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1 John 1:6–7
“If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.”
The Apostle John has established the foundational truth that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all (1 John 1:5). In today’s passage, he begins to draw the practical implications of this affirmation. The first of these implications is set out in the form of a contrast between two modes of life: walking in darkness and walking in the light.
In verse 6, John addresses what may be called the false claim of fellowship. Some, he says, claim to have fellowship with God while continuing to walk in darkness. By “darkness” John means a settled pattern of unrepentant sin, a course of life in which moral evil is embraced rather than resisted. Such a profession of fellowship with God is, in John’s words, a lie, and those who make it “do not practice the truth.” This last phrase is striking, for it shows that truth is not merely something believed in the mind but something practiced in life. To know the truth is to live by it. A person who confesses Jesus as Lord but walks in darkness has not actually grasped the gospel he professes.
The false teachers troubling John’s congregation almost certainly fell into this category. They appear to have taught that the spiritual life had to do only with secret knowledge, while the deeds done in the body were morally indifferent. John’s response is uncompromising. There is no fellowship with the God who is light apart from a corresponding manner of life.
Verse 7 sets out the alternative. Those who walk in the light, “as he is in the light,” do have fellowship—both with one another and, by implication, with God Himself. Two consequences attend this walking. The first is communion among believers: Those who walk in the light belong to the same fellowship that John has been describing since verse 3. The second is ongoing cleansing: “The blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” John does not say that the blood of Jesus cleansed us once in the past, though that is certainly true; he says that it cleanses us, continually, as we walk in the light.
This is a great comfort. To walk in the light is not to walk in sinless perfection. It is to live in the direction of the light, repenting of sin when it is exposed and trusting in the cleansing efficacy of Christ’s blood. The believer walks in the light precisely as one who is constantly being cleansed by the Savior whose blood was shed for him.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Walking in the light is a matter not of moral perfection but of moral direction. We walk toward the light when we hate our sin, run to Christ for cleansing, and live openly before God and His people. Where we have wandered into shadow, let us return to the light without delay.
For further study
- Psalm 32:1–5
- Proverbs 28:13
- Ephesians 5:8–14
- Hebrews 10:19–23
The bible in a year
- Proverbs 13–14
- 2 Corinthians 2