Your Deliverance – Walking in the Light being Cleansed ~ blog

We read some incredible words at the beginning of the Apostle John’s first letter. These words were the foundation on which I started 180 Ministries. They are so clear and so true and have been proven out in my life and the lives of thousands of other Christians. They are as true for you as they are for me…not to mention every Christian who has ever lived. Here they are;

“…what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed, our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. These things we write, so that our joy may be made complete.”

In 1 John 1:3-4, we find the word “FELLOWSHIP”. That word is only used 11 times in the entire Bible and 4 of the 11 are found in this passage and with verses that follow;

“This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.”

Fellowship is kind of a word that gets tossed around in Christian circles that has really lost its meaning. I think in every Baptist church I served in ministry they had a Fellowship Hall. As if inside that room was where fellowship took place. Then there would be a worship center, a prayer room, a youth center…you get the idea.

As a result, one might draw the conclusion that fellowship happens in that room but not elsewhere. Therefore, Fellowship almost always involves eating and having fun together. Actually eating, playing games, and even having talent shows are events where fellowship can happen. But fellowship is far more than that. In fact, no matter how many times you meet in Fellowship hall there is no guarantee that real fellowship is taking place.

What John is trying to tell us is that fellowship is describing our relationship both with God and one another. It is a connection that Christian believers can share in that we are all born-again into the same family. We are brothers and sisters in Christ. So, John is wanting to tell them something extremely important about all of them having fellowship with one another as we have fellowship with the Father and the Son.

Our fellowship with the Father and Son is automatic. Because they know everything there is to know about us. They know everything we have thought, done, and said. There is nothing hidden from the Father and the Son and amazingly they have always loved us, are loving us know, and will love us forever.

What John is trying to say is that just as we have fellowship with the Father and the Son, we should also be having fellowship with one another. And we have fellowship with the Father and Son because there is no darkness between us. God is light and knows all things so we have continuous fellowship with Them because nothing we do, think, or say is hidden from them.

But having fellowship with one another…not so much!!! It all comes down to walking in the light. If we are thinking we have having fellowship with God and yet are living in sin we are lying to ourselves and our fellowship with Him is interrupted. We still have our relationship with God but there is a disturbance in the force R2D2. Our relationship with the Father and Son is eternal but our day to day fellowship with them is strained.

Now, notice what he says happens to us and those around us if we are not walking in the light but instead are walking in darkness. We are living a lie and are not telling the truth. It does not separate us from God…but it separates us from one another. We are wearing masks and pretending to be solid Christian believers when in reality we are looking at porn and masturbating perhaps daily. We do not dare tell anyone because they would reject us.

However, John says that if we walk in the light…being honest with our brothers and sisters, then we can have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Christ is continuously cleansing us from our sins.

But you may say…I thought all of our sins were forever forgiven. Yes, that is true however I believe we can be forgiven of all our sins and not be cleansed from our sins. Yes, Christ paid the penalty for all our sins and they are all forgiven. But if we keep rolling around in the mud we do not need more forgiveness. We need to be cleansed.

Now, this is a very important insight that I have just recently been learning. Forgiveness has been given as the free gift of God’s grace because of the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross. So, I can be completely forgiven but still in my day-to-day life need to be being cleansed. I need to be walking in the light, telling the truth, confessing my sins to God so that I can not only have fellowship with God…BUT WE CAN ALSO HAVE FELLOWSHIP WITH ONE ANOTHER.

But we do not do that because of guilt, fear, and shame. So, we know the truth, God knows the truth, but others do not, and they think we are better than we really are. The only problem is that eventually, when we continue living a secret life…we are still forgiven but we need to be cleansed and quite frankly we begin to stink.

I do not know about you but if I am not taking a shower almost every day…I begin to stink. The more I work caring for the yard and organizing the garage the more I stink. There are deodorants that can mask the stink for a while but come bedtime my wife wants no cuddling with a stinky husband.

Nobody wants to be near stink or stinky people. They can dress up all they want with nice fancy clothes. They can look great and seem like they have it all together. But if you try to get close to them, they back away, make excuses, tell lies hoping to cover up their stink.

What happens, and I see it all the time…stinky people isolate. But as time passes the ever-growing stink drives them deeper into darkness and they do not have fellowship with anyone…even their own wife, family, and friends.

The solution…walk in the light. Find someone or a group of people with whom you can be completely honest. Where you can confess your sins and experience the cleansing that comes with it.

Quite frankly that is why we have Online Support Teams where men are getting cleansed and their lives can begin to return to normal and even begin to experience fellowship. They no longer are remaining isolated and their reading on the Stink Scale is decreasing.

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