Ever wonder what the early Christians did when they gathered around a baptism? Quite possibly they sang these words:

"Wake up, O sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you."

(Ephesians 5:14)

Consider them.

"Wake up." An effective evangelist describes her job just this way, "I wake people up. People all around us are living in a dream world. Christ needs us to jar them awake." We who are in Christ also sometimes start to doze off. Please, someone, wake us up!

"Rise from the dead." The wages of sin is death but when we find Christ and are buried into his death in baptism, we rise up into a new life. It's really as dramatic as that.

"And Christ will shine on you." The Italian translation is what caught my eye. It says, "Christ will inundate you with light." The Italian word here shares its history with our word for "flood, overflow, swamp."
When an Italian friend told us he was going to preach about light, I asked him about this phrase. He explained, "It means a tsunami of light." What an image! Christ does not give you a small sip of light, he pours it out on you in a wave more incredible than you could ever expect or imagine.

Years ago I asked my grandfather, a preacher, how he advised people to live. "Well," he said, "Jesus never said, 'Get the light,' or, 'Find the light,' or, 'Make the light.' Jesus said, 'You are the light.'" "I tell people, 'The light is already in you. Just get out of the way!'" The apostle Paul said it this way, "You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.for it is light that makes everything visible." (Ephesians 5:8-13)
Paul's next sentence after speaking of Christ's "tsunami of light" is simply, "Be very careful, then, how you live - not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil."

The world is dark but we have - we are - God's light. We can shine.

How can God use you this week to flood someone's life with light? Get out of the way!

Gary and Jennifer Williams
Florence Bible School
Italy