Monday, December 10, 2018

Luke 11:33-36 -- On Internal Light and Darkness

"No man, when he hath lighted a candle, putteth it in a secret place, neither under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that they which come in may see the light.
The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness.
Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness.
If thy whole body therefore be full of light, having no part dark, the whole shall be full of light, as when the bright shining of a candle doth give thee light."
Luke 11:33-36


I like this discussion of light and darkness and I think that there is a lot of symbolism here that is interesting.  The first verse seems to be talking about how we sometimes hide the light within us, or hide the gospel in our lives, either by not exercising our talents or serving others in the unique ways that we can, but also that we sometimes seem to be embarrassed of God, and hide the fact that we are members of his church from our friends or family rather than being happy and open about that part of our lives.

The other verses seem symbolically to be making commentary on how we perceive things and also what we allow in our lives.  Our eyes being evil could be looking at the world and expecting bad and evil things... and so that is what we see and what we find in the world around us, whereas if we look for the good, we will find it, and the world around us will seem much better.   The part about taking heed that our light isn't dark could also be about that, but I think it also adds the idea that C.S. Lewis expressed well in this quotation: "If we insist on keeping Hell (or even earth) we shall not see Heaven: if we accept Heaven we shall not be able to retain even the smallest and most intimate souvenirs of Hell."

Today, let's embrace the light--glorifying and acknowledging God in our lives, and also looking for the good.  Let's let go of the souvenirs of hell that we've picked up along the way.  Let's banish the darkness from our lives by going all in with God and filling ourselves 100% with light.

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