When God seems unreal

From Ray Ortlund, Jr:

“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.”  1 John 1:7

"Sometimes God seems unreal, remote, theoretical.  When that is so, there is a reason.  God is in fact real.  So are we.  That it doesn’t seem so demands an explanation.

"The problem might be intellectual in nature.  We might have doubts.  God wants to satisfy our doubts with reasonable assurances.  God loves our minds.  He made our minds to know him.  So this barrier to reality with God is significant but surmountable.

"The primary problem might be more personal in nature.  1 John 1:7 says that God is in the light.  That’s where he locates himself.  It’s where he has made himself findable.  If we want him, that’s where we need to go — out into the light, where he already is.

"To walk in the light, in the context of 1 John, is an honest relationship with God and with one another.  Honesty about our sins and failings.  No denial.  No sweeping the past under the rug.  No evasion.  It’s humbling, even painful, to face ourselves.  But entire openness to God about who we are and what we’ve done is how we step out of the shadows into the light of truth.  That is where God becomes real again.  “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light . . . .”

"And the blessings he has for us there in the light are renewed fellowship with one another, as the walls fall down, and cleansing by the blood of Jesus his Son, as our sins pour out in confession.

"God is real, when we are."