Plugged In | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: Plugged In | Previous Challenge Entry
By Naoma Bird
01/17/24
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Plugged In

In the earlier years of our marriage, my husband and I settled in a small town in the country. We loved the quieter life and the friendly people. We were in a valley surrounded by the beautiful hills of Pennsylvania. There were country roads we could take walks on, streams to fish for trout in, as well as beautiful wildflowers and wildlife to enjoy. Our bird feeders were frequented by all different kinds of birds, a few squirrels, and an occasional bear. Our children could walk to school and the playground and knew all the kids in the neighborhood. In the summer they would all join up and play a game they called “Kick the Can” until we would go out front and whistle, our signal that it was time to come home for supper. We loved our little town!

As you know there is an upside and a downside to every story.

In our little town, we would often have power outages. The outages could mean we’d experience a complete loss of power or sometimes what they called “brownouts,” where the power wasn’t completely cut off but was weak. They could be due to wind and rain or snow storms that caused downed wires. Sometimes it would be from a squirrel that had gotten into a transformer and chewed wires shorting it out. Once, lightning struck and destroyed a transformer and half the town found themselves in the dark.

Most folks in town kept a box of white utility candles and matches on hand (we were in this group), or flashlights and batteries. Some were fortunate enough to have a generator that ran on gasoline in their garage. Friends and neighbors would check in on the newer folks in town who found themselves powerless and in the dark and provided them with what they needed to bring in some light until the power came back on.

Many people today, from all over the world and from all walks of life, find themselves in the dark due to power failures. But worse yet, some are living in spiritual darkness because they don’t know the one source of spiritual power that never fails. They go through the storms of life in the dark because they’ve never made that connection with the true source of light (or once having experienced that source, have let sin create a block or disconnect between them and their power source), who is Christ Jesus.

Jesus tells us “You are the light of the world.” (Matthew 5:14) When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

Our connection, our source for this energy that shines in this world isn't ours, but is the light of Christ. God’s desire is for us to take His light that’s in us into the dark places in our world, wherever that may be. As we walk in his light, allowing it to shine through our good works, kindness, compassion, forgiveness, and love for all people, it brings his light into the darkness. To do that we must constantly be plugged into our source of power. God will draw people into that light. We are not to let the things of this world short-circuit our Transformer, who is Jesus, and hinder us from shining his light. Instead, we are to let it shine in our world, allowing God’s light to shine in that darkness in all we do, wherever we are, not for our praise or glory, but for the praise and glory of God.

God first called the people of Israel to be a blessing to the nations (Gen. 28:14). The New Testament believers, having been grafted into God’s family through Christ, are also his chosen, royal, and holy people (Romans 11:11-24). We have the call and opportunity to represent him to those in this lost and dying world of darkness and be a blessing to the nations.

For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Ephesians 5:8-10

*All Scripture from NIV
*Non fiction

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