There comes a time for many when their self-help journey inevitably takes on a spiritual connotation given the extent to how deep their attempts to become the best version of themself go. Because of this, one's inherantly spiritual nature steps into the forefront and opens up a whole new world. A crossover if you will, between spirituality and self-help. Living in the Light: A Guide to Personal and Planetary Transformation is just that, but so much more. This is self-help for those who have realised the True Self, the bigger picture to life and reality. This is, Self-Help; for those that have realised the budding light within and wish to illuminate it to its full capacity. That is, to live in the Light. I found myself resonating deeply with Shakti's insights (having already experienced and implemented a select few through my own realisations) but also gaining new profound insights that I have already taken on and have since seen reflections in my life personally and collectively (in regards to other people, places and the world at large). For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Essentially, to be in darkness is to be ignorant of God and his Word and to practice rebellion in regards to those things. The world is darkness, but the believer is light. He knows the truth about creation, the gospel, and God, and he lives in view of these realities that the world rejects. God’s will never conflicts with his Word. God’s Word is the revelation of his character and being, and it trains the man of God for all righteousness (2 Tim 3:17). 2. Believers test and discern God’s will by putting God first in their lives. The penalty of wrath – that’s a third characteristic of one who is darkness; God’s penalty of wrath comes upon them. In Romans, chapter 1: “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness.” In other words, the wrath of God is going to come on sin. And it talks about, verse 21, the people it’s going to fall on are those whose foolish heart was darkened. Those who are the fools, you see. Those who exchange the truth for a lie; those who didn’t want to retain God in their knowledge and went over to ignorance, and who did all kinds of evil things. Those are the ones. Application Question: What fruit do you most desire to produce in your spiritual life and why? To Live in the Light, Believers Must Continually Discern What Pleases God Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. (Ephesians 5:11-12)This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. remain an objective observer of your thoughts, but listen to the voice that tells you to rest, eat, etc. for optimal functioning The interesting thing is that what we create within us is always mirrored outside of us. This is the law of the universe. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature. In other words, the ones being forgiven are the ones in the light. And that’s the whole point. As long as we are God’s children, God is light, light produces light, God’s children are light, and Matthew5:14 says it: “Ye are the light of the world.” We are called sons of light repeatedly in the New Testament. In 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, and verse 4: “Ye brethren, are not in darkness,” verse 5, “Ye are all sons of light.” If God is light, He gives birth to us, we become light, then, says Jesus, we are the light of the world. We walk in the light, we are the ones having fellowship, we are the ones being cleansed. The point is this is a definition of a Christian. A Christian is somebody inthe light. We don’t walk in darkness.

If you have the attitude that life is something that happens to you and that all you can do is make the best of it, living in the light will change that for good. Secondly, and this kind of builds on that, they are ruled by Satan - they are ruled by the prince of darkness, they are literally dominated by him. It isn’t just that they do his deeds, being his children – and by the way, that’s the whole point in the text here, if you’re the child of Satan, you will do the deeds of Satan; if you’re the child of God, you’ll do the deeds of God. They not only do the thing he wants, but they literally are ruled and dominated by Satan. It is hard for people to realize that. But you remember that in Colossians1 it says that you were taken out of the kingdom of darkness? It’s a kingdom. It has a hierarchy, and it has a ruler, and it’s Satan. And he is the one calling the shots. You say, “Well, I’m a Christian, what should characterize my life?” Goodness, righteousness, truth. Hmm - that’s terrific. You know, there were a lot of people, and still are, who claim to be in the light.“Oh yes, we’re in the light, we made a decision for Christ, we’ve been born again. Oh, I’ve been going to church for years. I’m very religious, very religious. I’ve given a lot of money to the church. I’ve been in a certain denomination since I was baptized, christened, confirmed, or who knows what. Oh yes, I remember when I received an award for learning the Bible.”You know, people have all that stuff, “I’m a church member.” But you know what the real test is? You see, the children of light are made manifest by the fruit of light. The children of light are made manifest by the fruit of light. There needs to be some fruit. That’s what he’s saying here. Scripture quotations marked KJV or AKJV are from the King James Version or Authorized (King James) Version of the Bible. Sadly, instead of being led by God’s peace, many are led by fear of the future, fear of what people think, or fear of failure. God works in our hearts to will and do of his good pleasure. He guides us by his peace, not by fear and anxiety. 5. Believers test and discern God’s will by considering the counsel of other believers.It desperately needs to be reproved. You see, you can’t just let it go on. It’s evil, it’s vile, the things they do are unspeakably evil, and this is the heart of God talking here. And here we are in our world, where we’re drowning in a sea of media stuff that pumps into us, that there’s no such thing as evil, and we say, “Well, it’s not so bad.” It’s evil. It shouldn’t even be talked about. It shouldn’t even be entertained in a conversation. It’s so wretched, and it needs to be dealt with and exposed. And yet sometimes, you know, by just turning on your television in your home, you expose your child to a tolerance of the very thing you shouldn’t even talk about; the thing that you should expose as evil. But also, in considering our hearts, we must consider whether or not we have peace, as this often is an indicator of God’s leading. Consider what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2:12-13:

In the same way, the light of a believer’s life often changes a work environment as sin is exposed and righteousness replaces it. It changes people’s lives as they repent and give their lives to Christ. Light is by nature more powerful than darkness. It changes environments and lives. The only Old Testament occurrence of this precise phrase is in Isaiah 2:5, “O house of Jacob, come and let us walk in the light of the Lord.” The Psalms contain similar phrases (56:13; 89:15), as does Isaiah (9:2; 50:10-11; 59:9). Are you willing to be different even if it means being considered strange or hated? 2. Believers expose darkness directly by words of correction. Agathos - you know what it means? It means overall, moral excellence, and one lexicon says especially active in behalf of others. It isn’t just free from defects, it isn’t just useful for certain things, it’s just good, and it touches everybody in that same way, with a very positive, moral, excellent effect. And that’s the word he uses here. This is what Paul meant in 1 Thessalonians5:15, when he said, “Just do good to everybody.” And I think this is the first element of the fruit of light, and that is that it touches other people with goodness. Look at yourself. If you’re a child of light you’re going to walk in light, and you’re going to walk as a child of light, then the first thing should be goodness in terms of others. Now when I went to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ and found that the Lord had opened a door for me, I still had no peace of mind, because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I said good-by to them and went on to Macedonia.Are you willing to expose sin through correction and sharing the gospel with others? 3. Believers expose darkness by not even talking about things that happen in the dark. Reach your highest potential and a deeper understanding of self with Deepak Chopra's groundbreaking guide to the philosophy and practice of Yoga. And so he says, “The prophet says, ‘Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.’” He puts Christ in Isaiah’s words, because Christ is the fulfillment. May I add this? Most Bible commentators believe that this is a line from an Easter hymn sung by the early church – a line from an Easter hymn. It’s an invitation. Somebody may be sitting in our congregation right now and saying, “Well, I guess I’m in the darkness. I look at my life and I don’t see goodness and righteousness and truth. I don’t see Jesus Christ alive in my life. I’ve never known God. I’m in the dark intellectually, and I see moral evil on every hand.” In human evolution, it seems that as our rational capacity has evolved, we’ve grown increasingly fearful of the other aspects of our nature. The same hell will be occupied by people who were Satan-energized in gray flannel suits as it will be by witchdoctors from Bula-Bula land. You see, it’s only a matter of expression. And so they do the works of Satan. And people who are darkness function in the deeds of darkness, the unfruitful works of darkness, the works of Satan.

In John, chapter 12, verse 35, our Lord had just presented Himself as the light, and He said, “You’d better respond to the light while you have the light, because a little while you won’t have the light and darkness will come upon you and you won’t know where to go. While you have the light,” He says in verse 36 of John12, “Believe in the light that you may be the sons of light.” He gave them a message. But they didn’t believe. It says in the next verse “they believed not.” And then He said, “Well, then this is what Isaiah says; ‘He’s blinded their eyes, hardened their heart, they should not see with their eyes or understand with their heart, be converted and I should heal them.’” In other words, where you say to yourself, “I will not believe,” God then says judicially, “You cannot believe.”You come under divine judgment. Many times it will simply be the fact that believers do not curse, cheat, get drunk, have sex outside marriage, or lie that exposes the sin in others’ lives. A life of light exposes the sin of those around it. The rebuke of the light typically invokes either desire to change or anger. First Peter 4:3-4 says: Piper here exposes us to the power of the Word. He helps open our ears to sober and solemn warnings. He also helps us embrace encouragements that shine with the promises of God. This book is about money, sex, and power. It is of course ultimately and wonderfully about the supremely satisfying and shining glory of God in Christ. A great read into cultivating a 'bigger picture' means of composing oneself in this world, through alignment with ones Higher Self for the betterment of each of us as individuals and by implication, a collective. A definite step in the right directionBut everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes everything visible. (Ephesians 5:13) Application Questions: In what ways are you tempted to hide your light? In what ways do you believe God is calling you to place your light in the most effective location? To Live in the Light, Believers Must Produce the Fruit of Light For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry. They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you. In chapter 2, verse 12, he says, “You were without Christ, you were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: But now,” verse 13, “in Christ Jesus.” See. So many times in Ephesians, you’ve got a “you were, but you are.” And by the way, beloved, that’s all the way through the New Testament. You were, now you are - so live what you are. That, in fact, could be stated as the thesis of the epistles of the New Testament. You were, now you are - live what you are. That’s all he’s saying. Now, I want you to notice something very interesting in Ephesians5:8.“You were once darkness.” Did you note that he didn’t say you were in darkness? He says you were darkness.