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Today is Diwali, otherwise known as the (Hindu) Festival of Lights. I have fond memories of celebrating this festival when I lived in Trinidad & Tobago where it is a national holiday celebrated in different ways by people of most denominations.

Saving and except the Hindu Prayers (pujas) and other rituals done on this day, I would typically celebrate with friends and family. We would eat traditional Indian dishes including my favorite: curried chicken with aloo, pumpkin and paratha.

The most anticipated event on Diwali is the lighting of thousands of clay pots known as diyas after sundown.

Entire neighborhoods are transformed into art galleries where bamboo trees are cut and fashioned into intricate master pieces serving as ‘shelves’ for the diyas that decorate almost every open space including, but not limited to front yards and entire streets which are blocked off for the festivities.

Divali can best be described as the festival of celebrating light over darkness and truth where untruth prevails.

This is actually synonymous to what true Christianity represents! Christians are diyas in a world of darkness. Matthew 5:14 says that we are the light of the world; we are bearers of truth where untruth prevails as shown in Matthew 28:19 .

Today I celebrate the Festival of Lights in the context of what Christ commands us as Christians to be: lights in a world of darkness.

From the negro spiritual ‘this little light of mine’
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine… Won’t let Satan blow it out…Let it shine till Jesus comes…Hide it under a bushel- NO!…Let it shine all over the world…Let it shine! Let it shine! Let it shine!

Akhenaton

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