At the beginning of this year, there was a powerful declaration over your life. God called this year your year of light. This is not a theme or a nice phrase for you to hear. It is a declaration about your identity in Christ and what He intended for you to do this year.

You understand that light is not passive. Light does not sit in a corner and wait to be noticed. The very nature of light is that when it enters a space, everything in that space has to respond to it. That is who you are. And God has deposited in you the power you need to stand out, spread and transform spaces.

But is that light still shining the way it was in January? Because somewhere between the start of this year and right now, for a lot of people, what began as a burning hunger and fire has turned quiet. It is possible that compared to the start of the year, you have dropped those plans you had on the shelf, and even the prayers you pray now have nothing concerning God’s word for you in them.  And slowly, without even realising it, the power and capacity to do great exploits that you have received and have been placed inside you has been lying there, and not active. 

Today is your reminder. The year is not over, and what God said still stands. What He placed inside you has not gone anywhere; it is time to stop letting it lie dormant. Understand that every sermon you received, every prayer you prayed, every encounter with the Word of God, all of it was being stored up and has shaped you and enabled you for more.

Ephesians 3:20 says
New King James Version‬‬
20 Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, 

The Greek word apostle Paul uses for power here is “dunamis”, the same root word we get dynamite from. And what is significant about dynamite is not how it looks on the outside. You could hold it in your hand and feel nothing threatening about it at all. But inside that small, unassuming thing is the ability to bring down an entire structure. 

That is the picture of what God placed in you. Not a power that depends on how you feel when you wake up or how you feel due to the stress of work.  It is a power that is there consistently.

This year of light is not asking you to find something new. It is asking you to wake up to what has been inside you all along.

The book of Daniel helps us understand something important. The darkness in the world is not random. It is not just bad circumstances happening. Behind what looks like ordinary politics or a bad economy, there are often spiritual forces at work. “But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days…”‭‭ (Daniel 10:13)

The prince of Persia who came against Daniel’s prayer was not a man. 

This is what makes your light so significant. You are a carrier of divine power in a world that has been organised, in many places, to keep people bound. And the power that is inside you, that dunamis, is the very thing that those spiritual structures cannot withstand. Light that stays hidden does shine against darkness. God has given you everything you need for this year but it requires you to stop sitting on it.

In 1 Corinthians 12:1, Paul writes
New King James Version‬‬
1 Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant: 

Apostle Paul was writing to a church. And the word he uses for ignorant means choosing to keep yourself at a distance from something or being uninformed. Paul says that it is not acceptable. The world you have been sent into is too dark and organised for you to show up without taking advantage of the capacity God has given you. Talent will take you far, and even your hard work will open doors, but some things you’ll face here on earth will not respond to any of that. They will only respond to power. And you have it. 

In the Old Testament, when Moses stood before Pharaoh, the dialogue and persistent talk didn’t do much; his heart was hardened. What finally made Pharaoh release God’s people was the undeniable, repeated demonstration of power that Pharaoh could not match.

Some things in your life right now are in that same place. You have been patient, and you have done the right things. You have been qualified and prepared and faithful, and yet the situation has not shifted. Sometimes the issue is not your character or your effort. Sometimes what is in front of you will not move until he sees the light you are carrying, expressed in power.

There are doors in your career, in your relationships, in your city that are waiting for the light you carry to be released. The power God placed in you at the start of this year has not left. The light has not gone out. But for many, the flame has gotten low. 

Paul writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:6
New King James Version‬‬
6 Therefore I remind you to stir up the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 

The picture behind the phrase “stir up”  is someone kneeling beside a fire that has gotten low and is deliberately, intentionally fanning it. Feeding it and refusing to let it die. Because the fire is still there. 

That is what this moment is. God is asking you to fan the flame. To go back to what you were believing for at the start of this year. To pick up the plans that you have put aside. To pray the prayers that you have yourself to at the start of this year and stir up more hunger inside of you.

That is the word for today. Go back to what God said in January. Go back to the expectation that something significant was going to happen this year.

Someone like Daniel did not just survive Babylon. He outlasted kings and confounded the wisest men in the land. He walked out of a lion’s den untouched. He was set apart, and the light of God in him was not dormant. It produced results, and it made kings declare the power of the God of Daniel. That is the life you have been called to. You have been called to be the light of the world, you carry a power that cannot be ignored.

So fan the flame. Retrace your steps today. The world that you’ve been placed in needs to see your light. There are places where the darkness needs to be subdued. Walk in power and live truly like it’s your year of light.

Prayer Point
Father, I thank You for this year of light. Today, I go back to the plans and the prayers I started this year with. I declare that the power inside me is stirred up right now. I burn brighter, and it is evident in every space I occupy.