When the Light Went Out

Darkness.

What a horrible word and horrible state, especially for someone created and destined to live in the light of God. Darkness is not even a thing on its own; it is only the absence of something else: the absence of light.

In darkness we cannot see or move properly. In darkness our eyes are constantly searching for even the smallest little light, like remote stars in a vast, dark sky. To try to cope with darkness, since it is so unnatural to us, our pupils dilate, allowing more light to enter the eye, and the light-detecting cells in the human eye will desperately try to regenerate more rhodopsin, the protein that mediates light vision.

In Sweden, which suffers from long, dark winters with only a few hours of light per day, every baby is given additional A and D vitamins to compensate for what the light of day would normally supply. And if we’ve had a rainy summer with not too much sunlight, incidents of depression and even suicides increase as we again head for the dark winter.

Our whole being seems to fight this unnatural state of being without light, and the simple reason is that we are all created for light, created to be in the presence of the God who is light. In the absence of His light, we suffer—physically, mentally, spiritually.

So when did the light go out and why? The Bible tells us the story in Genesis 3:1-7. This account of the fall of mankind marks the greatest tragedy of human history: how we who were created by a God who is light and thus were designed to live in His light, rebelled against Him and sentenced ourselves to separation from Him.

Looking at the story in detail, it’s clear that what gave the serpent an opportunity to tempt man was ignorance regarding what God had actually said. Eve claimed that the Lord had said, “You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die,” which was wrong. God never said anything about not touching the fruit, only about not eating it (Gen. 2:17, emphasis added). As we allow ignorance of the Word of God into our lives, we open ourselves up to heresy, temptation, and failure. However, when we build our lives and our families on the strong foundation of the Word of God, and constantly sit under sound teaching of that Word in our local church, we stand strong.

And while we are at it, why did God have the tree of knowledge planted in the Garden of Eden at all? Why allow this opportunity for sin and separation in the first place?

The short answer to this question is because God wants His relationship with man, with you, to be based on love and not constraint. And love requires a free will.

You see, without the tree of knowledge in the garden, man would have had no choice but to stay in the presence of God. Though this would have been the best by far, love just does not work that way. You can use force to make people obey, respect, serve, and do as they’re told. But no force, no lack of choice in the world, can make someone love. Love can only grow from the stem of a person’s own free will.

When the devil realized that man was unsure of what God had really said or not said, he was quick to twist the words of God around to mean something different from what God initially intended.

Adam and Eve were fooled by his lies and chose to obey the prince of darkness rather than the King of light, and as a result they were expelled from the presence of God, the presence of light. This was the “death” God had talked about—one not defined by ceasing to exist but by becoming the opposite of what you were made to be. It was a “dying” in relation to man’s original purpose, which was to live in fellowship with the God of light. Mankind now had to acclimatize to a whole new reality: to be created for light, yet having to live in the absence of it.

Ever since the Garden of Eden, this is where we have found ourselves. Created for light, yet disconnected from it by our own choices, we nonetheless try to convince ourselves that we are doing just fine on our own in the darkness, going round and round in circles, repeating our own historical mistakes and failures over and over again. We lie to ourselves that we don’t need the light—that we are better off without it—even though our spirit, soul, and body tell us otherwise.

Praise God, our Lord can still turn darkness into light (Ps. 18:28). The light still shines in the darkness—and the darkness has not overcome it (John 1:5). Whatever darkness you might find yourself in, remember that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Rom. 10:13).

Tune in to hear Joakim Lundqvist this Thursday on LIFE TODAY. Adapted from Shine Your Light by Joakim Lundqvist. Copyright © 2024 by Joakim Lundqvist. Published by Charisma House, an imprint of Charisma Media. Used by permission.