November 3, 2023 … Reflecting His Light …

November 3, 2023 … Reflecting His Light …   

Devotional Song: ... GO TO THIS LINK ...  Please take the time to take in this song with lyrics from the group Elevation Worship singing … Shine A Light …  Powerfully singing of how all Christians are called to shine Christ’s light into this ever darkening world. .    

============        

Highlight Passage: … Matthew 5:14a [NLT] …

14 “You are the light of the world -   

… Jesus proclaims that His disciples become the “light of the world.”  

Highlight Passage (Context): … Matthew 5:14-16 [NLT] …  USE THIS LINK …  

… Jesus teaches to His followers that His followers become the Light of the world and are called by the Lord to shine that light with their (our) good deeds. 

===============                                                                 .                                                                                                                                             

Reference Passage: … John 8:12 [NLT] …  

12 Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.”   

… Jesus that His faithful followers will carry His light into the darkness of the world, leading the lost to eternal life.                      

Reference Passage: … Philippians 2:3-5 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK … 

… The Apostle Paul teaches fellow Christians that we must become more like Christ to share His light and life with others.  

Reference Passage: … Colossians 3:10 [NLT] …  

10 Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like Him. 

… The Apostle Paul exhorts fellow Christians to become more and more like Christ to be able to show His image (i.e., His glorious light) to a dark and sinful world.           

Reference Passage: … 1John 1:5 [NLT] …  

5 This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in Him at all.  

… God’s call, thru John, is for fellow Christians to recognize that God is light and has no darkness in Him; and so, we have His light in us as we surrender and follow Him.     

                                                                              

My Devotional Journal: Today's Our Daily Bread author, Xochitl Dixon … AT THIS LINK …    tells of being upset with her mother and writing her a note, trying to express the author’s feelings, yet tinged with love, ….  which caused the author’s  mom to write back to the her saying, …  “You’ve changed!”  And that led to interaction which ultimately led the ODB author’s mother to receive the Lord as her Savior.       

Oh how I identify with that scenario.  Some time after I went from angry atheist to a follower of Christ, I realized that my dad, who was an Elder in our home church, was actually lost (long story).  So, I began writing my dad about my relationship with Christ and how God’s love and grace had been a light for me to follow. Well, tho my dad was well into his 70s, he wrote me a letter, telling me that he had prayed to receive Christ as his Savior.  And immediately I noted a change in my dad, … like a light had be switched on … with him becoming more loving to my mother whom he had to care for with here heart disease’ and all of his former racist attitudes and crude jokes simply disappeared from his speech.  

So, I realized that my sharing what Christ had done to shine HIs light for me to follow Him was reflected  to my father by simply shining that light thru my testimony to my father.   How can we be Christ’s light today as we interact with a very dark world?  Let’s go be His light today and see what happens!    

   

My THANKFULNESS: ... Oh, Abba Father, thank You, King Jesus, … for shining Your light thru me as I walk in this very dark world.                                                

My Prayer Today: Oh Abba Father, ... King Jesus, ... . I pray. again today, that all reading here will join me, … to shine our light - Your Light, Lord - as we walk into the darkness of this world.   … Amen 

=============

Blogger Note:  Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled “Our Daily Bread,” distributed online via email by RBC Ministries.  If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.