He Shines, I Shine
2 Thessalonians 1:11-12 Amplified Bible (AMP)
11 With this in view we constantly pray for you, that our God may deem and count you worthy of [your] calling and [His] every gracious purpose of goodness, and with power may complete in [your] every particular work of faith (faith which is that leaning of the whole human personality on God in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness).12 Thus may the name of our Lord Jesus Christ be glorified and become more glorious through and in you, and may you [also be glorified] in Him according to the grace (favor and blessing) of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).
I remember having a conversation with a young lady a few years back and during the course of this lengthy conversation, she kept saying, I can’t let nobody take my shine, no one can have my shine; she was upset because someone very close to her was trying to steal what she valued most which was her “shine.” Well, of course I understood that shine was her presence, her persona, her popularity of sorts, her thunder, her attention and her glory. She had placed such value on her shine that the thought of someone trying to bring her down off her high on herself. As I sat and listened, my heart was a bit saddened that it seems that so many of our young people depend on their ability to make a name for themselves and have a place that exalts them above others. Sadder still as I listened it was revealed that the person attempted to outshine her was someone that she should have looked to for guidance and as a role model; which lead me to understand that this phenomenon is not restricted to our youth and young people that some of us adults are caught up too!
We often get caught up in the hype of a position, of a calling, a career, and a name and instead of drawing the attention to God; we want the spotlight on us. We are making a name for ourselves instead of the Kingdom of God. We have allowed the world’s influence to infiltrate our service to God and to man. We have taken social media, and often our church affiliations and even the pulpit at times and made it our platform for it to become about us, about our shine, our popularity and acceptance and not bringing Glory to God and allowing those we encounter to see the God in us, so that He first gets the Glory. There is never a day that someone on social media is not putting themselves on a pedestal for something they feel was a good deed, or something they got right. We have taken to needing the world to tell us we are great, and that we have done a good job, instead of allowing God to lift us up and give us our reward. We have totally missed God’s laws and principles, if we lift Him and draw all men unto Him, He gets the glory and He rewards us for our loyalty and faithfulness. If we delight ourselves in Him, He gives us the desires of our hearts; God asks us to seek Him first and then ALL these things will be added unto us.
Matthew 6:1 reminds us of this principle, “Take care not to do your good deeds publicly or before men, in order to be seen by them; otherwise you will have no reward [[a]reserved for and awaiting you] with and from your Father Who is in heaven.” If we were more Kingdom minded we would understand that when we are in Christ and serving God and doing all, for the cause of Christ that His shine is our shine and that we are seated in Heavenly places with Him. If we worship and serve Him and bless Him for all that we have, there will be no sickness among, us no barrenness in our land (not just physical barrenness, but economic, relational, etc.), and the number of our days God will fulfill. God will give us more shine than we know what to do with, if we would take a minute and stop trying to create an arena for ourselves and lift Him up instead. Let’s really live for the cause of Christ, so that He will shine bright and we will too, because He shines first!
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