How to Shine in Darkness

Announcements

The winner for top commentator last month was Jesus Freak {applause}. He wins his own hosting and domain account. Please contact me to redeem it. I will announce the other winnings with other posts.

I am not sure if I ever mentioned what this year was for me, in case I didn’t, it’s my year of shining. At the time I accepted that as my word for the year, I didn’t have clarity on how much darkness would exist. I was more interested however in knowing what I needed to do so that my light could shine.  It’s one thing to be a light, it’s another thing to shine the light. 

There is no gainsaying that if you have any light in you, this year is one of the best times in the history of the world to shine it. People will move from absolute obscurity to prominence this year. People will rally round carriers of light. This is the year that if you have knowledge, information, the capacity to enlighten or educate, you will be sought after. Darkness is covering the earth, and gross darkness it’s people, but as always, that darkness provides an opportunity for some to shine. So the question today is since we know that there is darkness, how do we shine in these times.

Before we go into the subject matter for today, first consider something. I heard this perspective a few days ago, and I thought it was apt. Follow me into this picture. Imagine for one minute that the story of the exodus of the children of Isreal from Egypt was happening today. The first thing you need to realize is that we would probably not get more detailed information than what we are getting to hear about the war in palestine. No particular names or faces, just blurred news. We wouldn’t have known who Moses, was, and all the things that God told him would not have been on the news. Some things would have caught the attention of the media though – yes, frogs, locusts.. the news would have described it as a “plague” and probably christened it with a name. We call them Tsunami’s, Cathrina e.t.c, when we have no clue what is going on. Behind the scenes however, is not the overflowing of a courseless river, or the climaxing of an unprecendented sequence of events, behind the scenes is the deliberate hand of God, working in the universe to fulfill His purpose per time. The world christens it financial meltdown, crisis, economic depression, and many other brilliant names, but what it really is the the hand of God, working behind the scenes to create the conducive atmosphere for the fulfilment of prophecy!

So, back to shining, here are a few tips for shining and shining brightly.

1. Arise

There is a verse of the bible I love so much, and has been my motto for this year, it says “arise and shine, for your light is come, and the glory of the lord is risen upon you. Gentiles shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising”. The first thing you need to do before you can shine is arise! In other words, that’s take responsibility. Find an area, your area, and don’t be caught sitting. You need to arise first and shine. No one lights a candle and keep it under the bushel. You want to shine, rise. In your career line, rise, in your business, rise, in your nation, rise. If you want to shine, you need to position yourself to be visible. One side of it is taking responsibility the other side of it is getting visible. Get a website, join a group or body, find your place and arise.

2. Be Deliberate

The verse didn’t say arise and you will shine, it says arise and shine. Shining has to be deliberate. Enough of people saying they like to be quiet, they like to be hidden, they like to be behind the scenes. It’s good to be all those things, but you need to find out a way to do them and still shine.  I read in the bible as well, as one of the words of Jesus, he said “Let your light so shine, that men may see your good works and glorify the father in heaven”. He didn’t command that we shine, he commanded that we so shine. That means shine, shine, shine! Shine superlatively. We are done with the era of silence, minimal or nill expression. If you’ve got light, let it shine. The world all around is groping in darkness. Just this morning I recieved a text message from a friend that she had just come out of a meeting where she with some other people were downsized.  Just as soon as I got that, I looked out the car and saw a newspaper headline of SEC asking the Federal Government to take over some sick banks. The cloud is getting thick with darkness. WE can’t afford you to be silent and abitrary anymore. Shine!

3. Operate with Understanding

It’s interesting that the verse says the reason you ought to shine is because your light has come, and that you have a glory that is risen upon you. I would have thought that if that was the case, it should be obvious enough not to require saying. I discovered however that nothing is obvious. Things become real not when they can be seen, but when they can be believed. I was recounting a story to a few of my friends yesterday, how in part 1 in university, I had made a goal for myself to get a 5.0 GPA implying that I was meant to score A’s in all my courses. I was in a small reading room one day, tackling one of my physics text books, when I got stuck on the answer to one of the last questions in the text book {Haliday we called it} chapters. I tried and tried but couldn’t solve the question to get the answer at the back of the book. Some hours later, one of the secondary school students – apparently a lecturers son, who I had gotten friendly with approached me to help him solve a physics problem from his secondary school text book. I asked him to bring it on – nothing in secondary school can challenge me. To my utter dismay the question he gave me was exactly the one I had battled with unsuccessfully. I asked him where he got the question from, and he told me from Nelkon and Parker – a secondary school text book. “What??”, I exclaimed. I asked him to show me, he did, and as soon as I saw that it was a secondary school question, I took it up and in 2 mins got it solved quite easily. I went back to my textbook, which had used alphabeths instead of numbers and cracked it in less than 2 mins. What happened? The light was there all the while, but I just came to understand that I was more than that question. The limitation I had before was in my mind, I saw the question as big, and it lived up to it. There are many giants around you that are actually dwarfs if you see them correctly. You need to operate from a point of understanding of who you are and what you carry!

4. Practice Reverse Paranoia

I had to just use that word 🙂 I have been carrying that word in my heart now for almost 48hrs and looking for the time when I’ll write again. The word is not totally mine though, some of it came from Jack Canfield. Reverse Paranoia is a state of life where you look at everything that happens to you as a good set up. Rather than the normal paranoid person that things that the world is falling apart on top of him, or the state of the economy is out to get him or his money, rather than think negative, reverse paranoia tells you to observe all these things and see them as a good set-up for you. In other words if you lose your job, be convinced it’s because there are better things. If you make a loss, it’s because you needed to for something that was coming ahead. If you don’t come first it’s so that you can be humble enough to get the reward that’s coming. Everything is working for your good. The Naira is sliding in your favour, the economy is collapsing because it’s your turn. Reverse paranoia is great paranoia.

5. Prepare

What a bird eats before it flies is what it flies with 🙂 {adapted from Yoruba}. If you don’t load yourself with information now, when it’s time to shine you will offer chrismas light. To shine and illuminate clearly, you must be filled with pure light. Sharpen your mind, develop your spirit. The bible also says that the spirit of man is the candle of the Lord, and with it he searches the inward parts. Your spirit is the source of light, your ability to connect with the heavenlies and transcribe the events of the time into the sequence of God’s calendar. Your ability to understand Cairus (set/appointed time) and make it applicable to Chronos (chronological time)- sorry for the greek. Prepare yourself – spend quality time with God, read your bible, be informed, think, reflect, meditate. There are different levels of light, which one do you want to be?

I really want to pour out my heart and say more… but I have a meeting that starts now… on the future. I’ll be back with part two.