Interior Darkness

Advent began today. We are celebrating the coming of light into darkness in this season.
I've been reflecting on my own darkness lately. I've noticed that the more time I spend with God, the more aware I am of my own depravity and sinfulness. Ironic, since the more time I spend with God, the more my external life gets "cleaned up." So people hear me say things like this and think I'm being too hard on myself. Probably at least 1 comment for this post will be along those lines. But people, let me tell you, I am the only person inside my head and it is UGLY in here!
Back to my point: that as we grow in our faith, we gain more understanding of our depravity. I think that this is a common experience for many of us. And I think it's an example of God's mercy. I think we only perceive our true sinfulness to the extent that we perceive God's grace. So the more I experience God's grace, the more I see of my own evil. The grace is what enables the vision. Because if we saw ourselves, truly saw ourselves without God's grace, we would fall into utter despair. So God gives us some grace, and then we see a little more. Then God gives us more grace, and we see a little more. The grace is what lifts us up and allows us to keep going. We begin to be like the debtor in Luke 7, who loved much because he was forgiven much. This is why sin is not a painful subject - not a depressing topic. It's a joyous one! God brought light into the darkness of my soul! And the more I understand of God's forgiveness, the more I love God! Talk about win-win! It would be like being audited, and discovering that the last 7 years of taxes were wrong and you owed millions to the government, and the auditor then smiled and said, "How about we make what you owed for the last 7 years your refund this year?" And the millions owed became the millions received. This is the good news of Advent! This is why Christ came into the world!