In bringing us to Himself God sooner or later places our sin under such powerful searchlights that we cannot fail to recognize it as the loathsome thing that it is in His sight. This is the painful process described in Scripture as the Holy Spirit convincing us of sin (John 16:8), bringing to light the hidden things of darkness, (1 Cor. 4:5) and making sin exceedingly sinful to us (Rom. 7:13). Because His aim in putting us through this process is to make us partakers of His holiness, He invariably makes us flee to Christ, the only Mediator between Himself and us, for both cleansing from its burdensome guilt and deliverance from its oppressive power.

In this brief article we will consider five such searchlights and indicate how our most secret thoughts, motives, desires, words, and actions are exposed by their powerful glare. As we do this, may we be made willing to place ourselves under them, be brought to loathe ourselves for what they show us, and seek that cleansing and deliverance that only Christ can give us.

1. The Character of God⤒🔗

When the Holy Spirit brings us to see God in His holiness and sovereignty, we cannot help seeing something of the sinfulness of our sin. “Woe is me, I am undone,” cried Isaiah, “for I have seen the king, the Lord of Hosts” (Isa. 6:5). ”I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear,” exclaimed Job, “but now mine eye seeth thee; wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:5-6). When we are shown the glory of God shining through His holy attributes, we reflect on our own contrasting depravity and wickedness. When we compare ourselves with others, we may thank God proudly that “we are not as other men” (Luke 18:11). But when we see ourselves in the light of God’s holy character, we cry out, “Unclean! Unclean!” and restlessly thrash around for a remedy outside ourselves.

2. The Law of God←⤒🔗

“By the law is the knowledge of sin,” says the apostle. (Rom. 3:20) That is, because no one can ever be justi­fied except by faith in Christ, God shines the light of His law on us precisely to show us our lack of conformity to its holy precepts. And because the law is spiritual, He shines its light inside our hearts, lighting up the hidden things of darkness that only He sees. Then we see the futility of seeking to justify ourselves by our own character or deeds, despair of ourselves, confess that “all our righteousnesses are filthy rags” (Isa. 64:6), and flee to Christ for a righteousness that will avail us before God. When we compare ourselves with obvious transgressors of God’s law, we fancy ourselves to be better than them; but when we compare our inmost thoughts and desires and our outward words and actions with the standard of the law itself, we find ourselves condemned and ashamed before Him.

3. The Torments of the Wicked in Hell←⤒🔗

No one loved souls more than our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Yet no one spoke more frequently and feelingly of the indescribable torments of the wicked in hell than He (Matt. 8:12; 22:13; 24:51; 25:30, 46; Mark 9:44, 46, 48). The sheer horror of being in such a place of eternal pain, anguish, remorse, and despair is expressed by Him in awful terms. Surely God created hell only out of love for His justice and hatred to sin. God does not punish sinners with such excruciating torments forever unless He judges sin worthy of such punishment. And when He graciously shines on us with hell’s light we cannot but reflect on the dread­fulness of the sin that deserves such wages. A true sight of hell will make sin abhorrent to us. Many a sin­ner, awakened to the awful prospect of spending eternity in hell, has wept himself to sleep believing that God would be righteous to wake him up in hell, because he knows that hell is what his sin deserves. When, in His mercy, God shows His righteous wrath condemning us to hell’s torments for our sin, we seek deliver­ance from Him who suffered those torments on the cross for such sinners as we are.

4. Striving to be Holy←⤒🔗

When God is bringing us to Christ, we desire to be free from sin. Longing to swim against the tide of human corruption and worldliness, we struggle hard to over­come it. We try to pray, but find our hearts dragging us downward. We read the Scriptures, but find our hearts still restless and lacking peace with God. We strive to run the Christian race, but find ourselves unable to take even one step forward. We vow to live better lives, but find our old nature unchanged. Before long, we discover that sin is like a strong man, able to wrestle us to the ground without effort on every occasion. We feel condemned to a life of continued striving against sin without any help from God, and become thoroughly weary of ourselves and all our efforts. Yet when we hear that heart-melting invitation: “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28), then we flee to Christ and find relief. From that moment on, sin does not have dominion over us. And despite its continued attacks and temporary victories, we are able to sing with the Psalmist: “Iniquities, I must confess, prevail against me do: But as for our transgressions, them purge away shalt thou” (Psa. 65:3, Metrical Version) and cry out with the Apostle: “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 7:24-25). Striving to be holy is a most effective search­light to show us our sin and drive us to Christ.

5. Christ Crucified←⤒🔗

Nothing gives us such a horrendous sight of sin, however, as a believing view of Christ crucified. More than anything else, this shows just how much God hates sin. For Him to punish His only-begotten, dearly-beloved Son in our nature — One who was holy, harmless, and undefiled, and lovingly bore the sins of others — shows us God’s infinite hatred of sin more than even eternal punishment. And the more we see God’s hatred of sin, the more we see sin’s sinfulness. When we look upon Him whom we have pierced, we cry out with Isaac Ambrose:

Oh, what is that cross on the back of Christ? My sins! Oh, what is that crown on the head of Christ? My sins! Oh, what is that nail in the right hand, and that other in the left hand of Christ? My sins! Oh, what is that spear in the side of Christ? My sins! And what are those nails and wounds in the feet of Christ? My sins! With a spiritual eye I see nothing else torment­ing Christ, condemning Christ, executing Christ but sin. Oh, my sins, my sins, my sins!

This is the most powerful searchlight of all that God employs to show us the exceeding sinfulness of sin.

Lessons for Ourselves←⤒🔗

1. We may be sure that if we do not see our sin under these five searchlights, despite its greatness and loathsomeness in God’s sight, it is not because there is no sin in us to see. It is because we are blind to ourselves. The holy character of God, the commandments of His holy law, the awful torments of the wicked in hell, the futile attempts to become holy without Christ, and Christ crucified have never shone into our hearts with exposing light and power. We are still in our sins. And if we are still in our sins, we are strangers to grace and to God. Oh, may we give ourselves no rest until we find ourselves at peace with God through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ! Let us heed and act on His own gracious invitation: “Come unto me” (Matt. 11:28), taking our encouragement from the promise attached to it: “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:40). Only by so doing shall we be delivered from the guilt and power of sin.
2. Since sin is so sinful in God’s sight, how thank­ful believers should be for the power of grace. Only by the riches and freeness of God’s grace have we been delivered, and continue to be delivered, from the enormous evil of sin. Only by the power of that grace are we preserved, like a tiny spark of fire preserved in an ocean of wickedness. “The whole world lieth in wickedness” (1 John 5:19). Our own hearts are still the receptacles of so much wickedness. Yet God’s grace keeps our eyes from tears and our feet from falling (Psa. 116:8). Furthermore, He has promised that He will continue to keep that which we commit to Him against the day of Christ’s appearing (2 Tim. 1:12). Let us be thankful then, and press on, until we reach the place where there is no more sin and no further need for searchlights to show us our need of Christ.