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Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the LORD is risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the LORD shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee” Isaiah60:1-2

You are saved to shine; you are justified to be glorified. Darkness may cover the earth, gross darkness may cover the nations but your God cannot abandon you. His plan is to make you an eternal Excellency and a joy of generations to come.
According to our text however, you must ‘arise’ before you shine. What does it means to arise:
(a) Come out of the dead.
Eph.5;14
Wherefore he saith, awake thou that sleepeth, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.

When you remain in sin, you are dead. When you refuse to abandon iniquities, you are dead. If you ever want to shine and manifest, you must arise out of your sin and put on the righteousness of God. There is a power in God available to all who surrenders to Him. It is the power to overcome sin.
Are you backslidden and the devil is keeping you on the ground? It’s your turn to wake up!

(b) Come out of Depression
1 Kings 19:5
And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold then an angel touched him and said unto him, Arise and eat.

Never allow failure to keep you on the ground. Elijah was depressed, down and almost out before the angel of the Lord told him point blank: arise .
Friends, you are not a failure until you said you are. In the words of William A. Ward, ‘failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end street”. You therefore have no reason to start mourning. ‘Where there is no faith in the future, there is no power in the present”. Stop hiding inside the caves of life, arise and continue the journey. Problems are not express routes into paralysis. Rather they are
P – Pathways unto better things
R – Repairers of destinies
O – Opportunities to grow and succeed
B – Blessings in disguise
L – Lessons to learn
E- Ever present tests for assessment
M- Multivitamins for the soul
S- Stepping stones unto glory

If all you desire is to live without problems, you are doomed to go into extinction without progress.
Proverbs 24:10
If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.

Days of adversity will come, so that your strength could be assessed. God cannot trust you with His glory until you have been tested! And the tougher the test, the higher the promotion. If you get depressed and discouraged because of one small challenge, you are not fit for His glory.
Jeremiah 12:5
If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how can thou contend with horses? And if in the land of peace, wherein thou trustedst, they wearied thee, then how will thou do in the swelling of Jordan?

Arise, stand on your problems. Put yourself over your mountain. Put that horrible past behind and forge ahead with the strength of God.
If we open up a quarrel between today and yesterday, we will not live to see our tomorrow. Yesterday is gone, all you have now is today; arise and make the best out of it.

(c) Stop sleeping, start fighting
You have slept enough; it’s time to rise up! Your destiny can’t be decaying while you are busy slumbering! Stop sleeping the sleep of death; you must rise up to fight in prayer.
Psalm 13:3
Consider and hear me, O Lord my God: lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death.
Jonah 1:6
….Arise, call upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us…

It is time to cry and call and pray. Speak against your mountains in prayers; call upon God the very present help in hours of troubles! You are appointed to rise and shine, but still you need to pray. The only way to access divine blessings is through prayer. Your glory is sure, your fulfillment is guaranteed, but you must wrestle in prayer.
Deuteronomy 2:24
Rise ye up, take your journey, and pass over the river Armon: behold, I have given into thy hand Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon,and his land: begin to possess it, and contend with him in battle.

The word says, I have given you victory but you must fight, you must contend with the enemy in battle!

(d) Start moving
To arise also means to take a step. Beloved, you are long due for some steps. The place where you are is not the place of your rest. Until you take some steps, you can’t see your desired signs!
When the prodigal son fulfilled his vow to ‘arise and go’, his destiny was re-arranged for better.
No movement, no achievement. No steps, no signs. No motion, no manifestation
God told Abraham: arise, walk through the land…” He told Jacob, “arise go to Bethel”. He told Jonah, “arise go to Nineveh”. He said unto Joshua, “arise go over this Jordan’
What He said unto them, he is saying unto you now: GO, MOVE, CHANGE YOUR POSITION!
When your position does not change, your situation cannot be altered.
Many followed Jesus, many struggled to see him and could not, but when Zacchaeus changed his position, his glory came and he became a shinning star.

Friends, stop following the crowd, get out of the midst of the multitude, change your position, take a strange step and you will be the focus of men!