AWAKE AND ARISE!

“…Therefore it is said, ’Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light.’ Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart, always and for everything giving thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father.” (Eph 5: 14-20)

Here’s a helpful passage for those of us who sometimes wake up before the alarm-clock goes off, and then proceed to lie there, thinking this and that, in the darkness of the early morning. I find this is not a good idea, to let myself lie there and think. It’s a better idea to pray, letting God into my day as soon as possible. Why? Because my own thoughts, when divorced from prayer in my most vulnerable moments, like the early morning, tend toward various forms of darkness and merely-human fears. “Awake, O sleeper,” the Apostle tells me in these moments, “and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light.”

So let me not be alone with my thoughts today, because I don’t have to be. I can let God into the picture, reconnecting with Him in some heartfelt prayer, “always and for everything giving thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father.” Amen!