“God did not send his Son into the world to judge and condemn the world, but to be its Savior and rescue it.  So now there is no longer any condemnation for those who believe in him, but the unbeliever already lives under condemnation because they do not believe in the name of God’s beloved Son. And here is the basis for their judgment: The Light of God has now come into the world, but the hearts of people love their darkness more than the Light, because they want the darkness to conceal their evil. So the wicked hate the Light and try to hide from it, for their lives are fully exposed in the Light. But those who love the truth will come out into the Light and welcome its exposure, for the Light will reveal that their fruitful works were produced by God.” John 3:17-21 TPT

I have been meditating on these verses a lot lately. How God sent Jesus into the world to rescue us, not to judge and condemn us, yet we are still hiding out in the darkness, hiding our true selves away, afraid to step out into the light because we do not like what is hidden in our heart and we are still afraid of what God might think of us. He came to rescue us from these very feelings so why are we still afraid?

Everyone wants to be fully known and fully seen, to feel valued, important and worthy of love and affection. We long to have someone know our hearts intimately, even the messy parts and still choose to love every part of us.

God designed us for intimacy. Intimacy is into me you see. It is having an uncovered heart, free from fear and shame and every part of you is fully known and fully seen. To be completely ourselves and not live with the fear that we are going to be judged or condemned for how we really feel or how we think.

Even though we long to be known and seen and that God has actually designed us for intimacy we don’t actually live this way. We are still hiding bits of our self, we are afraid of what He may see if we truly open up, so we stay in the dark and cover up the things that are messy or scary. By doing this we are missing out on the power of true vulnerability with Him.

We must remember, the light of God has now come into the world, and we must move our hearts from hiding in the darkness to living in the Light. We need to uncover our hiddenness. God wants to know us, every part of us, but He is waiting for us to invite Him in so that He can see what is really going on in our hearts. Not so that He can judge us for it but so that He can help us mend our hearts.

Being open and vulnerable with God is so powerful because it helps us to walk in freedom from our shame and freedom from lies that we may believe about our self. He will take all the mess and turn all the chaos of our hearts into order.

Vulnerability with God will actually move us out of sin and into freedom but we need to push past the discomfort of vulnerability and have some open and honest conversations with God.

Come out into the light and welcome its exposure. Allow God to search and know your heart and throw off the shame that you may be holding on to and find comfort in God’s words. Find comfort in His truth over your life about who you are and who you were created to be. His words of life and love will empower you into more freedom to be fully yourself.