How much does Jesus change us? Completely! What we experience is like the difference between night and day. This is how Jesus, in sending His messengers, describes the effect of the Gospel.
… I am sending you to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God… (Acts 26:17-18).6 M
[He] called you out of darkness into his marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).
In Satan’s “dark world” 7 people stay spiritually and morally blind.
They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart (Ephesians 4:18).8
In their case the god of this world has blinded9 the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God (2 Corinthians 4:4).
Worse than that, the sinner becomes darkness. Paul reminded Ephesian Christians, “You were… darkness” (Ephesians 5:8). Darkness took over their character or nature. Darkness defined who they were (Ephesians 2:1-3).
But Jesus turns all that around. He shines on us and in us so fully that we become light. Notice the absolute wording of Ephesians 5:8.
… for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light…. M
What a contrast! What a complete change! Light reaches to the core of our being and transforms our very nature. Now, says Peter, you “participate in the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4).
8. cf. Matthew 13:15; Mark 8:17-18; Acts 7:51-58; 28:27; Romans 1:21; 11:7-10
9. Research Subject – Spiritual blindness: Isaiah 6:10; 44:18; Matthew 13:14-15; 15:14; 23:14-26; Luke 4:18; 6:39; John 9:39; 12:40; Acts 28:27; Romans 2:19; 11:10; 2 Peter 1:9; 1 John 2:11; Revelation 3:17