For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light. Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.

See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. (Ephesians 5:8-16 KJV)

I’ve been reviewing the screenplay for my novel, Saint Ben and reminding myself of the passage in Ephesians that contains the admonishment, “Awake thou that sleepest,” that began an array of pranks that two 10-year-old boys played on Ben’s father who was the pastor of the Colorado Avenue Standard Christian Church in 1958. The passage from which it was taken is quoted above and is in the King James Version because in 1958, that was the only version of the scriptures commonly used. The prank the boys pulled was to set off a loud alarm clock in the front of the church precisely as the pastor read, “Awake thou that sleepest.”

What they didn’t know was that the pastor had already planned to raise his voice on “Awake thou that sleepest,” anyway, and Ben found a microphone backstage that he put up to the alarm clock, so the end result was to literally shake people out of their pews and make it seem like the whole thing was planned.

As I revisited this passage, I was amazed at how relevant it is today, even in King James English. These are indeed evil days and the necessity is to be redeeming the time — making the time count for the kingdom of God.

The important thing here is to realize that God has given us an assignment to fulfill in evil days. He has given us a task of reproving (exposing) the unfruitful works of darkness that are done in shame and in secret. He wants us interacting with the culture around us, pointing out what is wrong and calling a spade a spade. And we do this by bringing out the truth and the error by the light that lives in us because we are children of light. Not only are we called to not participate in these unfruitful works of darkness, but to expose them — to call them out. And to do that, we must be awake to what is going on.

I think that sometimes we think we are simply not to have anything to do with evil, but this passage goes on to say that we are to expose it and hold it up to the truth. It’s the light in us that will do this. Sometimes we might not even be aware of the light we bring into the world, but that’s even more of a reason to be awake.

So “AWAKE THOU THAT SLEEPEST … and Christ shall give thee light,” and that light will make a difference. We have a job to do; no sleeping on the job.