walk in the light

“As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him…”

Acts 9:3

There’s never been a time where the things of God were not somewhere in my sphere of knowing. From a young age my desire was to please Him who sent his Son for my sins and to do what was right in his sight. I was a good kid and I liked to obey the rules. I felt safe meeting standards. It felt good to be good. 

But unbeknownst to me, sin was already crouching at the door. I was uniting my heart with a lie and weaving my identity with death. For perhaps it is the most dangerous thing in the world to believe this: that I am good. 

It became the material I built my life with. 

Deception will cover you with a blanket of sweet warmth. Once entrenched, you’ll do almost anything to stay covered, lest your body be exposed to discomfort…even the discomfort of truth. 

I clung to this lie. I became blind to it and I was like those who “flatter themselves too much to see their sin” (Psalm 36:2).

God was good. I did life well. Why look too deeply?

I had no idea the darkness I was walking in. I had no idea how near along the precipice I teetered. I had no idea that the ground on which I stood was beginning to crumble beneath my very feet.

But dealing with darkness is Jesus’ specialty;  to him, even darkness is as light. Healing the blind is what he came to do.

One Sunday morning, my husband and I were en route to church (the kids were young and in the back seat). I turned to my husband with a furrowed brow, tripping over the thought that was gnawing at my mind.  “I don’t think I understand the cross…” 

Having been a Christian my whole life, it felt odd to say. I should probably understand the cross. After all, I had heard about it ever since I could remember— from Sunday school to sermon after sermon.


You see, I had understood with my mind but had not fully grasped it with my heart. The truth is I didn’t know a thing about what it meant to be saved. 

You see, I had understood with my mind but had not fully grasped it with my heart. The truth is I didn’t know a thing about what it meant to be saved. 

I didn’t know what it meant because I had never needed to. I was my own saviour through my own goodness and works, my own righteousness. That lie—I am a good person, a good student, a good kid—had so warped my thinking that I had no idea, despite hearing it from a young age, that I needed a saviour. That lie had kept me wrapped up cozy, ensuring that I never needed to meet my sin-stained heart or the One that had cleansed it.

I was lost and I could not find my way.

This lack of understanding, oh, it gnawed at me for some while. It bothered me immensely. I could tell I was missing something. I wanted to know what Jesus’ sacrifice meant from a deep place in my heart and not just as a fact memorized. 

My heart cried in prayer—Lord, show me what I am missing!

And then he did.

My whole life I had been chasing the sunshine. 

But I met him in the storm. 

I was a house and he was the hurricane. He shattered the murky windows that I had viewed myself through and replaced them with a new way to see. He exposed weak structures. He blew away the pretty siding and trellis, the white painted picket fences I had constructed that looked good from afar but were rotted up close.  He tore it all down until it was only me and him. 

Me as I was and him as He is. 

Oh, It hurt. 

I had never felt so broken.

I had never felt so loved. 

He exposed me to who I was so I could know who he was and why he died for me. 

He exposed my sin to reveal his righteousness and mercy.

He exposed my weakness to reveal his strength.

He exposed the lie to reveal the truth. 

I once believed I was good.

I now know that I am not, but for him.

Is it possible that there are others like I was? Are there others here who have grown up in the church from infancy and heard week after week about Jesus on the cross but have never actually met their sin face to face because it has been shrouded by their own goodness? Veiled by dormant lies deep within our hearts? How can we love the Saviour if we don’t know the things for which we’ve been forgiven? (Luke 7:47)

Have you ever asked the Lord to show you?  

I believe this is a prayer the Lord answers readily.

Will you let him expose your heart so that you can know Him and be known by him? 

Let his light shine on you.  Even though it hurts, come awake!  

After the storm we may walk with a limp, but friend, we will walk in the Light. 

I’m a barefoot, book-in-hand, outdoors kind-of gal … I love reading the Bible and am passionate about sharing what God teaches me through His word as I, by His grace, follow my Shepherd home to that city I can settle in. Read more