This week as I thought about the influence of God’s light coming into the world, a few truths became evident. We can go through stages in life, and we may not notice we are in one. Also, we may not recognize a need to get out of the stage we are in. I have been in stages where I felt uncomfortable or regretted an action I did, or I did not know what to do.
It is only when we look back, months or years later, that we recognize we really needed a lot more growth and understanding to get through it. Eventually the correct path can show itself, and we figure it out.
Growing up for me was rougher than I like to admit. When we do not grow up with life balance, we compensate by doing too much of one thing and not enough of another. For people like me, as we become adults, the story becomes a picture of life on a roller coaster — a lot of ups and downs with moments of terror and uncertainty. All we can do is hold on, and hope to get through it.
I am at the age where more balance is in place. I can look at the roller coaster moments and realize, the ride can actually be a fun experience, if I approach it with certain elements of confidence:
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- the ride will end
- the engineering of the ride will not fail
- I can contribute to keep myself safe
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If I cannot put these elements into the conversation, I come to an important discovery: We will not understand darkness if that is all we have.
In order to have confidence in life, I need some degree of understanding of how to cope with life as I move through it. The Advent reading for this week points out a discovery revealed in the Old Testament. People were uncertain about the ride, uncertain about the engineering, and uncertain about their own contributions to get through life. God had to help us understand, by spelling things out at the right time, and in a way that we could understand. Check out this reading from Isaiah 61:1
The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.
Earnest Hemingway’s quote above is useful. If darkness is all we have, we are not going to know anything different. If a person has only known one thing (whether it is darkness or light), how can we have a perspective to understand more than one point of view?
God’s Light tells me some great things about the roller coaster ride called life. I can have confidence in the life He has given me.
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- I am certain that experiencing any part of the ride will TEACH me something
- Light gives understanding to living.
- God is in control. He knows the ride parts much better than I do, and I can trust Him.
- Light gives confidence.
- My role is to do my part, based on the rules’ He has given.
- I need to respect that there are guardrails for a reason
- My task is to hold on, and enjoy the ride
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Light gives understanding so we can know how to make things work.
