The older I get, the more light I need in order to see clearly with my physical eyes. I’m continually bumping into things in the dark in spite of the night lights placed strategically around my home. I once was able to read without a reading lamp or glasses far into the evening, but now, my eyes just require more light to see the very same things. It’s a physiological fact we all must face because we live in a fallen world where bodies wear out over time.
The correlating spiritual reality is exactly opposite. When John the Baptist said, “He must increase and I must decrease,” (John 3:30) he was referring to Jesus’s ministry becoming more prominent than his own but his words are a perfect picture of what has happened during my lifetime of walking with Jesus. At first, He appeared small, a part of my life, only because what I knew of Him was limited and I viewed Him as from a distance. The closer I’ve been drawn to Him, the more I see and the more of my field of vision He engulfs. He is my life. My vision becomes clearer in the spiritual realm even as my physical sight is diminished.
“For we live by believing and not by seeing.”
2 Corinthians 5:7
https://bible.com/bible/116/2co.5.7.NLT
“Jesus once again addressed them: “I am the world’s Light. No one who follows me stumbles around in the darkness. I provide plenty of light to live in.” (John 8:12)
“Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path.”
Psalms 119:105
https://bible.com/bible/116/psa.119.105.NLT
Yet not all have this sight. It is given to those who by faith accept the gift of God unto salvation and continue in Him. Only in Christ, the one way to the Father, is found abundant life, incomprehensible peace, forgiveness of sin, and the gift of the Holy Spirit. As I walk in the light of His Word, enlivened by His Spirit, I have the mind of Christ. (I Corinthians 2:16) Without belief, the things of God sound foolish. (I Corinthians 2:14)
To them, “Jesus said, “You’re looking right at me and you don’t see me. How do you expect to see the Father? If you knew me, you would at the same time know the Father.”
You’re tied down to the mundane; I’m in touch with what is beyond your horizons.
You live in terms of what you see and touch.
I’m living on other terms.
I told you that you were missing God in all this.
You’re at a dead end.
If you won’t believe I am who I say I am, you’re at the dead end of sins.
You’re missing God in your lives.”
“I have so many things to say that concern you, judgments to make that affect you, but if you don’t accept the trustworthiness of the One who commanded my words and acts, none of it matters.
That is who you are questioning—not me but the One who sent me.”
John 8:19, 23-29
https://bible.com/bible/97/jhn.8.12-29.MSG
In his Message version, Eugene Peterson captures what the prophets and Jesus say time and again- you’re looking right at Me and you can’t see me.
“‘Go and say to this people:
When you hear what I say, you will not understand.
When you see what I do, you will not comprehend.
For the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes— so their eyes cannot see, and their ears cannot hear, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them.’”
Acts of the Apostles 28:26-27 (quoting Isaiah’s call 6:9-10)
https://bible.com/bible/116/act.28.26-27.NLT
It’s one thing to be in the dark, unable to see because there is no light but it is another thing entirely to close your eyes against the light. One who finds themselves in the dark has no control over his situation, but one who closes her eyes and claims not to see is making a choice.
“I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night— but even in darkness I cannot hide from you.
To you the night shines as bright as day.
Darkness and light are the same to you.”
Psalms 139:11-12 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/psa.139.11-12.NLT
Jesus came and lived a perfect, sinless life, making the final necessary sacrifice for sin, yours and mine. God’s wrath is appeased for all who trust in His statement, “it is finished.” (John 19:30) No one who follows Him stumbles around in the darkness. He provides plenty of light to live by.
“This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you:
God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all.
So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth.
But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.”
1 John 1:5-7 NLT
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