“When a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there to hear it, does it make a sound?” A popular philosophical and metaphysical question that arose in the early 1700’s that simply asks the question, without a witness did it happen. My personal thought is quite simple, of course it does. I think it rather arrogant of man that the universe would so revolve around himself that physics and science would stop in his absence. But the question does bring up a rather interesting viewpoint concerning our sinful actions towards God. If we sin in private with no one around, is it really sin?
Sin in God’s Word is constantly aligned with darkness. The idea strikes me of a cockroach skittering around in the night only to be surprised and scattered by the sudden arrival of light. Our sin prefers the cover of darkness, the cover of an empty forest to aid in the supposed erasure of our act.
“And this is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the Light; for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light, so that his deeds will not be exposed.” John 3:19-20
Considering the verse from the Apostle John above, here is a twist on our deep-thinking forest proposition. “If you sin in the dark, does God see it?” He proposes that Jesus is light. He also states that evil (sin) is darkness and that those that love the darkness will not come to the light. And for this simple reason, what is done in the dark was done in the dark for a reason, that is, to not be known. The light will illuminate the dark and all will be known. So, if evil is done in the dark and never exposed by the light, is it still evil?
Today we plug right along in 2 Kings and take a pause at chapter 8. In it we quickly find the two permanent fixtures that inhabit most of Kings and Chronicles. A mighty prophet of God and evil leaders. The books of Kings can get quite confusing at times, dealing with the seemingly endless evil kings that come flying at you a mile a minute. One thing that continually amazes me is how relevant God’s Word is to us today. Thousands of years later little has changed. Men and women easily become corrupted by absolute power; their sin nature fully splayed open as a result. There were evil leaders from the pharaoh that Moses dealt with in Genesis all the way to the evil leaders that crucified Jesus Christ. And there are still evil leaders in October of the year 2020.
“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” Ecc. 1:9
Today we see more evil being sown by men with evil sewn into their very hearts. King Benhadad is sick and as all dying men do, they throw up a foxhole prayer and seek God. The very man that he tied to assassinate, Elisha, he now calls for. The king sends his right-hand man, Hazael, to retrieve Elisha, hopeful that the man of God can save Him from his imminent death. And the exchange that takes place between Elisha and Hazael is where we’ll rest for a bit.
“When he (Hazael) came and stood before him (Elisha), he said, “Your son Ben-hadad king of Syria has sent me to you, saying, ‘Shall I recover from this sickness?’” And Elisha said to him, “Go, say to him, ‘You shall certainly recover,’ but the Lord has shown me that he shall certainly die.” And he fixed his gaze and stared at him, until he was ashamed. And the man of God wept. 2 Kings 8:9b-11
Hazael is doing as he is told and asks of Elisha what will happen to the king. But you see, God has been talking to Elisha. Elisha knows the truth. Hazael will be the next king. And he will take the throne through the evil act of murdering this very king. And after he takes the throne his evil heart will complete unfathomable acts against the people. During the initially casual greeting, Elisha knew. As this man of evil stood before Elisha in his darkness, he was ever so confident his darkness could not be exposed to the light. Oh, how many times we feel secure that our sin firmly resides in the safety of the shadows.
But Elisha, being in the light of God, gazes deep into the darkness of Hazael’s heart. He stares into the shadows of his spirit. He looks into the very being of Hazael. And his fixed gaze affected Hazael greatly. The gaze of God saw into the darkest parts of his being. We’re told that the long, hard gaze of Elisha caused him shame. Other translations describe the gaze as causing embarrassment, discomfort and unease. So it is when the gaze of God fixes upon our sin, the sin that we desire to keep hidden in the secret of darkness.
Folks, if we sin in the dark, God sees. If we sin in private, God sees. If we sin in secret, God sees. The gaze of God will focus on our very being, staring directly into the creature He created. There is no darkness that God cannot illuminate. He is the light, and it will cast all sin into the sunlight of His righteousness.
Are you thinking that you can hide sin from God today? Are you confident that you can bury your secret sin so deep that God cannot find it? Do you think you have found a spot that is so dark that not even the light of God can spotlight it? Folks, God knows, He sees. And the fixed gaze of God will peer into your soul to convict. You see, God knows how much our sin destroys. He knows better than anyone how much our rebellion to Him costs us. Our sin not personal sin. It destroys not only our lives, but the lives of those around us, our relationships, our ministries, and our ability to be all that God desires us to be. Living in the darkness will cost you.
And as God sees the future of our sin, He mourns. God can see the true cost of our sin and what it will do to our future. And as he sees this dire future, He weeps. As Elisha fixed his gaze upon the heart of Hazael, he saw the evil that would occur at his hands. And he wept for the pain that was to happen in the lives of those that God so loved.
“Why is my lord weeping?" asked Hazael. "Because I know the harm you will do to the Israelites," he answered. "You will set fire to their fortified places, kill their young men with the sword, dash their little children to the ground, and rip open their pregnant women." 2 Kings 8:12
Our sin destroys. Our sin kills. Our sin steals. Today, be more honest than you’ve ever been with God. Lay your heart bare before Him. Confess how you have wronged yourself, wronged others and wronged Him as a result. You can’t hide it; you can’t bury it and you can’t ignore it. The fixed gaze of God will penetrate any barrier you erect. The gaze of God will see all you hope to hide.
God bless you richly as you seek to be closer to Him today.
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