Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Life more abundantly...


This morning's sunrise

"...There is no other way to the happiness for which we were made. Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand by the fire: if you want to get wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prize which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united with God, how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?"
C.S. Lewis from Mere Christianity

This morning's sunset changed moment by moment according to the movement of the sun, the light source. Within ten minutes of taking this picture the sky became a plain blue, still beautiful,but lacking the intensity it held only moments ago.

I know that it is the same with my relationship with God. It is possible, even as a Christian, to hide from the light source and walk a shadowed road, never stepping out from under the trees to allow His light to change my life and make it brilliant. I have to stand in a place where I receive His light in order for my life to be illuminated by it. This allows the life that I lead to become worthwhile. Jesus said:
"I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly."
John 10:10

Standing in the full light is where our lives are brightened and made into something extraordinary.