Waking Up to God

Sometimes the warm cocoon of bedding is nearly impossible to leave.  When the alarm clock rings its obnoxious clatter in a concerted effort to either wake me up or just make me angry.  Often times it feels more like the latter, and I would rather just stay in bed, holed up against the world hidden behind a covering of blanketed bliss.  Unfortunately, as much as any of us would prefer to remain cuddled in a cocoon of covers, life persistently calls us to crawl out and meet the day.

This seems a most appropriate metaphor for belief.  Though we would rather hang around in the coma of comfort behind the veil of sinful slumber, God beckons the unbeliever to leave their state of eternal night and to step into the eternal light of His glory.  The fleshly, natural self is asleep (dead) to God because of sin.  But God calls for us to awaken.

Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians, speaks to this regard.  He paraphrases Isaiah, "Awake, O Sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine upon you (Eph. 5:14)."  This is fundamental.  God desires to light our lives, to illuminate us with the glory of His majesty.  However, unless we, by faith, crawl out of our comatose cocoons of sinful slumber, we will be ever-unable to receive Him.

In a sense, we have an advocating heavenly alarm clock in the Holy Spirit who is ringing in an effort to prompt us to awaken from our sin.  And, like being awoken in the morning, we have a choice to make: will we either hit the snooze and pull the covers of unbelief over our heads to sleep for all eternity in hell, or will we heed to the prompting of God and awake to meet His day and His light?  These are the two choices, and they have everlasting consequences.  We should be compelled to awaken so as to embrace the day that the Lord has made, which is belief in the Son, Christ Jesus.

A brief note is in order for those who have already chosen the latter.  For those of who have already made our choice to awake from our sinful slumbers and to leave the ignorant envelop of our walking death, there is a sincere and distinct task to wake up those who are still asleep.  It is our obligation to the world to, by the empowering of the Holy Spirit, announce that the day has come in Christ Jesus and that everyone should be made awake in order to leave the darkness of death and to live in the light of the Lord.  Let us then take seriously the call to awaken to the Lord and to wake others up too!