A Thought on Paper

A quick thought:
I was talking about the brightness of white paper with Tim today (don't worry it was in jest, we weren't seriously talking about paper brightness) and a thought struck me as I drove home. What defines the brightness of the paper isn't anything intrinsic about the paper itself. In other words, the brightness of the paper doesn't eminate from the paper like it would from a light bulb. Instead the brightness of paper is measured by how much light it reflects. The more light it reflects, the brighter it is considered. This is like us. We are not holy or righteous intrinsically. We have none on our own. The depth of our holiness and righteousness can only be measured by how much and how accurately we reflect the Light. Our righteousness is not our own, it comes from an outside Source. "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." Christ is the source of our righteousness. The depth to which the world sees this righteousness depends on how well we reflect Christ. Now, I'm assuming some things here, but I think that one of the things that would reduce the brightness of paper would be impurities in it. If I'm right, then the analogy becomes even more vivid. What reduces our ability to reflect the Light is our impurities. The more pure we are, the more capable we are of reflecting Christ. This brightness must also be seen. When light strikes a piece of paper that light reflects back to our eyes and it is there that we see the brightness. As Christians, we receive our brightness from Christ, but that brightness doesn't stop with us, it reflects back to the eyes of the world. We are witnesses to the glory of God and God has chosen us to reveal Him to the world. We need to be an accurate representation of the Light and be bright. Our impurities must be removed so that we can be sine cere and demonstrate Christ to the world.