“While you have the Light, believe in the Light, so that you may become sons of Light.” These things Jesus spoke, and He went away and hid Himself from them.
John 12:36, LSB
We often walk in the blindness of our own perceived goodness. Christ Jesus was speaking these words to a people who wanted to believe in the Christ but could not overcome their own high-mindedness. The offense of the words of Jesus was that He did not affirm them and speak words that spoke of how faithful and wonderful they were because they performed the correct religious duties. Jesus was challenging their free will and how they wanted to believe because He wanted to point them to the Light. Like the pillar before the Israelites in the desert, they had God standing before them but rejected Him for the things that were around them. They wanted to be able to choose to believe instead of being taught what God wanted them to do. We still struggle with this today. We like to believe that we are made right by our decisions and actions, but nothing can justify us but Christ. When we give all things over to Him, then we are no longer doing it for ourselves, but we are being led by the light of our Lord working through us. Letting His light work through us and in the world.
Let us pray. I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, your dear Son, that you have kept me this night from all harm and danger, and I ask you to protect me this day also from sin and every evil, that in all I do today, I may please you. For into your hands, I commend myself, my body and soul, and all that is mine. Let your holy angel watch over me, that the wicked foe have no power over me. Amen.