Shining Light: a word for christmas

12 Dec 2016

Everyone is familiar with the Christmas gospel. you know "In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were mad,e without him nothing was made which has been made. In him was life and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it."




This is one of the most famous passages in the Bible and we read it every Christmas without fail, It talks about Jesus being God and being with God at the very beginning and it refers to him as "the light" Light is such an exciting phenomenon and as a science student I've studied light for at least 5  years of my life and I still get amazed by how something can travel 8000000 metres in a second when I can barely travel one!

Light is mentioned 272 times in the Bible which shows just how important it is the first words spoken by God in the Bible are "Let there be light" Which makes it even more exciting when he sent the light down to redeem the Earth because he was returning it to its original glory. We get light wherever we go it's almost impossible to escape light, Even in the darkest depths of the ocean where it is pitch black the angler fish, you may remember it from Finding Nemo, provides its own light. In that 'light' this is what we should be doing as Christians, we are called to be the salt and the light of the Earth to reflect the light that Jesus shows.

We so often have the picture of light as something that lights our path and brings hope to dark situations but I was recently challenged by the fact that light also comes to disturb. A small beam of light sneaking through your curtains could be enough to stir you from your sleep. In the same way Jesus comes into our hearts, yes to bring us peace, but also to disturb. If the spirit isn't disturbing our hearts, alerting us if we do something we know we shouldn't and in disturbing us pointing us in the right direction,

My prayer this Christmas is that the Holy Spirit keeps disturbing me and keeps me going in the right direction in Gid's great plan for my life which all began at the birth of his Son, Jesus of Nazareth.