#DailyDevotion Live As Children of Light

1 Thess. 5:5-11 ⁵You are all the children of light and of the day. We have nothing to do with night and darkness. ⁶Let us not sleep, then, like the others, but be awake and sober. ⁷People sleep at night and get drunk at night. ⁸But let us who live in the daylight be sober and put on faith and love as a breastplate and the sure hope of salvation as a helmet. ⁹God didn’t appoint us to be punished by His anger but to be saved by our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁰Who died for us so that, awake or asleep, we may live with Him. ¹¹Then encourage one another and strengthen one another just as you are doing.

¹²Jesús spoke to them again. “I am the Light of the world. Follow Me, and you will never wander in the dark but will have the Light of Life.” If Jesus is the Light of the World then it would follow that we are children of the Light. Jesus taught us in the Sermon on the Mount, ¹⁴“You are the light of the world. A town can’t be hidden when it’s built on a hill.” Paul having been taught by Jesus, of course teaches us that we who follow Jesus are children of light and of the day. As such we have nothing to do with the night and darkness.

Satan, and those who follow him, try to sound if he is the light, having once, mistakenly, been called Lucifer (bearer of light), in Isaiah (it isn’t speaking of the devil there or his rebellion but rather kings of the middle east, using the Latin, Is. 14:12). The devil is a deceiver and deceiver work in darkness (figuratively speaking). They hide truths wrapped in truths. They use slight of hand to deceive. They try to justify the evil and wicked things they do covering it up with words like love, don’t judge, and tolerance. People sleep at night and get drunk at night. If you are doing things you don’t want other people to know you are doing it, then you are not acting as children of the light but as children of darkness.

So as children of light, Paul tells us to be sober (clear minded and thinking) and put on faith and love as a breastplate and the sure hope of salvation as a helmet. Paul does mean literally sober here. It is unbecoming of children of God to get drunk. We cannot fully withstand the temptations of the flesh and its sinful inclinations when our thinking is impaired. God’s love is our breastplate. Knowing and trusting God loves us because of Jesus Christ keeps the accusative arrows of Satan from penetrating our hearts and damaging our conscience. As we live out God’s love in our lives we also will not do things to be accused of by Satan. The beautiful thing about Christianity is the sure and certain hope we have in Jesus as a helmet. A helmet protects your head. We need it to protect our thinking. Satan will try to use Scripture to make us doubt our salvation. He will point to all our failures in life, even as Christians, and say, “You must not really be repentant or believe if you do such things.” We should respond, “You are correct, my faith is not that good and certainly I am a poor representative of Christ, nevertheless, Jesus died for the sins of the world and promised eternal salvation to all who believe in him. I am not saved by how good my repentance is or the quality or quantity of my faith, but by the sure and certain works of Jesus who does not fail.” The Gospel of Jesus Christ, his ransom from sin and death by the shedding of his blood for all, his victory over death by his resurrection for all, his atoning sacrifice and propitiation by his suffering, shedding of blood, and death for all, is our helmet which protects all our thinking. As Paul writes, “God didn’t appoint us to be punished by His anger but to be saved by our Lord Jesus Christ.” So we are to encourage one another with this Gospel.

Heavenly Father, give us your Holy Spirit so we may be children of light and live as such in this dark and fallen world. In Jesus’ name we pray. A