Stay “Woke"

Christian Believers need to stay woke to the fact that Earthly, sinful (harmful) ways, cause one to “pass away, become senseless, or devitalized” (to die).

Believers are to be woke – knowledgeable about the world with the willingness to access and critique systems of oppression, including sinful (harmful) systems.

Merriam-Webster notes:

 

The word Woke is a slang term that is easing into the mainstream from some varieties of a dialect called African American Vernacular English (sometimes called AAVE). In AAVE, awake is often rendered as woke, as in, “I was sleeping, but now I’m woke.”  

Woke’s transformation into a byword of social awareness likely started in 2008.  Stay woke became a watch word in parts of the black community for those who were self-aware, questioning the dominant paradigm and striving for something better.  

The word woke became entwined with the Black Lives Matter movement; instead of just being a word that signaled awareness of injustice or racial tension, it became a word of action. Activists were woke and called on others to stay woke. 

The broader uses of woke are still very much in flux,

–Words We're Watching talks about words we are increasingly seeing in use but that have not yet met our criteria for entry.

Paul tells us very much the same thing. Be aware that, as a Christian believer, you have died (to disappear from or to subside gradually) from sin (harmfulness). By focusing upon the attributes of God, Jesus, Heaven, we can learn to regularly move farther away from harmfulness to ourselves and to others.