Jesus says in Matt. 5: 16 “Let your light so shine before men…”
We can shine academically, when we get good grades and do well in our studies. We can shine in our work: Achieving goals, good time keeping, good attendance. There are many ways in which we can shine, but there is only one way we can so shine before men that they see our good works and glorify our Father in heaven.
The only good light we have has come from God, and now we have a command to let our light shine.
How we do that is by firstly having the beatitudes, or beautiful attitudes in our lives that Jesus had just spoken about in verses 3 – 10. We do that by reading God’s word daily, meditating on the words we’ve read, and allowing His word to penetrate our souls.
Secondly we have to live out those attitudes. We have to put them into practice in our lives every day. We have to make a decision to purposefully put our own feelings and thoughts to one side, and then acting upon the word that is in us.
This is very hard to do at first, but like all things, the more we practice, the better we become.
This is being changed from glory to glory. This is fulfilling the command from the Apostle Peter when he said, “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light” (1 Pet. 2: 9)