The darkness makes both good things appear to be evil and evil things appear to be good, because the darkness conceals the truth about everything.
Evil things that could be killing us, hindering honest relationships with our friends and family, and shaming us from the presence of God become secret stashes of pleasure and personal gratification in the dark. But darkness condemns everything (not just what is evil). What is perfectly innocent and permissible is treated as immoral when we conceal it in the darkness because it isn’t “spiritual.”
The darkness brings slavery in both the form of legalism and sin (read Galatians 5). In the dark we mutilate ourselves by protecting what is hurting us, but we also hide, in shame, the beautiful things that make us human (human in a good way, human as in alive, human as in what God smiled upon when he made us).
The good news about Jesus is that he shines through the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish him (John 1:5).
If we would walk into the light, where he is, our sin would no longer enslave us by pretending friendship. If we were in his light, our humanity would no longer shame us by pretending to be unspiritual at the hands of legalism.
I’m in way over my head, trying to say anything clear about this subject, but I think it’s important because I’ve seen too many miserable people trying to be free but never leaving the darkness, or trying to be religious and never leaving the darkness, and it’s just sad.
The chapter called Angels and Animals in Rob Bells book, Sex God deals with this issue in a somewhat different way. It’s worth reading.
Posted by The Millers 