fellowship Apart from Lifestyle
Fellowship Apart from Lifestyle
John begins these conditions with what might seem obvious to us but is an easy ditch to fall into.
If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.
John describes the common idea that we can know what is right but not have to live that way. In fact, knowledge is king and then, if you get the right lifestyle, you are lucky.
It struck straight at the heart of the false teaching. The knowers had a secret. Those who knew the secret were in the inner circle and in close communion with God.
But they lived perverse lives. Immorality, drunkeness, carousing, and slander could pour from a believer’s life as long as you had the teaching down.
Napoleon once said that laws were made for ordinary people but never meant for the likes of him.
It grew in the church.
Clement of Alexandria writing a generation later than John tells us that there were heretics who said that it made no difference how people lived. In another century the theologian Irenaeus tells us that they declared that truly spiritual people were quite incapable of ever being affected or harmed by sin, no matter what they did.
It seems to be a self-apparent problem but the teachers had organized their personal universe to make knowledge, not life important.
But Christianity is a “doing” faith.
John said that in his gospel
But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.
Paul agrees.
When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in front of them all, “You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?
It is about acting.
God determines how much you know by how you live, not by what you say.
John calls it “lying” when your lip and life don’t match. If you say you have fellowship with God who is light and live in the dark, there is something false in that.
When there is a difference in what is said and what is done, believe what is done.
This is a danger area for us. We are a fellowship who believes in knowledge. Memorize scripture. Get the doctrine right. We measure the intellectual and the doctrinal.
It can be a false measure. When Josef Stalin, the Soviet leader during the second world war, was growing up, he lived in an orphanage run by the Russian Orthodox Church. The priest drummed the knowledge into him. He learned the right answers. He could recite the entire four gospels from memory without missing a beat.
But look at his life. During his leadership, he killed 20 million Russians. He knew the gospel but was a ruthless butcher.
We do need to believe the right things but if we stop there, we are deluded. God wants to see the fruits of a life.
Sin…Not Me
Sin…Not Me
The second possibility sounds strange to us but is more common than we think.
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
The teachers claimed that they had not committed sin, even in their immorality. They took that strange twisted view that as long as the spirit was pure, the body was to be ignored. If it was a glutton, the spirit had not sinned. If you took a pick ax to to another person, that was the fleshly part, not the spiritual part that counted.
John says that takes a significant amount of self-deception. The word he uses is the one for someone who leads someone astray. The German legend of the Pied Piper of Hamlin illustrates what happens. The pied piper, once he rid the town of its rats found the town fathers unwilling to pay. He decided to hold the children of the town hostage by playing his flute and the followed him out of town.
Instead of a pipe, this is a person’s own rationalizations. It is your own thinking that takes you off track.
While it is easy to dismiss this, before you show it the door, stop and think about how it comes out of our mouths. We deny responsibility. We make excuses. Some might say, “my heart was at least right when I hit him in the nose.” When we dismiss our sin as what others did or that I intended to do good, we make the same claim.
I Cannot Sin
I Cannot Sin
But then John takes it one step further.
If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.
Some of the false teachers had moved beyond recognizing their own sin. They insisted that, since their spirit was right, they had the inability to sin. The “knowers” due to their special, secret knowledge had lost even the ability to recognize sin in their lives. They then, did not have the sin or its result.
We would think this is insanity if we did not hear it much in our own mouths.
Karl Menninger wrote a book in 1988 called Whatever Became of Sin. In it, he said sin disappeared from the American vocabulary. Menninger died thirty years and would be appalled at how much of a prophet he might become.
We have traded the word “sin” for things not as threatening. Some people believe that the word “sin” is just too strong to describe them. Instead, people have “missteps.” Instead of lying, people “misspoke.” Sin was softened to slips and errors in judgment. And to really soften it, it came in the passive voice—Mistakes were made.
We reduce sin to zero by categorizing sin. We create categories of sin. Sin is the bad list. Murder. Adultery. And then, we place people there. Hitler was a sinner. Charles Manson was a sinner. As long as what I did does not rise to that level, I did not sin. “At least I did not kill anyone.” We comfort ourselves with that kind of nonsense.
There is a consequence to this kind of thinking. When we denied we did sin, we lie. This is so much worse because it makes God the liar.
God set up standards. In fact, the term “sin” simply means missing the mark. The mark is objective. You miss it or you don’t. You hit the target. It’s not a game of horseshoes where close counts.
It’s always interesting to play games with my grandchildren. We are playing along and they are in danger of losing. There’s a simple answer. Change the rules. Make sure the mark is constant moving so I don’t transgress that.
If God put a standard and it is violated…and you deny it, then you put the lie in God’s mouth.
Then, John gives the other side, walking in the light.
Walking in the Light
Walking in the Light
When you walk in the light rather than stumbling in darkness, something characterizes your life.
You Live To Please the Light
You Live To Please the Light
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.
The word “walk” is how you get around in the world. It is how you live your life. In fact John says says that walking in darkness is not about not believing the truth but “doing” the truth.
If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.
We may believe this is self-apparent but it is not.
In an article in Christianity Today called “Hipster Faith” it described our modern conundrum.
Younger evangelicals who want to shed some of the trappings of mainstream, baby-boomer Christianity—bumper stickers, mega-churches, right-wing politics. They want a more gritty, relevant, justice-oriented faith. They meet in night clubs, cuss in the pulpit, and cancel services once a month to serve the poor. On the one hand, there's something appealing about it. These 'hipster" churches are exposing the shallowness and hypocrisy of their parent's generation, who built bigger houses and better churches, all the while neglecting the poor, trashing the environment, and turning the gospel into a commodity. At the same time, there's something disturbing about it. This new breed of Christians seem to think that as long as they're doing social justice and unplugged, authentic worship, things like drinking, swearing, and sexual experimentation aren't really a big deal.
Are they walking in the light?
When you do, you reflect Jesus. He said:
I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.
We made What Would Jesus Do a convenient slogan but it’s the wrong one. It should be what did Jesus do. Do we have communion with the father like he did? Do we have the same dedication to keeping both law and spirit in our lives? Can we help others without dumping God in the process.
If you are not getting closer to what Jesus did, you are getting farther away.
You Confess Your Sin
You Confess Your Sin
As opposed to trying to sidestep sin through semantic juggling or cockeyed philosophy, living in the light faces sin squarely.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
This is the opposite of denying sin. It means to “say the same thing.” When two people see a train wreck, they agree it was a train wreck. When God sees sin and we say “we sinned,” we are saying the same thing. We see it as God sees it.
Confession may be one of the hardest thing for people to do. We want to look good, save face, and preserve our self respect.
But confession allows for a life to be examined. It gives a sense of openness and takes the mystery. There’s a good reason that the expression is “confession is good for the soul.” It’s hard to hide forever.
What John says is to not confess cuts us off from the only way to be healed and forgiven. Confession says, “I did it.” It doesn’t blame circumstances or others. It says, “I sinned.” It doesn't say “I made a mistake.” It stands up, raises its hand and takes responsibility. It doesn’t turn the blame backward and say, “I was misunderstood.”
What Walking Creates
What Walking Creates
John says that this kind of walking in the light creates two important things for Christians.
It creates fellowship.
It creates fellowship.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.
The only way we can share in the life of God in Christ is to live like they did.
How would you like to take a car trip of any length with people you can’t stand? Would you want to be in that car?
The church is built on a common conviction that the way of Christ is the way to heaven. It believes in sin and forgiveness. How can you have fellowship if you do not share that.
The only way we have things in common with Christ and his body is if we share the values.
It creates cleansing.
It creates cleansing.
Twice in this short passage this emphasis comes out.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
He uses two words to describe our cleansing as we walk in the light.
One is forgiveness. The word means to let go, just as a leaf in fall lets go of the tree and flutters to the ground. God lets go of our sin and doesn’t hold us against us.
But the second word, used twice is cleans. The Greek term provides a clinical word for us, the word catharsis, a cleansing. It is a ritual word. The Old Testament ritual had many steps but one was a stop at the basin in the courtyard. There you scrubbed to make yourself clean. It wasn’t hygienic. It was the preparation to meet God. When God cleanses us, he makes us ready for His presence.
But it says something else. Forgiveness lets go of sin but cleansing erases all remnants of it. God does something. He takes away the scar the sin leaves. And it is important.
Many of you know my grandson was born with a cleft lip. We were grateful it was only the lip. Yesterday, we had a family celebration called Smile Day. It was the first anniversary of the surgery to close the cleft. A year ago yesterday, surgeons did miracles. Today, you never knew he had an issue.
God does that kind of surgery.
But what is even more marvelous is this is happening constantly to those walking in the light.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.
There the verb is present tense and says that he is constantly cleansing the sin from us.
The reason is this passage makes two assumptions. God assumes that we miss the mark and confess our sins. We don’t always obey easily and he knows that, even in the best circumstances, we slip and fall.
But the second assumption is we can do nothing about it. God through Christ takes care of the sin. The language puts the onus on God.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
It says that God is faithful and just. He does this because of who he is. He promises to do ti, that is his faithfulness. And because of Christ’s death, he is just.
Walking in the light is not a burden but a blessing.
Conclusion
Conclusion
In John’s day, the teachers had complicated Christianity. Ritual and secret services were required to get the illumination needed to be one of the “knowers.” It was hard hill to climb and you had to do it.
But one of the great truths is that God doesn’t make it hard. He is light. Walk in his presence in a way that pleases him, and life gets simplified. There are no special classes, incantations. It is taking one step after another in obedience to him. Can you take a single step and then another?
And then, we remain in the light, not because we are perfect but because God is. He takes care of the sins we admit to and own.
This is the direction to go in our spiritual life.
Sometimes you need someone to help. Mary McLaurine knows. She has a condition called developmental topographical disorientation. Her mind does not form mental maps. If she goes outside, she gets lost in her front yard.
She describes her life this way:
I was staying a friend's home and decided to take their dog Otis for a walk. As I started back, I had no idea where I was. I was only blocks from where I had started my walk, but I was lost. Fear and adrenaline pulsed through my veins and I began to sweat profusely. My surroundings looked completely unfamiliar. It was as though I'd been dropped into the middle of a foreign land.
I hadn't written down the address of the home where I was staying. Walking in any direction would be just a guess: Am I getting closer to or farther away? Would I have had to knock on someone's door to use their phone to call the police? How could I expect them to return me to a place if I had no address to provide?
However, Mary was fortunate. Someone was there to guide her home. And Christ says, as you walk in life, don’t worry, I will get you home.