Walking in Light

1 John 1:5-7 (ESV)
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. [6] If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. [7] 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 cleanses us from all sin.

God is light; there is no darkness in him at all. He is light, he hides nothing from us, but reveals all to us in his Son Jesus Christ. His death is our forgiveness, his life our life because he died for us.
If we walk in darkness, this does not mean that we walk in sin. Sin is with us, the rest of this very chapter makes this true. But to say we have fellowship with him, while we forfeit the forgiveness of sins, and make Christianity about our living a righteous life etc. When instead of basking in forgiveness we reject it by trying to earn our own salvation, or by tenaciously hanging on to sin and refusing to let it go or have it recognized as sin, then we lie and do not practice truth.
Tenaciously holding on to sin, John later on talks about sins unto death. Sins that lead to death, sins the devil uses to separate us from Christ. There are sins that seem to have a harsher effect on us and our faith than other sins. I don’t know why this is. I only observe it. Christians, sinners though they may be, hate sin. Christians try to avoid sin then, because we do hate it. It can’t be in such a manner that we look down on others who fall into the traps of sin. We can’t do that either. But it is a thin line, and a hard thing to do to forgive sin, and not condone it. It is a hard thing to do to reach out in love to an erring brother and try to turn him to a better way. Sin has such a grip on us.
But how can we in love take advantage of others for whom Christ died, exploit them sexually and emotionally, even if they seem to beg for the exploitation, when we know that Christ died for us also? How can we do this? How can we tenaciously hold on to sin, when we know Christ has forgiven it, that which nailed him to the cross. Our sin kills us! Our sin destroys us. Sin is never good for us, it is never the better way. In the end, neither is it the easier way. We cannot so tenaciously hold onto sin that we will not let it go that we refuse to let it go, even if that means that we no longer go to Christ to receive his body and his blood for the forgiveness of sins. We cannot do this. We are worth more than that, Christ has shed his blood for us, that we would not be slaves to sin, subjecting ourselves to exploitation of sin, by exploiting others. It cannot work that way. And yet this is the world we live in. Pornography is rampant, and what is that but the exploitation of others as if they were nothing but animals sacrificing their flesh for our appetites. Shacking up? Divorcing on whims? Not to mention the exploitation rampant in the market places. One could make a case without being to legalistic to just shut the T.V. off and refuse to be exploited by the commercials for products you never knew existed, and yet now think you need. Sometimes I think T.V. is a bigger factor in the accumulation of debt than credit cards. Just a thought but I have been digressing.
But if we walk in light…. The blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin. That is light, the forgiveness of sins we have in Christ washing us clean day in and day out from the sin, filth and death of the world in which we live. He forgives our sin and gives us life. Amen.