Have you ever tried to walk around somewhere when there was no light at all?  Maybe you were camping and it was the middle of the night and you didn’t have a flashlight.  Maybe you got up in the middle of the night and the power was out and you had to stumble around.  Or perhaps you have, like me, been caving and your headlamp went out while you were far away from your caving partner.  I can tell you first hand it is quite unsettling and disorienting.  You can try and feel your way around but you really won’t make much progress until you have light.  John compares this idea of stumbling around in the darkness to what is like when we have hate inside of us.  Let’s look at his words together today.

My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. 2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands. 4 Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. 5 But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: 6 Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.7 Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. 8 Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining. 9 Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. 10 Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. 11 But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.

We were created in the image of God.  The Bible tells us that God, in His very nature, is love.  That means that we are designed and created to be against of love.  When we harbor hate toward another person it is like going through life in the darkness.  We are blinded.  I literally was stuck in the cave without my light until I remembered that in my backpack I had a backup hand held light.  I turned that on and then I could move again.  I could make my way through.  When we find we are blind because we have hate we need to use our backup light.  God Is always with us to forgive us.  To remind us of His great love for us and to fill us again with love even for those we don’t particularly like much.  Do not allow hate to blind you in life but seek God’s great love and walk through life in the light of that love for Him and others. 

In His Grip,
Pastor Dave