John’s message is this: God is Light (1 John 1:5). That message has been interpreted a few different ways, but I do believe the primary understanding is a reference to His moral purity or holiness. This is the point Martyn Lloyd-Jones makes:
I say it with reverence that before I begin to think and consider the love of God and the mercy and compassion of God, I must start with the holiness of God. I go further; unless I start with the holiness of God, my whole conception of the love of God is going to be false, and this of course is what we have been witnessing. We have had the flabby, sentimental notions of God as a God of love, always smiling upon us, and then when wars and calamities come we are baffled and we turn our backs upon religion-this is what millions have been doing since the great wars of this century. And the trouble has actually been due to the fact that they did not start the way the Scriptures start, with the holiness of God. God is utter, absolute righteousness and justice; ‘holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord’ (Heb 12:14); ‘God is a consuming fire’ (Heb 12:29); sharing in the light that is unapproachable, everlasting and eternal in the brightness and the perfection of His absolute qualities. Light! And light must not be interpreted as knowledge; light is knowledge, but light essentially stands here for holiness utter, absolute holiness and purity. And John makes certain that we shall not go astray in our interpretation, by adding this negative: ‘And in him is no darkness at all.’
Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Life In Christ
We will be considering this truth as we work our way through 1 John 1:5-10 on Sunday at Meadowview Baptist.