Friday: If We Walk in the Light
WEEK 50
FRIDAY
IF WE WALK IN THE LIGHT
Acts 19:18-20
Usually the Lord gives me a key verse for the year, a verse around which life can revolve. On New Year’s morning, God gave me this one: “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” (1 John 1:7 RSV).
Our business is to live to the highest light we have, which is Jesus, “as he is in the light.” The touchstone in any situation is: Is this according to Jesus? Does it fit into his mind and spirit? Would he approve? If not, then our “light” is darkness.
But it is not always easy to tell whether Jesus would approve, whether it does fit into his mind and spirit. There may be a lot of good in a thing and some evil. A congressman told me of sitting down and adding up on one side the good and on the other side the evil, in a measure to be decided, and he added: “I have to decide it. I can’t run out on it. I can’t dodge it. But I know I’m not making a clear-cut decision between good and evil. It’s not all black and white, it’s often gray. What do you do then?” My reply was, ‘Well, walk in the highest light that you have; and then if you have made a mistake, the ‘blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.’” He covers the sins and mistakes that you honestly make in deciding in half-lights. And the word “cleanses” is present continuously; he continuously cleanses from all sins. These mistakes honestly made do not break the fellowship—“we have fellowship one with another”—between Christ and us and between us and others. The fellowship persists, for he provides for a continuous cleansing. So the cleansing is once and for all, yet it is continuous.
So you do not have to be always right. We are all only Christians in the making. We blunder and stumble. But when we stumble, we stumble forward. When we fall, we fall on our knees. “Daddy,” said a little boy who had walked many blocks holding on to his father’s finger, “you had better take hold of my finger, for I’m getting tired.” His very tiredness threw him into greater security. Everything furthers us when we are his, for he loves us in spite of our blunders.
O Jesus, your grace is a continuous wonder to me. You are so stern, holding me to the highest, and yet so tender, stooping to my lowest. You are Grace and more Grace. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: If I have to decide in half-lights today, I shall do my best and leave the rest.