For His Glory

I've been writing about the "Light of the World" this week. It's gone differently than I expected. God, thankfully, rearranged my mind and gave me better, more truthful direction that what I had intended.

While writing about it, I have been so humbled by holiness, so I wanted to write down this thought.

I remember the first time I saw my engagement ring. Even though I had picked out the setting (yes, I am that girl) it was more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. But as I have been focused on Light, lately, it occurred to me that I would have been unable to recognize the beauty of the thing if Andy had given it to me in the darkness. Afterall, it's the light reflecting and refracting off a diamond that gives it its brilliance.

The thought developed further- now that I have had my diamond for over a year, there are times that it gets dirty. When that happens, its brilliance is reduced, even if the light with which I view it is steady. It's then that I need to take it to be cleaned (or clean it myself with toothpaste, a trick I learned in Real Simple)

How similar we are as children of God. Perfectly cut creations, designed by a Master. He meant for us to reflect His Light, to shine, to reveal His glory. But we are so often hiding from Him. Like Paul said, we are afraid of the light because our deeds are evil. We fear exposure because we don't realize that we were made to shine.

The light reveals our sin and toothpaste is no help in removing such a thing. We cannot shine well then either. We need to be cleaned professionally.

But we were made for brilliance. We were made for Light. We were meant to reflect it. So no matter how much we avoid light, no matter how much we don't deserve to be made clean, it's His desire to make us shine.

I praise God for that today. I praise Him for shining light into my life, revealing sin, calling me to repentance. Search me, Oh God, know my heart. Get every angle. Make it shine. For Your glory, Lord, for Your glory.