For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
Everyone who practices evil hates the light and will not come to it, staying away lest his deeds be exposed and reproved. The light is Christ Himself, the Light of the world in whom alone there is light and life, and it is also God's Word and its truth and gospel message. Loving darkness rather than light because deeds are evil is itself the condemnation, and the light brought to the understanding judges those who neglect or turn away from it. Sinners turn away because they love an indulgence God's Word condemns and fear exposure of sins they are unwilling to forsake, wanting no change of practice and no reproof. Coming to the light means humble repentance and being born again with the heart examined and confessed and transformed into Christ's likeness, while refusing it hardens the heart and blinds the eyes until conviction is stifled.
Words and Setting
Everyone who does evil hates the light and stays away from it and will not come to it, because he does not want his deeds to be exposed and reproved. The hatred is for exposure itself, and the avoidance is deliberate, lest wrongdoing be brought to view and rebuked.
The words were spoken by Christ to Nicodemus in a secret nighttime interview as Christ's own testimony concerning righteousness and truth. They brought him into contact with all light and gave him practical truth to carry away. John the Baptist's testimony that He who comes from above is above all is almost the counterpart to this testimony to Nicodemus, testifying to Jesus' superiority as the Promised One and identifying John's cause fully with Christ.
In its immediate setting the verse explains the condemnation, that light has come into the world and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. It stands contrasted with he who does truth coming to the light, that his deeds may be seen and made manifest as wrought in God. It belongs with God giving His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life and through Him may be saved. That giving is the unmistakable expression of the Father's love in giving His sinless Son for the redemption of the fallen race, the Innocent bearing the chastisement of the guilty and God's wrath for transgression, to make known His love for mankind and His desire to lead men to obey His precepts and bring them back to allegiance to God. Life itself is a manifestation of that love and a costly talent committed by God, measured by the sacrifice of God's Son, because human beings are His by creation and doubly His by redemption, deriving life from Him as Creator and Source of all life and Author of the higher life He desires for beings formed in His image. The Son was sent not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved, so that he who believes is not condemned and he who believes not is condemned already for not believing in the name of the only begotten Son of God. The same teaching is connected with the Son of man being lifted up as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness.
Light and Darkness
The light hated and avoided by everyone who does evil is Christ Himself, the Light of the world and the world's light, bright and shining with no darkness at all. He came to reveal God, and to bring light and life, with peace and joy and deliverance from the power of evil, and apart from Him there is no light at all. Those who cling to wickedness resist that revelation, refusing to come to Him because they do not want their deeds exposed and reproved, which brings condemnation. Rejecting Him is turning from infinite truth and love and righteousness and closing the heart to heavenly light, bringing darkness and despair, while receiving Him draws the soul to His purity and goodness and moves it to follow His example. The Pharisees rejected this light and knowledge because His teaching did not come as they expected, and by that rejection closed the way to salvation and severed their connection with Him. The priests hated Jesus and felt no pity at His suffering because as the Light He exposed their darkness and error and made their deeds plain. Those who have the history of Christ and the testimony of His followers have greater light than the Jews who rejected Him and are therefore more responsible for rejecting Him.
The light is also God's Word and its truth, the standard to which every soul must be brought up, the gospel and saving message, and the truth as it is in Jesus. The final trial is by what God does say, not by what is imagined He ought to say, so rejecting what He speaks through His delegated servants because it does not coincide with past work and preconceived opinions, and refusing to yield one's own way, is choosing darkness to avoid reproof. Iniquity clouds spiritual vision, so those who cherish evil do not welcome this light of truth, fail to value it, see it as distorted, and turn away rather than diligently seeking to understand it. Error loves darkness and refuses to come to the light, while God's Word invites and challenges full investigation and is to be searched so that men may fully investigate God's claims and understand His will. Coming to the light therefore means examining Scripture openly and humbly, searching it and comparing Scripture with Scripture, since resisting truth by criticizing it and refusing to hear or investigate it is hating the light lest deeds be reproved. Accepting that gospel message brings good deeds that are seen as done in God, with the gift of God offering eternal life, while at the final judgment people are judged according to their deeds and those who refuse this gift have no excuse.
The light functions by making hidden evil visible, exposing sinful indulgences and corruption hidden beneath a respectable appearance. It uncovers impurity and selfish motives and hostility toward God beneath an apparently upright life, so that as the purity of Christ is seen, sin and defects become painfully clear. God sends this light to reveal a person's true condition and danger and need for a holy life and a new heart and Christ as Saviour, and to show the way to recover through Christ the likeness lost by sin. Those whose works are not done in God refuse to come where their actions will be revealed, and refusing to walk in the light sent shows a preference for darkness and a desire to avoid reproof.
That light from heaven comes through God's messengers and delegated servants, through faithful preachers and defenders of truth who openly rebuke sin, and through the righteous lives of God's servants that reflect it more clearly. Refusing it after receiving a knowledge of the truth is turning from great light and choosing darkness. Those who exalt self and reject God's truth show their hatred of the light when they despise faithful preachers, and those who refuse to obey the truth resist others who obey it because the faithful way of life shines against sin and error and continually reproves the unbelieving and disobedient. Cain's hatred of Abel illustrates this, for Abel's righteous life and defense of God's goodness exposed Cain's wrongdoing, so Cain killed him, showing that the clearer the light reflected by God's faithful servants the more plainly the ungodly see their sins and the more fiercely they may try to destroy those who reprove them.
Condemnation and Judgment
Loving darkness rather than light because deeds are evil is itself the condemnation, for everyone who practices evil hates the light and stays away from it so that wrong deeds will not be exposed and reproved. This is Christ's own testimony concerning righteousness and truth, belonging to the unmistakable expression of the Father's love in giving His sinless only begotten Son for the redemption of the fallen race, the Innocent bearing the chastisement of the guilty and God's wrath for transgression to make known His love and His desire to lead men to obey His precepts and bring them back to allegiance. It is true even among professed believers associated together in church capacity, where not all have the truth, not all are obedient to the commandments, and many are backsliders who have not followed on to know the Lord and discerned the intensity of the love God has for every soul. The light a person receives judges and condemns when it is neglected or turned away from, so people are accountable for how they respond to light brought to their understanding, and those who disregard and disobey the light God has given will be condemned by it. The light of truth reveals whether works are done in God, and many professed followers refuse to come to it since their works will not withstand its test.
Sin is guilt, not misfortune, and a person is a sinner by deliberate choice, not by circumstances, education, or temperament. Hating the light and staying away to avoid exposure is the condemnation, and it leaves no excuse in the judgment for not giving God the heart and the best and holiest affections. Using the falls of professed believers into sin to excuse neglect to act on admitted truth and light only covers the conscience for now and cannot be offered to the Maker, the Judge of all the world, but is reasoning on Satan's side. Closing the eyes to the light does not make faults less grievous or lessen accountability, for rejecting reproof calls for no reform and leaves the person unchanged, and those who indulge in sin and shut their eyes to avoid forsaking cherished sins, or through indulgence of baser passions, still choose darkness rather than light and remain responsible and guilty.
At the final judgment people are judged according to their deeds, and the light belongs to the gospel message where accepting it brings good deeds done in God and the gift of God offers eternal life, so those who refuse this gift have no excuse. Everyone who has had light and evidence but refuses the light will receive sentence of death in the judgment. Refusing the light means denying the Holy Spirit's leading, making light of the Holy Spirit, blaspheming God, calling the working of His Spirit a delusion, and choosing to be led by an unseen agency of evil and to stand under satanic influences rather than be convinced. Like the Jews, evildoers hate the light and will not come to it so their evil deeds will not be exposed and rebuked, choosing darkness rather than light, and because the given light is refused their eyes are blinded and their hearts are hardened. They reject truth and its reproofs, sometimes because accepting it would require a change of practice or a cross, and the light received increases accountability so that rejection of greater light brings greater retribution.
Each person's response to Christ reveals inner purposes and where he stands, and in responding to Him each person passes judgment on himself. Those devoted to self reject the truth and avoid the light, while those who listen to the Holy Spirit are drawn to Christ.
Why Sinners Turn Away
Sinners stay away from the light because they love some indulgence condemned by God's Word and fear exposure of sins they are unwilling to give up, preferring darkness to a change of practice or the bearing of a cross. Indulgence of baser passions and iniquity clouds spiritual vision, so truth as it is in Jesus is not valued but looks distorted and is turned from instead of being diligently sought. The light received increases accountability, so choosing darkness does not lessen guilt and rejection of greater light brings greater retribution.
Avoidance shows hatred of reproof and correction and no desire to be told of errors and sins, with self-righteous hearts refusing to see themselves as God sees them. When truth is presented with freshness and exalted, hearts that are loved and sought for salvation can become determined to resist rather than be reproved and corrected. Sin kept hidden and entertained in the heart defiles it and resists any verdict against wrongdoing, and the first evidence of amendment is to acknowledge the sin.
Refusal does not come merely from lack of arguments, for those who do not love the light return to the same objections even after they have been answered because they do not want darkness and error exposed and removed. Those set against the Sabbath commandment are like the Jews who rejected Jesus as Messiah, whom even great miracles or a message from heaven would not persuade because they had chosen darkness rather than light and would call such a message satanic. Repeating arguments to silence such objectors does not change them, since the trouble is refusal of light rather than want of evidence.
The Jews fulfilled this by rejecting Christ rather than coming to Him for life, because they did not want to see their sin clearly and His teaching revealed their sins. By refusing light and correction despite powerful evidence of His Messiahship, their hatred grew with the light until they became self-deceived enough to think killing Him and crucifying Him was service to God. They also despised Him in the person of His messengers because He was not the Christ they had looked for, asking Who is this, Is not this Joseph's son, and the same fulfillment comes when the religious world now rejects the message for today because the agencies God sends are not what men expected or understood. Christ's goodness exposed their self-righteousness though they could point to no wrong act in His life, and shutting eyes and conscience to the light hardened them in choosing darkness.
The same pattern appeared in the Pharisees, who rejected Christ the light of the world because His teaching did not come as they expected, and by rejecting the light and knowledge He offered closed the way to salvation and severed connection with Him. The priests hated Jesus as the Light exposing their darkness and error, which is why they felt no pity at His suffering when His light made their deeds plain. Herod had nearly become John the Baptist's disciple but rejected truth after conviction and grew so hardened that his sins seemed trivial, showing that turning from the Spirit of truth leads into deeper darkness and moral decline. Cain's hatred of Abel shows the same law, for Abel's righteous life and defense of God's goodness exposed Cain's wrongdoing so Cain killed him, proving the clearer the light reflected by faithful servants the more plainly the ungodly see their sins and the more fiercely they may attack those who reprove them.
Papist leaders hated the light of Scripture because it would have revealed their sins and wrongdoing. With God's law removed as the standard of righteousness they exercised power without limit and practiced vice without restraint.
Rejecting the light leaves people captive to Satan, who makes them see light as darkness and good as evil and evil as good. In that darkened state men at ease love error because it agrees with the carnal heart, take it for granted as clear, and cannot see where truth had the advantage so as to settle that error is truth, while evil angels are deeply interested in keeping darkness, error, and doubt over truth. Resisting God's light thus leads people to call truth and the work of the Holy Spirit darkness, fanaticism, or error. Turning from clear warnings and truth for darkness is linked with accepting deceptive satanic falsehoods.
Coming to the Light
Coming to the light means humble, thorough repentance, dying to self and being crucified to self, so that the life shows the truth has done its good work in consistent life and godly conversation. It means honestly examining heart, motives, temper, speech, and conduct, comparing life with God's law and Christ's example, openly facing wrongs and confessing them, taking a decisive stand for what is right through thorough work wrought by the Holy Spirit that breaks Satan's hold and glorifies the Lord. It means hearing the Saviour's voice when He is present among His people, humbling the heart before God, and receiving the Holy Spirit when plain evidence is given, refusing to keep one's own citizen's dress instead of the robe of Christ's righteousness.
The verse shows why every man, woman, and child must be born again, with natural traits, temperament, and disposition transformed into Christ's likeness, or they cannot enter and be welcomed into the kingdom of heaven. The chapter belongs especially to those who have not been born again, and those who have light are to walk in it as Christ is in the light. This need is illustrated by Nicodemus, who was confident his moral character was correct and felt no need to humble himself before God, flattering himself that he was righteous. Entering into life requires renouncing one's own righteousness and depending wholly on Christ and His imputed righteousness instead of relying on self and staying from the light.
A life changed by Christ does not hate or refuse this light but accepts and rejoices in the truth that reveals sin. Those who receive Him are drawn to His purity and goodness and seek to follow His example rather than choosing darkness rather than the Saviour. Receiving the light of God's Word reveals character faults, and walking in that light allows people to be changed and to grow in grace and knowledge of Christ.
Refusing to come leaves the heart unsubdued, without repentance and its fruit, because when God's Word brings reproof the unsubdued heart seeks excuses and attacks the message or messenger rather than admitting and correcting wrongs, though reproofs and appeals are meant to bring sanctification. It leaves character spotted over with imperfections, sin, and corruption and found wanting in the day of God, with sensibilities benumbed and blunted by sin and wrong, conscience seared, and sacred things dragged down to a level with common things. It defiles the soul, and those who have received all the evidence that will ever be given, hearing truth spoken in demonstration of the Spirit yet hating the light, tempt God, enter dark secret paths, and stumble to ruin. Reproof then becomes a stumbling block, and those who keep rejecting offered mercy and truth are left unrestrained to continue downward, with conscience and moral sense hardened until one once convicted by the Spirit of truth can become capable of terrible crimes.
Continued resistance hardens in proportion to unbelief, for resisting and contemptuously rejecting the light God gives deepens darkness, and because given light is refused eyes are blinded and hearts are hardened. Those able to yield but choosing not to stifle conviction and oppose those carrying God's message, as the Jewish rulers saw their guilt through the Spirit's evidence yet kept rejecting it until repeated resistance hardened opposition and led away from salvation. Refusing the light means denying the Holy Spirit's leading, making light of the Holy Spirit, blaspheming God, calling His Spirit's working delusion, and choosing to be led by an unseen agency of evil under satanic influence rather than be convinced, and all who have had light and evidence yet refuse it will receive sentence of death in the judgment. God's wrath falls not merely because people have sinned, but because they keep on resisting despite the light and evidence given, with the Spirit of God departing from some never to return.
A person's response can also depend on how and under what circumstances truth is presented, for a fair opportunity to weigh arguments and compare Scripture with Scripture may reveal its clarity and win acceptance. One may fail to receive truth because it is presented without fair chance to weigh and compare, while presented clearly and appropriately it may win him. The need is not learning nor controversy but truth and a new heart, for until the heart is changed reasoning about points of difference produces no saving result but strengthens resistance. Therefore workers dealing with awakened yet held souls like Nicodemus, to whom Christ gave new light bringing into contact with all light and practical truth to carry away, are to avoid controversy over false theories and keep to the affirmative presenting Christ's truth.
Warning to the Church
Even among professed believers joined together in church capacity, not all have the truth and not all are obedient to all the commandments, and many are backsliders who have not followed on to know the Lord. Their shrinking from light proves love of darkness rather than light because deeds are evil, and it keeps them from discerning the intensity of God's love for every soul. The remedy is to follow on to know the Lord step by step, for He is leading and will give increased light, while those who refuse the light by choosing their own way reject His way.
The same principle applies to the church when it refuses to search Scripture or listen to truth rather than face correction of its works. Its preference for worldly customs and approval helps it deceive itself about its standing with God. Some would keep the church from seeing clearly by resisting the wisdom and grace that reveal sin under any guise, whereas the eye-salve of Christ gives understanding to discern good from evil and see sin clearly. Even after light had been given, some responsible men chose darkness, using worldly methods and supporting wrongdoing rather than taking a clear stand for what was right.
Those who have no desire to read the testimonies do so because the very sins of which they are guilty are specified there. Those who from youth have received warning and reproof yet do not walk in the light by reforming, but still indulge the same sins and keep the same defects of character, fulfill the same avoidance. This refusal to be corrected by individual members, especially leaders of the flock, mars the work of God, makes its impress upon the churches, and prevents the work of setting the churches in order. Coming to the light means hearing the Saviour's voice, humbling the heart before God, and receiving the Holy Spirit when plain evidence is given with Christ present among His people, while turning away means refusing to hear, refusing to humble, refusing the robe of Christ's righteousness and keeping one's own dress, growing harder and more unimpressible, cultivating unbelief and strengthening resistance. At the last General Conference men fulfilled this turning away by turning a deaf ear to Christ's message of mercy, placing themselves in a fortress of unbelief and in opposition to Christ, disloyal to truth, failing to honor and glorify God, and working to make the testimonies God gave His people appear unreliable.
Condemning brethren and magnifying their imperfections is contrary to Christ, who came to a marred and impure world to heal imperfection and save the lost, since God sent His Son not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved, with the believer not condemned and the unbeliever condemned already for not believing in the only begotten Son of God. Instead His example is to be followed in seeking to save souls. Those who have lived in sin but accept the truth in penitence may be in a better position to develop Christian character than people given great light who fail to use it and remain in darkness by neglecting the light and opportunities God gives them. Christ treats the penitent with tenderness but denounces hypocrisy and vain pretense.
Those deceived by the enemy are unwilling to receive correction or come to the light, following their own judgment instead of heeding God's voice, while unbelief and skepticism take the place of faith. By contrast, God is willing to pardon those who turn to Him with penitence and faith. Following an evil course and refusing to come to the light means resisting the messages of warning and reproof sent for guidance. Refusing counsel and warning rather than admitting possible error is a refusal to come to the light that leaves a person resistant to correction. When God's Word brings reproof, an unsubdued heart and unsubdued will seeks excuses and refuge, attacks the message or messenger and finds fault with them and dismisses divine authority rather than admitting wrong, correcting wrongs, and repenting, and this refusal keeps the heart from being subdued, repenting, and bearing fruit of repentance, though the light's reproofs and appeals are meant to bring sanctification. Such ridicule and opposition from pride that will not confess reveals a spirit unlike God's.
Rejecting light after receiving the evidence leaves people choosing darkness and heading toward ruin, and refusing the truth and hating the light also obstructs others from receiving it. Those who have received all the evidence that will ever be given, who have heard truth spoken in demonstration of the Spirit, yet refuse to accept the message and hate the light, tempt God and reject light, enter dark secret paths, and continue to stumble to ruin with the Spirit departing, some never to return. By interposing themselves between heaven-sent light and the people they become parties to the ruin of souls, trampling upon the Word of God and doing despite to His Holy Spirit. Those who refuse to obey the truth resist others who obey it, since the faithful way of life shines against sin and error and continually reproves the unbelieving and disobedient.
Those who refuse in loyalty to God to obey His holy commandments choose darkness over light and therefore remain ignorant of divine things and cannot correctly explain the central gospel truth of Christ crucified as the great atonement for sin, even though that truth is plainly and decidedly revealed in God's Word. Those who have set themselves against the Sabbath commandment are like those who rejected Jesus as Messiah: even great miracles, or a message from heaven, would not persuade them, because they have chosen darkness rather than light and would call such a message satanic. In the last days, those who reject the light are warned not to be found among the transgressors of God's law, for error hates the light and avoids it because the light exposes and reproves its deeds. Those who knowingly reject given light choose darkness, and the darkness grows more intense, as with those who disregard instruction about health reform. People who know the light yet understand the laws of health but continue violating them for popular or sensual indulgences, excusing themselves because change is inconvenient or makes them singular, prefer darkness to light, and their refusal to act on knowledge makes them accountable for resulting suffering and for the harmful example leading others into the same course.
Choosing the company of people who reject God's light is perilous, for those who love darkness rather than light refuse to come to the light because they do not want deeds exposed and corrected. Christians are warned against choosing close friends who reject God and love darkness rather than light, and should seek the company of those who love God and obey His commandments. God can sustain those placed in difficult settings, as He did Joseph and Daniel, but Christians should not deliberately choose associations that draw them away from light.
Set beside God's love in giving His only begotten Son so that whoever believes will not perish but have everlasting life, and beside Christ dying the Just for the unjust to bring us to God, parents dealing with children as a reproduction of themselves are called to examine themselves, to submit way and will to God, and to seek wisdom, patience, kindness, and love in restraint and discipline rather than acting in anger. Nicodemus illustrates the opposite of avoidance: he received Christ's lesson, became a believer, and defended Him before the council, while his fellow rulers answered with scorn. Edith is noted as one not knowing how to come to the light, where doing evil is joined with hating the light and avoiding it so deeds will not be exposed.
Everyone who practices evil hates the light and will not come to it, staying away lest his deeds be exposed and reproved. The light is Christ Himself, the Light of the world in whom alone there is light and life, and it is also God's Word and its truth and gospel message. Loving darkness rather than light because deeds are evil is itself the condemnation, and the light brought to the understanding judges those who neglect or turn away from it. Sinners turn away because they love an indulgence God's Word condemns and fear exposure of sins they are unwilling to forsake, wanting no change of practice and no reproof. Coming to the light means humble repentance and being born again with the heart examined and confessed and transformed into Christ's likeness, while refusing it hardens the heart and blinds the eyes until conviction is stifled.
Words and Setting
Everyone who does evil hates the light and stays away from it and will not come to it, because he does not want his deeds to be exposed and reproved. The hatred is for exposure itself, and the avoidance is deliberate, lest wrongdoing be brought to view and rebuked.
The words were spoken by Christ to Nicodemus in a secret nighttime interview as Christ's own testimony concerning righteousness and truth. They brought him into contact with all light and gave him practical truth to carry away. John the Baptist's testimony that He who comes from above is above all is almost the counterpart to this testimony to Nicodemus, testifying to Jesus' superiority as the Promised One and identifying John's cause fully with Christ.
In its immediate setting the verse explains the condemnation, that light has come into the world and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. It stands contrasted with he who does truth coming to the light, that his deeds may be seen and made manifest as wrought in God. It belongs with God giving His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life and through Him may be saved. That giving is the unmistakable expression of the Father's love in giving His sinless Son for the redemption of the fallen race, the Innocent bearing the chastisement of the guilty and God's wrath for transgression, to make known His love for mankind and His desire to lead men to obey His precepts and bring them back to allegiance to God. Life itself is a manifestation of that love and a costly talent committed by God, measured by the sacrifice of God's Son, because human beings are His by creation and doubly His by redemption, deriving life from Him as Creator and Source of all life and Author of the higher life He desires for beings formed in His image. The Son was sent not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved, so that he who believes is not condemned and he who believes not is condemned already for not believing in the name of the only begotten Son of God. The same teaching is connected with the Son of man being lifted up as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness.
Light and Darkness
The light hated and avoided by everyone who does evil is Christ Himself, the Light of the world and the world's light, bright and shining with no darkness at all. He came to reveal God, and to bring light and life, with peace and joy and deliverance from the power of evil, and apart from Him there is no light at all. Those who cling to wickedness resist that revelation, refusing to come to Him because they do not want their deeds exposed and reproved, which brings condemnation. Rejecting Him is turning from infinite truth and love and righteousness and closing the heart to heavenly light, bringing darkness and despair, while receiving Him draws the soul to His purity and goodness and moves it to follow His example. The Pharisees rejected this light and knowledge because His teaching did not come as they expected, and by that rejection closed the way to salvation and severed their connection with Him. The priests hated Jesus and felt no pity at His suffering because as the Light He exposed their darkness and error and made their deeds plain. Those who have the history of Christ and the testimony of His followers have greater light than the Jews who rejected Him and are therefore more responsible for rejecting Him.
The light is also God's Word and its truth, the standard to which every soul must be brought up, the gospel and saving message, and the truth as it is in Jesus. The final trial is by what God does say, not by what is imagined He ought to say, so rejecting what He speaks through His delegated servants because it does not coincide with past work and preconceived opinions, and refusing to yield one's own way, is choosing darkness to avoid reproof. Iniquity clouds spiritual vision, so those who cherish evil do not welcome this light of truth, fail to value it, see it as distorted, and turn away rather than diligently seeking to understand it. Error loves darkness and refuses to come to the light, while God's Word invites and challenges full investigation and is to be searched so that men may fully investigate God's claims and understand His will. Coming to the light therefore means examining Scripture openly and humbly, searching it and comparing Scripture with Scripture, since resisting truth by criticizing it and refusing to hear or investigate it is hating the light lest deeds be reproved. Accepting that gospel message brings good deeds that are seen as done in God, with the gift of God offering eternal life, while at the final judgment people are judged according to their deeds and those who refuse this gift have no excuse.
The light functions by making hidden evil visible, exposing sinful indulgences and corruption hidden beneath a respectable appearance. It uncovers impurity and selfish motives and hostility toward God beneath an apparently upright life, so that as the purity of Christ is seen, sin and defects become painfully clear. God sends this light to reveal a person's true condition and danger and need for a holy life and a new heart and Christ as Saviour, and to show the way to recover through Christ the likeness lost by sin. Those whose works are not done in God refuse to come where their actions will be revealed, and refusing to walk in the light sent shows a preference for darkness and a desire to avoid reproof.
That light from heaven comes through God's messengers and delegated servants, through faithful preachers and defenders of truth who openly rebuke sin, and through the righteous lives of God's servants that reflect it more clearly. Refusing it after receiving a knowledge of the truth is turning from great light and choosing darkness. Those who exalt self and reject God's truth show their hatred of the light when they despise faithful preachers, and those who refuse to obey the truth resist others who obey it because the faithful way of life shines against sin and error and continually reproves the unbelieving and disobedient. Cain's hatred of Abel illustrates this, for Abel's righteous life and defense of God's goodness exposed Cain's wrongdoing, so Cain killed him, showing that the clearer the light reflected by God's faithful servants the more plainly the ungodly see their sins and the more fiercely they may try to destroy those who reprove them.
Condemnation and Judgment
Loving darkness rather than light because deeds are evil is itself the condemnation, for everyone who practices evil hates the light and stays away from it so that wrong deeds will not be exposed and reproved. This is Christ's own testimony concerning righteousness and truth, belonging to the unmistakable expression of the Father's love in giving His sinless only begotten Son for the redemption of the fallen race, the Innocent bearing the chastisement of the guilty and God's wrath for transgression to make known His love and His desire to lead men to obey His precepts and bring them back to allegiance. It is true even among professed believers associated together in church capacity, where not all have the truth, not all are obedient to the commandments, and many are backsliders who have not followed on to know the Lord and discerned the intensity of the love God has for every soul. The light a person receives judges and condemns when it is neglected or turned away from, so people are accountable for how they respond to light brought to their understanding, and those who disregard and disobey the light God has given will be condemned by it. The light of truth reveals whether works are done in God, and many professed followers refuse to come to it since their works will not withstand its test.
Sin is guilt, not misfortune, and a person is a sinner by deliberate choice, not by circumstances, education, or temperament. Hating the light and staying away to avoid exposure is the condemnation, and it leaves no excuse in the judgment for not giving God the heart and the best and holiest affections. Using the falls of professed believers into sin to excuse neglect to act on admitted truth and light only covers the conscience for now and cannot be offered to the Maker, the Judge of all the world, but is reasoning on Satan's side. Closing the eyes to the light does not make faults less grievous or lessen accountability, for rejecting reproof calls for no reform and leaves the person unchanged, and those who indulge in sin and shut their eyes to avoid forsaking cherished sins, or through indulgence of baser passions, still choose darkness rather than light and remain responsible and guilty.
At the final judgment people are judged according to their deeds, and the light belongs to the gospel message where accepting it brings good deeds done in God and the gift of God offers eternal life, so those who refuse this gift have no excuse. Everyone who has had light and evidence but refuses the light will receive sentence of death in the judgment. Refusing the light means denying the Holy Spirit's leading, making light of the Holy Spirit, blaspheming God, calling the working of His Spirit a delusion, and choosing to be led by an unseen agency of evil and to stand under satanic influences rather than be convinced. Like the Jews, evildoers hate the light and will not come to it so their evil deeds will not be exposed and rebuked, choosing darkness rather than light, and because the given light is refused their eyes are blinded and their hearts are hardened. They reject truth and its reproofs, sometimes because accepting it would require a change of practice or a cross, and the light received increases accountability so that rejection of greater light brings greater retribution.
Each person's response to Christ reveals inner purposes and where he stands, and in responding to Him each person passes judgment on himself. Those devoted to self reject the truth and avoid the light, while those who listen to the Holy Spirit are drawn to Christ.
Why Sinners Turn Away
Sinners stay away from the light because they love some indulgence condemned by God's Word and fear exposure of sins they are unwilling to give up, preferring darkness to a change of practice or the bearing of a cross. Indulgence of baser passions and iniquity clouds spiritual vision, so truth as it is in Jesus is not valued but looks distorted and is turned from instead of being diligently sought. The light received increases accountability, so choosing darkness does not lessen guilt and rejection of greater light brings greater retribution.
Avoidance shows hatred of reproof and correction and no desire to be told of errors and sins, with self-righteous hearts refusing to see themselves as God sees them. When truth is presented with freshness and exalted, hearts that are loved and sought for salvation can become determined to resist rather than be reproved and corrected. Sin kept hidden and entertained in the heart defiles it and resists any verdict against wrongdoing, and the first evidence of amendment is to acknowledge the sin.
Refusal does not come merely from lack of arguments, for those who do not love the light return to the same objections even after they have been answered because they do not want darkness and error exposed and removed. Those set against the Sabbath commandment are like the Jews who rejected Jesus as Messiah, whom even great miracles or a message from heaven would not persuade because they had chosen darkness rather than light and would call such a message satanic. Repeating arguments to silence such objectors does not change them, since the trouble is refusal of light rather than want of evidence.
The Jews fulfilled this by rejecting Christ rather than coming to Him for life, because they did not want to see their sin clearly and His teaching revealed their sins. By refusing light and correction despite powerful evidence of His Messiahship, their hatred grew with the light until they became self-deceived enough to think killing Him and crucifying Him was service to God. They also despised Him in the person of His messengers because He was not the Christ they had looked for, asking Who is this, Is not this Joseph's son, and the same fulfillment comes when the religious world now rejects the message for today because the agencies God sends are not what men expected or understood. Christ's goodness exposed their self-righteousness though they could point to no wrong act in His life, and shutting eyes and conscience to the light hardened them in choosing darkness.
The same pattern appeared in the Pharisees, who rejected Christ the light of the world because His teaching did not come as they expected, and by rejecting the light and knowledge He offered closed the way to salvation and severed connection with Him. The priests hated Jesus as the Light exposing their darkness and error, which is why they felt no pity at His suffering when His light made their deeds plain. Herod had nearly become John the Baptist's disciple but rejected truth after conviction and grew so hardened that his sins seemed trivial, showing that turning from the Spirit of truth leads into deeper darkness and moral decline. Cain's hatred of Abel shows the same law, for Abel's righteous life and defense of God's goodness exposed Cain's wrongdoing so Cain killed him, proving the clearer the light reflected by faithful servants the more plainly the ungodly see their sins and the more fiercely they may attack those who reprove them.
Papist leaders hated the light of Scripture because it would have revealed their sins and wrongdoing. With God's law removed as the standard of righteousness they exercised power without limit and practiced vice without restraint.
Rejecting the light leaves people captive to Satan, who makes them see light as darkness and good as evil and evil as good. In that darkened state men at ease love error because it agrees with the carnal heart, take it for granted as clear, and cannot see where truth had the advantage so as to settle that error is truth, while evil angels are deeply interested in keeping darkness, error, and doubt over truth. Resisting God's light thus leads people to call truth and the work of the Holy Spirit darkness, fanaticism, or error. Turning from clear warnings and truth for darkness is linked with accepting deceptive satanic falsehoods.
Coming to the Light
Coming to the light means humble, thorough repentance, dying to self and being crucified to self, so that the life shows the truth has done its good work in consistent life and godly conversation. It means honestly examining heart, motives, temper, speech, and conduct, comparing life with God's law and Christ's example, openly facing wrongs and confessing them, taking a decisive stand for what is right through thorough work wrought by the Holy Spirit that breaks Satan's hold and glorifies the Lord. It means hearing the Saviour's voice when He is present among His people, humbling the heart before God, and receiving the Holy Spirit when plain evidence is given, refusing to keep one's own citizen's dress instead of the robe of Christ's righteousness.
The verse shows why every man, woman, and child must be born again, with natural traits, temperament, and disposition transformed into Christ's likeness, or they cannot enter and be welcomed into the kingdom of heaven. The chapter belongs especially to those who have not been born again, and those who have light are to walk in it as Christ is in the light. This need is illustrated by Nicodemus, who was confident his moral character was correct and felt no need to humble himself before God, flattering himself that he was righteous. Entering into life requires renouncing one's own righteousness and depending wholly on Christ and His imputed righteousness instead of relying on self and staying from the light.
A life changed by Christ does not hate or refuse this light but accepts and rejoices in the truth that reveals sin. Those who receive Him are drawn to His purity and goodness and seek to follow His example rather than choosing darkness rather than the Saviour. Receiving the light of God's Word reveals character faults, and walking in that light allows people to be changed and to grow in grace and knowledge of Christ.
Refusing to come leaves the heart unsubdued, without repentance and its fruit, because when God's Word brings reproof the unsubdued heart seeks excuses and attacks the message or messenger rather than admitting and correcting wrongs, though reproofs and appeals are meant to bring sanctification. It leaves character spotted over with imperfections, sin, and corruption and found wanting in the day of God, with sensibilities benumbed and blunted by sin and wrong, conscience seared, and sacred things dragged down to a level with common things. It defiles the soul, and those who have received all the evidence that will ever be given, hearing truth spoken in demonstration of the Spirit yet hating the light, tempt God, enter dark secret paths, and stumble to ruin. Reproof then becomes a stumbling block, and those who keep rejecting offered mercy and truth are left unrestrained to continue downward, with conscience and moral sense hardened until one once convicted by the Spirit of truth can become capable of terrible crimes.
Continued resistance hardens in proportion to unbelief, for resisting and contemptuously rejecting the light God gives deepens darkness, and because given light is refused eyes are blinded and hearts are hardened. Those able to yield but choosing not to stifle conviction and oppose those carrying God's message, as the Jewish rulers saw their guilt through the Spirit's evidence yet kept rejecting it until repeated resistance hardened opposition and led away from salvation. Refusing the light means denying the Holy Spirit's leading, making light of the Holy Spirit, blaspheming God, calling His Spirit's working delusion, and choosing to be led by an unseen agency of evil under satanic influence rather than be convinced, and all who have had light and evidence yet refuse it will receive sentence of death in the judgment. God's wrath falls not merely because people have sinned, but because they keep on resisting despite the light and evidence given, with the Spirit of God departing from some never to return.
A person's response can also depend on how and under what circumstances truth is presented, for a fair opportunity to weigh arguments and compare Scripture with Scripture may reveal its clarity and win acceptance. One may fail to receive truth because it is presented without fair chance to weigh and compare, while presented clearly and appropriately it may win him. The need is not learning nor controversy but truth and a new heart, for until the heart is changed reasoning about points of difference produces no saving result but strengthens resistance. Therefore workers dealing with awakened yet held souls like Nicodemus, to whom Christ gave new light bringing into contact with all light and practical truth to carry away, are to avoid controversy over false theories and keep to the affirmative presenting Christ's truth.
Warning to the Church
Even among professed believers joined together in church capacity, not all have the truth and not all are obedient to all the commandments, and many are backsliders who have not followed on to know the Lord. Their shrinking from light proves love of darkness rather than light because deeds are evil, and it keeps them from discerning the intensity of God's love for every soul. The remedy is to follow on to know the Lord step by step, for He is leading and will give increased light, while those who refuse the light by choosing their own way reject His way.
The same principle applies to the church when it refuses to search Scripture or listen to truth rather than face correction of its works. Its preference for worldly customs and approval helps it deceive itself about its standing with God. Some would keep the church from seeing clearly by resisting the wisdom and grace that reveal sin under any guise, whereas the eye-salve of Christ gives understanding to discern good from evil and see sin clearly. Even after light had been given, some responsible men chose darkness, using worldly methods and supporting wrongdoing rather than taking a clear stand for what was right.
Those who have no desire to read the testimonies do so because the very sins of which they are guilty are specified there. Those who from youth have received warning and reproof yet do not walk in the light by reforming, but still indulge the same sins and keep the same defects of character, fulfill the same avoidance. This refusal to be corrected by individual members, especially leaders of the flock, mars the work of God, makes its impress upon the churches, and prevents the work of setting the churches in order. Coming to the light means hearing the Saviour's voice, humbling the heart before God, and receiving the Holy Spirit when plain evidence is given with Christ present among His people, while turning away means refusing to hear, refusing to humble, refusing the robe of Christ's righteousness and keeping one's own dress, growing harder and more unimpressible, cultivating unbelief and strengthening resistance. At the last General Conference men fulfilled this turning away by turning a deaf ear to Christ's message of mercy, placing themselves in a fortress of unbelief and in opposition to Christ, disloyal to truth, failing to honor and glorify God, and working to make the testimonies God gave His people appear unreliable.
Condemning brethren and magnifying their imperfections is contrary to Christ, who came to a marred and impure world to heal imperfection and save the lost, since God sent His Son not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved, with the believer not condemned and the unbeliever condemned already for not believing in the only begotten Son of God. Instead His example is to be followed in seeking to save souls. Those who have lived in sin but accept the truth in penitence may be in a better position to develop Christian character than people given great light who fail to use it and remain in darkness by neglecting the light and opportunities God gives them. Christ treats the penitent with tenderness but denounces hypocrisy and vain pretense.
Those deceived by the enemy are unwilling to receive correction or come to the light, following their own judgment instead of heeding God's voice, while unbelief and skepticism take the place of faith. By contrast, God is willing to pardon those who turn to Him with penitence and faith. Following an evil course and refusing to come to the light means resisting the messages of warning and reproof sent for guidance. Refusing counsel and warning rather than admitting possible error is a refusal to come to the light that leaves a person resistant to correction. When God's Word brings reproof, an unsubdued heart and unsubdued will seeks excuses and refuge, attacks the message or messenger and finds fault with them and dismisses divine authority rather than admitting wrong, correcting wrongs, and repenting, and this refusal keeps the heart from being subdued, repenting, and bearing fruit of repentance, though the light's reproofs and appeals are meant to bring sanctification. Such ridicule and opposition from pride that will not confess reveals a spirit unlike God's.
Rejecting light after receiving the evidence leaves people choosing darkness and heading toward ruin, and refusing the truth and hating the light also obstructs others from receiving it. Those who have received all the evidence that will ever be given, who have heard truth spoken in demonstration of the Spirit, yet refuse to accept the message and hate the light, tempt God and reject light, enter dark secret paths, and continue to stumble to ruin with the Spirit departing, some never to return. By interposing themselves between heaven-sent light and the people they become parties to the ruin of souls, trampling upon the Word of God and doing despite to His Holy Spirit. Those who refuse to obey the truth resist others who obey it, since the faithful way of life shines against sin and error and continually reproves the unbelieving and disobedient.
Those who refuse in loyalty to God to obey His holy commandments choose darkness over light and therefore remain ignorant of divine things and cannot correctly explain the central gospel truth of Christ crucified as the great atonement for sin, even though that truth is plainly and decidedly revealed in God's Word. Those who have set themselves against the Sabbath commandment are like those who rejected Jesus as Messiah: even great miracles, or a message from heaven, would not persuade them, because they have chosen darkness rather than light and would call such a message satanic. In the last days, those who reject the light are warned not to be found among the transgressors of God's law, for error hates the light and avoids it because the light exposes and reproves its deeds. Those who knowingly reject given light choose darkness, and the darkness grows more intense, as with those who disregard instruction about health reform. People who know the light yet understand the laws of health but continue violating them for popular or sensual indulgences, excusing themselves because change is inconvenient or makes them singular, prefer darkness to light, and their refusal to act on knowledge makes them accountable for resulting suffering and for the harmful example leading others into the same course.
Choosing the company of people who reject God's light is perilous, for those who love darkness rather than light refuse to come to the light because they do not want deeds exposed and corrected. Christians are warned against choosing close friends who reject God and love darkness rather than light, and should seek the company of those who love God and obey His commandments. God can sustain those placed in difficult settings, as He did Joseph and Daniel, but Christians should not deliberately choose associations that draw them away from light.
Set beside God's love in giving His only begotten Son so that whoever believes will not perish but have everlasting life, and beside Christ dying the Just for the unjust to bring us to God, parents dealing with children as a reproduction of themselves are called to examine themselves, to submit way and will to God, and to seek wisdom, patience, kindness, and love in restraint and discipline rather than acting in anger. Nicodemus illustrates the opposite of avoidance: he received Christ's lesson, became a believer, and defended Him before the council, while his fellow rulers answered with scorn. Edith is noted as one not knowing how to come to the light, where doing evil is joined with hating the light and avoiding it so deeds will not be exposed.