Ephesians 5:7-12 “Therefore do not be partakers with them. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret.”
Pastor Herk continues: The Apostle Paul did not say that Believers were once in darkness, but that they were darkness. Fallen humanity is darkness because there is no light of Christ in their lives. Do not be deceived, 1 John 1:6-8 tells us, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him [Jesus], and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.” The true born-again Christian is washed clean in the blood of Christ and transformed with a hatred of sin against the Lord of their salvation. They were once darkness, but now are light in the Lord; transferred from darkness to light. Not by their good works but by God’s good work in their lives; in Christ, we are light. Jesus said in John 8:12, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”
When anyone make the choice to accept Jesus as Savior of their life and follow Him as Lord of their life, He is continually present in their life and become light in a dark world. Believers are not merely enlightened, we are light; the light of the world. The Greek word for light here is “phōs”, meaning the power of understanding of moral and spiritual truth, mind, reason and its knowledge, together with the spiritual purity associated with it, which illuminates and exposes to the view of all, openly and publicly. Matthew 4:16 says, “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and upon those who sat in the region and shadow of death Light has dawned.” We are no longer dark. Believers are a living testimony of God’s redemptive and transformational power in a changed life that witness, bearing witness to the Light, to those walking in darkness, reaching out in love to bless and make disciples of all nations. John 1:9 confirms, “That [Jesus] was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.”
God did something that we could never do for ourselves. Converting from darkness to light is supernaturally divine intervention and confession, belief and faith is our contribution. Jesus declares in John 8:23-25, “You are from beneath [in succession of Adam’s sin]; I am from above [the kingdom of Heaven]. You are of this world [fallen in sin and dark]; I am not of this world.
Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.” Remember what you were before Christ [dark], what you have been saved from [death and eternal Hell], what you have become [light in Christ], where you have been saved to [eternal life in Heaven], and never revert to be darkness again. Romans 6:3-5 “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His Resurrection.” When, live our lives, walking in a manner that is consistent with light in God [Father, Son and Holy Spirit], then we are going to bear good fruit; consistent with whose we are.
Jesus points out the fundamental difference of character in Matthew 7:16-20 “You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.” If you are light, then your life is going to reflect that fact, and you are going to produce the fruit of godly goodness in righteousness and truth. The old life is dead, buried with Christ; do not allow it to recur. Once we have made our way into the light through Jesus Christ and experienced what it is to live in the freedom and joy in the obedient Christian walk with the biblical worldview, we should not even desire the previous darkness again. Any attempt to slide by into darkness and retrieve some sin for a season left behind and yearn for is going to lead to a devastatingly disastrous end. When you bury the hatchet, don’t leave the handle sticking out.
Let's conclude Pastor Herk's message on Light and Darkness in the next post.
In Christ, Brian
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