Hiding from Eternal Life

This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. (John 3:19-20)

A compelling story is going around in the News right now about a Pakistani girl who dared to protest against the Taliban for their opposition against any female acquiring an education. Because of her stance she was shot in the head by her own people for daring to say anything that drew attention to the fanatical, selfish and abusive system of belief that these men benefit from at the expense of women.

It occurred to me that this is a dramatic illustration of a key principle that Jesus revealed during His discussion with another member of a fanatical group of religious people. The Pharisees likewise had cultured a system of extremist religion that not only viewed women's rights as a threat to their power but like today's extremists Muslims, they also fostered a system designed to prevent exposure of their own sins of darkness being exposed by keeping the focus on other people's supposed faults.

Jesus gave one of the clearest definitions of the concept of judgment as heaven defines it in this passage, He was speaking of exactly what is taking place before our eyes in the massive struggle between the light of truth and the darkness of violence we are seeing all around us. Rather than implying that judgment happens on some great Day way off in the distant future, Jesus speaks of judgment as potentially happening every time anyone finds themselves confronted with truth and attempts to avoid its glare by hiding even deeper by covering up with any method they can find.

A couple days ago I reviewed this passage with a friend. As we looked at it more closely we noticed a number of paired concepts in these verses that helps to reveal its implications more clearly. Some of these terms come from surrounding verses not quoted above.

• Light or darkness.
• Love or hate.
• Eternal life or perish.
• Save or condemn.
• Believe or not believe.
• Practices the truth or does evil.
• [Desire] that his deeds may be manifested or fear that his deeds will be exposed.

The more I study this definition of judgment as given us by Jesus the more clearly it becomes that heaven's version of judgment is dramatically different than how we use this term. But maybe that is not so strange after all, for if we are of those who prefer our distorted definitions of religious terms in order to prop up our false, selfish systems that benefit some at the expense of others, then we too will live in fear of getting too close to the Light for fear that our prejudices and incriminating teachings will expose us too. We can often be found to be as afraid of exposure by the clear words of Jesus as those we condemn among extremists we hear about on the News.

In fact, when we claim to be Christians and say that we believe in Jesus and yet and His teachings while in fact we treat others in ways that conflict with those principles, we may be in even greater threat of exposure than those who follow the teachings of Islam. It might be somewhat understandable that those who have an agenda of using violence in the name of Muhammad act the way that they do given some of their prophet's instructions about how to treat those outside their religion. But it is a far greater travesty when Christians fall into similar patterns of thinking and acting in the name of Jesus who explicitly taught non-violence and who personally gave the greatest demonstration of this in the history of the universe.

On the cross Jesus revealed a God who could not be abused enough to resort to using any tactics of evil or even harbor any such attitudes against His enemies. Yet when people professing to be followers of this same Jesus who explicitly revealed what God is like and then insist on living in ways out of harmony or even just the opposite to this God, they only reinforce the accusations of God's greatest enemy. Then when the light of the real truth about God shines into their lives they become just as quick to resist that light as radical Muslims fear the light of truth that threatens to expose their system of evil.

To claim that Christianity is superior to Islam and yet maintain a willingness to resort to using force to gain supremacy over enemies only bolsters the claims of Satan and does nothing to advance the Kingdom that Jesus came to establish. This becomes clear when the truth of Jesus begins to shine from those today who are presenting these disturbing revelations about God. Whenever Christians in particular react violently to the idea that God never resorts to force, coercion, fear or any other method of Satan to achieve His ways, we see judgment happen over and over again in the present. Even if that violent reaction is only emotional, it betrays the fact that truth cannot cohabit in the heart with lies about God and that there is an internal conflict being ignited by the light of truth.

Judgment will come to its full reality on a specific day in the future – there is no doubt about that. But what we must begin to see is that judgment also happens every day to some degree or another. And if we examine this message by Jesus to Nicodemus beyond just quoting the most familiar verse in the Bible while removing it from its context, we will begin to see how much we ourselves may be fearing exposure of our own deeds and beliefs of darkness. We may be ever so sincere in our insistence that we are followers of Jesus and are not afraid of the light of truth. But at the same time there are many areas in our lives where evidence emerges to the contrary: in our reactions to threats over our traditions and systems of religion, our practices or church policies that we fear being exposed. And especially we do not want our secret motives to be exposed; motives that if seen clearly would reveal that we are more interested in being seen as faithful Christians while in reality living for self.

One key part of this passage that often gets brushed over may be a pivotal point that is most important to grasp in this teaching. I am starting to believe that Jesus is speaking something vitally important that receives very little press in most of our discussions in religion.

But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God. (John 3:21) (see also 1 John 3:3-10)

I have been contemplating this passage for some time now and the more I meditate on it the more forceful this phrase emerges for me. The above verse is in direct contrast to the previous one where those who avoid the light live in fear that their deeds will be exposed. Yet we have a very difficult time receiving personally the core of this warning by Jesus because we find it to hard to accept that we might be among those called evil. That word 'evil' is such a strong term that we simply can's bring ourselves to be connected with it. We assume Jesus must be referring to other people 'out there' somewhere who are obviously more evil that we. This must be talking about people who are living in open antagonism to God – and of course enemies of ours as well. Yet we may be missing the very truth that might threaten to expose us personally, living in fear that our system of belief that keeps us so comfortable and assured of a spot in heaven might in heaven's view be evil.

The stronger reactions we have to such an implication the more likely it is to contain truth. Remember that it was not some outsider or Samaritan or Gentile that Jesus was speaking to here but it was a prominent, highly educated, pious leader of the most respectable and truth-filled religion on earth. Nicodemus was not even hostile toward Jesus like many of his other colleagues. He had come to visit with Jesus privately in order to possibly establish an opening by which Jesus' reputation might be improved and ways might be worked out to improve His acceptance with those in charge. Nicodemus had come with what he thought were generous motives; but the reaction of Jesus to his very first compliment seemed to be anything but willing to negotiate.

From our viewpoint we can easily judge Nicodemus rather harshly because we now know that Jesus had some vital truths to teach that Nicodemus had completely overlooked. And yet in most of our expositions on this passage and given the popularity that John 3:16 has achieved over the centuries, we still may find ourselves in even deeper deception about our condition of darkness than maybe even Nicodemus was in. We may be so vested in our own version of religion and our entrenched interpretations of this passage that if true light begins to shine from this passage threatening to expose our religious facade we have depended on for so long, we might just react worse than did Nicodemus.

When I compare verse 21 with the previous verse, it becomes evident that the opposite of deeds as being wrought in God must be deeds of evil that are not in God. At first that sounds rather simplistic or even confusing, but the implications of this contrast are enormous if I take them seriously.

What did Jesus really mean when He referred to deeds being wrought in God? I think the answer to that question should be freed from the immediate explanations we like to offer without serious study and reflection guided by conviction of the same Spirit Jesus spoke of to Nicodemus. Jesus told Nicodemus that the wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit. When we rely on pat explanations for this passage without allowing God's Spirit access to bring conviction of our own evil deeds to bear in our own hearts, we may be resisting the very nature of this Spirit that challenges status quo religion.

One of the first things that the Spirit convicts us of is the evil that the light of emerging truth about who God really is exposes. If we think about this logically it becomes rather plain. When God's goodness and love and the real truth about His character becomes more evident to us, anything that is unlike Him in ourselves or beliefs becomes exposed by default. Therefore, the actual definition for evil is simply anything that is not just like God, or what the Bible terms ungodliness.

We tend to move the idea of evil away from ourselves to only refer to people whom we feel are openly wicked, that we view as a threat to us or society, who are obviously people we don't want to be around us. Yet because of the amazing power of sin to deceive, only as we become willing to be honest can God reveal that there is far more evil within us that we have ever supposed. If evil is anything that is not like God's character, one very effective way we have developed to mask the evil within us is to insist that God is actually more like us than what Jesus revealed. Thus the difference between God and our life becomes less sharp and there is less that we need to adjust in us to become like our altered concept of Him.

How diabolical this insidious deception is for each one of us. Because we water down the clear, pure holiness of God with assertions about Him and His ways that minimize the contrast between us, we come to worship a God who is partially of our own making while believing we are in the light. Yet the God we often worship is actually a composite god made from our doctrines and denominational traditions and cultural preferences – little different than what the Jews had done by the time of Jesus. And now we have become so vested in our version of God that we resist any threat from any new light of truth about Him that might expose the fraud contaminating many of our teachings. We too often attack the messengers rather than honestly face conviction that maybe our own fundamental beliefs about reality might be part of our veil of darkness.

Are we really that much different from the mentality of the Taliban who views educated women as a threat to their system of institutionalized abuse and suppression of women for their own selfish exploitation? Maybe on this one issue we may not have yet arrived at that extreme. But at the same time it may be exposed by the Light that many of our arguments over the status of women in our own church might be similar to Muslim's prejudices than we are willing to admit. It may seem easy for us to point to the extremist stance and actions of the Taliban and call them wicked and evil. But in doing so might we someday discover than in our rush to judge them we may actually be implicating our own evil without realizing it? (study Romans 1:18 through 2:16)

But beyond even the issue of women's status or labels in our society, there are many other areas of deeply entrenched prejudices that may be hidden in darkness that the Spirit of God desires to expose for our eternal welfare. Do we find ourselves resisting light because of fear we will be found to be living life apart from full submission 'in God'? Do we really know what it means to live 'in Christ', or are we satisfied to just have pat theological explanations for this phrase that does not threaten our status quo or make us feel too exposed?

Judgment comes to everyone sooner or later. That is a fact that is unavoidable and we must embrace it if we want to live in the light of real truth. The next question that emerges here in this teaching of Jesus to Nicodemus is this: When are we going to be willing to be exposed by our own choice? Are we going to voluntarily come to the light to face becoming exposed in areas of our heart and our beliefs that we cherish as fundamental truth and fear challenge? Are we clinging to beliefs about truth that we refuse to have challenged because we believe we have studied them so thoroughly and can prove them conclusively that we are unwilling to allow any more light to upset or threaten our foundations?

The sins of some men are quite evident, going before them to judgment; for others, their sins follow after. Likewise also, deeds that are good are quite evident, and those which are otherwise cannot be concealed. (1 Timothy 5:24-25)

This is another very important text regarding judgment but has been very misunderstood by many. But let me ask some questions here. Are we willing to allow our sins to become exposed by the light of truth through convictions by the Spirit of truth that will make them more evident? Are we willing to enter into this exposure of judgment now voluntarily instead of putting off that exposure until our sins have to follow us all the way to the final day of Judgment, of full exposure?

I believe we must come to grips with the truth that it is our choices now that determines whether we will submit to being exposed now to the Light that always brings judgment, Light that exposes the hidden things lurking inside of our hearts. We can choose to come to the light now while we still have time and capacity to be healed and transformed into the true image of God; or we can continue to hide from the light, resist its exposure and discover too late that it will crush out our lives on the great day of Judgment after we have lost all ability to respond to the healing power inherent in the love of God that could have healed us before while we had a chance.

Wisdom says that it makes more sense to submit to exposure of judgment now, even to embrace it fully in order to avoid eternal loss in the future. But not only does choosing judgment now benefit our future life but the Light that brings judgment also brings into our lives the benefits of eternal life even here and now. That is the message I throughout these passages. God longs to expose what we are trying to hide in darkness in order to set us free, to deliver us from lies about Him and the effects of sin that ruins our lives; for He longs for us to not perish but to enter into eternal life even now.

This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. (John 17:3)

And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. (1 John 5:20)

Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth. We will know by this that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart before Him. (1 John 3:18-19)

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. (1 John 4:7-8, 20)