Thoughts for the Day

‘No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar, but on the lampstand so that those who enter may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your body. If your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light; but if it is not healthy, your body is full of darkness. Therefore consider whether the light in you is not darkness. If then your whole body is full of light, with no part of it in darkness, it will be as full of light as when a lamp gives you light with its rays.’

(Lectionary, New Revised Standard Version)

Thoughts

'Light' and 'eyes' play a big part in our bible. I have previously looked at Jesus' words about not hiding a light, in other words simply put, our faith should show itself in the way we live our life and should not be hidden. But the second part of the parable says something different. In Luke's account Jesus says "Your eye is the lamp of your body." What does this mean?

Human anatomy says that light travels in a straight line from something like the sun or a light bulb, and that when it hits an object it is reflected by that object back to our eyes. Our eyes take in the light as well as other information and send it to our brain, which is how we see the object. If our eye is healthy then we get all the light we need to see the object, but if the eye is diseased then the light turns to darkness. Jesus uses this idea to speak of goodness and evil. When a person is tuned into God they are full of light, and there is no room for darkness, that is no room for evil. Instead we shine forth goodness into our world.

When speaking about the task God gave him to carry out St Paul says that he was sent to the gentiles "to open the eyes (of the gentiles) so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God."

Lord Jesus Christ,
keep us ever able to reflect
Your goodness and truth
in all that we do and say.
May we be ever open to the
work of the Holy Spirit
in our life
and strong enough to
reject all that is evil
and unworthy of You.
Amen.