Returning to the Light

If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true; but if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

1 John 1:6-10

Sin can be so easy to name in other people, but we rarely pay attention to sin in ourselves until we have done something hard to ignore. We might not have the nerve to say we are without sin, but we rarely take a hard look at our sinfulness.

Sin starts small. We aren’t so much in the darkness as in the shade. “Shady” sins are often what are sometimes called “sins of omission,” not bad things we do but opportunities to do good that we ignore. We may not notice that we are turning away from God when we ignore an opportunity to be kind to someone or to put ourselves in God’s presence. After all, we are busy.

The shade can become comfortable, but ignoring opportunities to do good weakens our will to follow Christ. We get out of practice reaching outside ourselves toward God and other people. The shade deepens. Soon doing small bad things and then bigger ones doesn’t feel so bad. We slip further and further into darkness without noticing the loss of light.

1 John has an unpalatable antidote – confessing our sins. In order to confess them, we have to name them, and to name them we have to shine a bright light into our hearts and onto our actions. Classic spirituality calls this an “examination of conscience” – a thorough search for what we have done wrong, trying not to let things slip past us.

Confession is powerful . We are “forgiven and cleansed from all unrighteousness.” We can walk in the light of Christ’s presence again. Like most antidotes, it only feels good afterward, when we remember who were are and how good walking in the light feels.

God’s peace,

Katie