Awake, O Sleeper

And rise from the dead

Sep 03, 2023

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AWAKE, O SLEEPER

How early Christians have historically spoken of death is fascinating to me. We read of the way they looked straight at it without intimidation, many times. They were also people just like us - just like us - but having relatives killed for the faith, or living in a town that is next on the map for persecution, or having to gather in catacombs will alter one’s point of view, I imagine.

I sit at a table with amber-colored electric light bathing me, a cup of coffee (sweetened condensed added if it’s a K-cup), and family members beside. I can attend any service I want to. I have access to video archives of awesome services, texts from spiritual heroes, and a very nice copy of the scriptures.

Still, with every advantage, I slumber.

So many witnesses to the truth of Jesus, and I slumber.

I get accustomed to everyday life, much of it repetitious. My eyes glaze over. I go through the motions. I forget my wedding garments. I assume I have enough oil. I hear a knocking at the door, but I slide into sleep.

The following section of scripture was written to a specific audience and refers to various things that they should do and things to shun. But the end captivates me.

In that scripture, I see a picture of baptism and of resurrection. I see the prodigal. I also see a culture on fire without care for what has come before and why such a thing should even matter. Eyelids get heavy. If the owner of the house knew when the thief was coming, he would prepare. Shhh. Sleep. If the parents trusted the scriptures, they would not have entrusted themselves and their families to this culture. Sleep, now. It’s ok.

Cardi has previously defended the song as not being overly explicit within the context of the hip-hop, calling out a double standard in the genre. "The people that the song bothers are usually conservatives or really religious people, but my thing is I grew up listening to this type of music," Cardi said on The Kyle and Jackie O Show at the time. "Other people might think it's strange and vulgar, but to me, it's almost like really normal, you know what I'm saying?"1

Go to sleep. You are so tired. Everything is fine. Hush, hush, now. Everything is fine…

SCRIPTURE

Ephesians 5:1–14

[1] Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. [2] And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

[3] But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. [4] Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. [5] For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. [6] Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. [7] Therefore do not become partners with them; [8] for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light [9] (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), [10] and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. [11] Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. [12] For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. [13] But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, [14] for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says,

“Awake, O sleeper,

and arise from the dead,

and Christ will shine on you.” (ESV)

PATRISTICS

Here, Jerome talks about the part of the verse that isn’t referenced in scripture.

Therefore He says: "Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light." - Ephesians 5:14

The one who is content with a simple answer will say indeed that Paul must have read this phrase in some arcane prophet or in the writings called apocryphal. He then brought the text into the open, as he manifestly does in other places—not to substantiate the apocryphal texts but in the same way that he makes use of verses elsewhere from Aratus, Epimenides and Menander to substantiate what he says on other occasions…. Someone less content with this simple answer might argue that the apostle said this as an exhortation to penitence. It is as if he were assuming the voice of the Holy Spirit. For my part, scanty as my knowledge is, I have nowhere found this written after diligently scouring all the editions of the ancient Scriptures and the texts of the Hebrews themselves.2

- Jerome (around 420 AD)

MODERN WITNESSES

Watchman Nee

I can clarify my point with an illustration. The many sins are like the fruit of a tree. They exist individually, and a tree can bear one or two hundred of them. This is how sins are. Sin, on the other hand, is like the tree itself. What we the sinners see with our eyes is the fruit. We realize that the fruits are bad, but we do not see that the tree is just as bad. The fruits are bad because the tree is bad. This is how God teaches us to understand the problem of sin. At the beginning He shows us the individual sins. In the end, He shows us ourselves. At the beginning we need forgiveness because we have committed sins. But after a while we realize that we need to be freed because we are sinners.3

POEM

God's Grandeur

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.

It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;

It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.4

C.S. Lewis

(From the Screwtape Letters. Please read this if you haven’t. You MUST know this book where an experienced demon trains a younger demon. The last three sentences here are gold.)

“My Dear Wormwood,

A few weeks ago you had to tempt your patient to unreality and inattention in his prayers: but now you will find him opening his arms to you and almost begging you to distract his purpose and benumb his heart.

He will want his prayers to be unreal, for he will dread nothing so much as effective contact with the Enemy. His aim will be to let sleeping worms lie.

As this condition becomes more fully established, you will be gradually freed from the tiresome business of providing Pleasures as temptations.

As the uneasiness and his reluctance to face it cut him off more and more from all real happiness, and as habit renders the pleasures of vanity and excitement and flippancy at once less pleasant and harder to forgo (for that is what habit fortunately does to a pleasure) you will find that anything or nothing is sufficient to attract his wandering attention.

You no longer need a good book, which he really likes, to keep him from his prayers or his work or his sleep; a column of advertisements in yesterday’s paper will do.

You can make him waste his time not only in conversation he enjoys with people whom he likes, but in conversations with those he cares nothing about on subjects that bore him.

You can make him do nothing at all for long periods…

The Christians describe the Enemy as one ‘without whom Nothing is strong’.

And Nothing is very strong: strong enough to steal away a man’s best years not in sweet sins but in a dreary flickering of the mind over it knows not what and knows not why, in the gratification of curiosities so feeble that the man is only half aware of them, in drumming of fingers and kicking of heels, in whistling tunes that he does not like, or in the long, dim labyrinth of reveries that have not even lust or ambition to give them a relish, but which, once chance association has started them, the creature is too weak and fuddled to shake off.

You will say that these are very small sins; and doubtless, like all young tempters, you are anxious to be able to report spectacular wickedness.

But do remember, the only thing that matters is the extent to which you separate the man from the Enemy.

It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing. Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick.

Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one— the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts,

Your affectionate uncle,

SCREWTAPE”5

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SONG

(Imagine being in 6th century Ireland. Dang.)

Be Thou My Vision

Attributed to Dallán Forgaill

Alternative English version by Eleanor Hull (1912)

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Be all else but naught to me, save that Thou art;
Be Thou my best thought in the day and the night,
Both waking and sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
Be Thou ever with me, and I with Thee, Lord;
Be Thou my great Father, and I Thy true son;
Be Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my Breastplate, my Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my whole Armor, be Thou my true Might;
Be Thou my soul's Shelter, be Thou my strong Tow’r,
O raise Thou me heav’nward, great Pow’r of my pow’r.

Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise;
Be Thou mine inheritance, now and always;
Be Thou and Thou only the first in my heart,
O high King of heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of heaven, Thou heaven's bright Sun,
O grant me its joys, after vict'ry is won;
Great Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be Thou my vision, O Ruler of all.6

This is an incredible map. You should explore the high-res version by clicking the picture above or using the link below.