Filled Up with Light

You aren’t giving up on us, are you, God?
    refusing to go out with our troops?
Give us help for the hard task;
    human help is worthless.
In God we’ll do our very best;
    he’ll flatten the opposition for good.

(Psalm 60:10-13, The Message) 

Nebuchadnezzar then approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!”

So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire, and the satraps, prefects, governors and royal advisers crowded around them. They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them.

(Daniel 3:26-27, NIV) 

Remember, our Message is not about ourselves; we’re proclaiming Jesus Christ, the Master. All we are is messengers, errand runners from Jesus for you. It started when God said, “Light up the darkness!” and our lives filled up with light as we saw and understood God in the face of Christ, all bright and beautiful.
If you only look at us, you might well miss the brightness. We carry this precious Message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives.

(2 Corinthians 4:5-7, The Message) 

 

A terrible fire ravaged the whole building, and when, afterwards, she went back to inspect the remains of her office all she could do was shake her head and be grateful that she had not been in the building at the time. Certainly none of the files of papers had survived. 

 

With one backward glance her eyes fell on a tiny blackened vase still standing on the charred remains of her desk. She had a new office now in a different place it was able to move in there instead. Well, little vase, she said, you and me have survived and you shall come with me into my new office. 

 

It stood in the usual place on the corner of her new desk, but when people came in she noticed a difference in their reaction. Before they would say, 

'Oh, what a beautiful vase.'

Now, since it had been through the fire, they said, 

'Oh, what beautiful flowers.'

(Northumbrian Aiden readings, Dec.17)