My friends Ben and Paige have a 3-year-old named Ruth who loves playing hide-and-seek. Ruth hiding from her dad is one of the sweetest things I’ve seen. For a moment, she tries (usually unsuccessfully) to conceal herself. But after a few seconds of solitude, Ruth gets restless, and it becomes clear that all she wants is to be seen by her dad. She wants to be found.
If Ben doesn’t get to her promptly, Ruth will step into the open and shout, “Here I am, Daddy! Here I am!” She knows the ultimate prize isn’t successfully hiding but being found by her loving father. The greatest joy is in being known and held by him.
Like Ruth hiding from her dad, we can spend our lives hiding from God and others. Yet deep down, we know life’s greatest prize is being found: known and loved.
To experience this joy, we must let ourselves be seen—including our sins, weaknesses, and insecurities. We must say with Ruth, “Here I am!” and step into the light. But what kind of light is safe?
World’s Light
The world typically responds in one of three ways when someone’s sins are exposed—all detrimental to that person’s growth:
1. Shame: This response sees someone stuck in a pit of sin and throws dirt on him, burying him and making freedom even harder.
2. Ignore: This response sees someone stuck in a pit of sin and walks past, pretending never to see her fallen condition.
3. Celebrate: This response sees someone stuck in a pit of sin and congratulates him, encouraging him to stay where he is.
Notice that the world’s light never frees us but only leads to deeper pain and bondage. Thus, when stuck in a pit of sin, we’ll be tempted to think our greatest need is to hide in the shadows—to keep away from the light. Yet our greatest need isn’t a darkness that hides but a light that frees and forgives. We were made for the light, but it must be the right light.
Jesus’s Light
John 4:1-42 powerfully differentiates the world’s light from Christ’s light. Jesus meets a Samaritan woman whose isolation suggests her community had outcasted her for her sins. When Jesus shined light onto her life (v. 16), she seemed to expect the same harsh treatment, so she hid (v. 17)—afraid to be seen and known.
Yet when Jesus revealed himself to her as the Messiah who already knew the worst about her yet still loved her (v. 26), freedom and joy flooded her heart. She realized she didn’t have to hide anymore (v. 29). If she was already fully known and still loved by him, from whom did she need to hide? (Rom. 8:31-39).
We were made for the light, but it must be the right light.
Christ’s all-knowing love transformed her greatest fear (being known) into her greatest comfort. She was finally free to pursue obedience without concealing her shortcomings. She was finally free to stop hiding from him and start hiding in him (Col. 3:3).
Before we step into the light, we need to know that grace awaits us—a grace that fully knows and confronts our sins but also forgives us and helps us walk in new freedom. Stepping into Jesus’s light is stepping into life itself.
How to Step into Jesus’s Light
James 5:16 says, “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.” The Greek word translated “confess” means “to agree.” Confession aims to create an agreement between how others see us and who we truly are. The reward of confession is intimacy, as one can only be loved to the extent that he or she is known.
One of the most important forms of confession is repentance. We confess to God and others, “I have sinned against you.”
Yet confession isn’t limited to admitting our sins. We also practice confession whenever we’re honest with others about our weaknesses, insecurities, traumas, and struggles—every time we say with Ruth, “Here I am,” and let others see us for who we truly are. Confession is no less than letting ourselves be seen and known.
Find Your People
Confessing our sins and weaknesses to others is one of the primary ways we experience God’s grace and love. Through the compassion of a member of his body, Jesus physically manifests his heart toward us. Oh, how desperately and regularly we need these experiences. They reinforce the gospel and protect us from seeing Jesus wrongly, which we’re all prone to do.
Confessing our sins and weaknesses to others is one of the primary ways we experience God’s grace and love.
We don’t need to practice confession with all people. The people to whom we entrust the most delicate parts of our hearts must be trustworthy, and different relationships warrant different levels of disclosure. (For example, it’s wise to have accountability partners of the same gender.) Here’s one of the best words of advice I’ve ever received: We don’t need to tell everyone about every sin we struggle with. But there should be no sin we struggle with that no one knows about.
Sin thrives in the dark but dies in the light. It’s good to exercise wisdom in choosing whom to share with. But share with someone—this is the first step toward freedom.
Run to the Light
Satan’s lie is convincing us we need to hide from Jesus (and his people) after we sin. Yet Jesus is the sin remover, the shame remover, the condemnation remover. He’s the remedy to our guilt, not the cause. He’s who we need most after we sin.
“Run to the light; it is not to be feared,” Paul Tripp writes. “Yes, it is the light of exposure, but what will be exposed has already been covered by the blood of the One who exposes it.”
Friend, true freedom doesn’t come when we’ve successfully hidden; it comes when we’re found out but still accepted and cherished through God’s gracious love. Run to the true Light—Jesus himself—and find the forgiveness and freedom you long for in him.