Found By God, the Light of Life (John 1:4-5), N.P.

I thought I was searching for what counted, for what was real, but I have discovered that it was actually God who was seeking me. I was groping, not seeing much, and hoping-but not knowing-that God existed. With defiance toward a dark world in decline, I challenged God one night to make Himself real to me.

Some weeks later while I was at the library, a lady entered to return some books. Spotting me at a photocopy machine, she noticed the college logo on my shirt. She invited me to share with her and with her husband my knowledge of the area, since they were planning to move there. Meeting with them two days later we drove to a dinner where friends of theirs were gathered. Although I had mixed feelings I resolved to remain open and reserve judgment of the meeting until later.

That night someone read aloud some words written a long time ago in a letter recorded in the Bible: “That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom 10:9). Here it was-the solution, the answer, the only hope of an individual and of a dying world!

When I opened my mouth and confessed “Jesus is Lord” I experienced what I know was a transfer out of darkness into light. I experienced the reality of what Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, spoke in the opening of His Epistle to the Colossians: “Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you for a share of the allotted portion of the saints in the light; Who delivered us out of the authority of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love.”

For several months thereafter I enjoyed the infusing and shining Lord. One night in a small group meeting at home the Lord enlightened me to see my fallen nature of sin. I experienced the searching eyes of the Lord as the Spirit. Spontaneously I opened to the Lord. From that day onward I felt freedom to pursue the Lord as my life and everything without the burden of condemnation of sin. I realized that God did not intend for me to try to behave a certain way, but rather to gain Him and live out His life. I had experienced the remainder of Paul's sentence to the Colossians: “...the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

The words from a hymn by Johann C. Layater express my experience:

“Each day let thy supporting might

My weakness still embrace.

My darkness vanish in thy light,

Thy life my death efface.”

(Hymns 395)