John 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Everyone goes through times of darkness. However, Jesus is here letting us in on a little secret: the light didn’t go away from us, we turned our back on the light. We may not think we have done that, but as the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. We do well to examine our lives and see how much light we have. If things are looking dark, then our first thought should be to seek the light, that is, Jesus. There are countless things that distract us from Him. Many of them are not bad in themselves. Indeed, the only bad thing about them might be that we let them come between us and the light, that is, Jesus. Family and country and education and many other things are wonderful and even highly desirable, but if we let them come ahead of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are headed into darkness. Someone who is following Christ is going to be a good father or mother, for example, but even there, children can become idols to us, and everything falls apart when that happens. There is no end to the tragic stories of poor parenting, and some even come from parents who think they are following Christ, such as missionaries. There are Missionary Kids with deep wounds because their parents took what seemed to be “the only way” of sending them off to boarding school far too young, instead of perhaps making a way to teach them at home, for example. God knows our weaknesses, and repentance is always available. No one does everything perfectly, so we need to keep watch over our “light level” to see how we are doing. That’s not to be neurotic about it, however; God does enable us to create good habits so that we don’t have to stay on edge. That said, any time we find ourselves in the dark, we need to first ask God why He allowed it to happen. The answer will always be, “For your good.” The second thing we need to ask God is what He wants to teach us from the experience, and there are as many answers to that as there are experiences. We all have blind spots, and sometimes God allows us to walk squarely into them so that we will recognize they exist. That can be painful, and often is, but it is extremely helpful in the long run. We all need to keep growing, and to do that we need to recognize the dark spots we’ve been hiding, sometimes even from ourselves. Jesus’ statement here is very broad, but it’s true. If things look dark, seek Him!

This is something I’ve experienced time and time again. My biggest problem has been pride, thinking “Surely I don’t have that problem,” when to an outside observer it was obvious. My wife has been extremely helpful in this area! Even this morning I was having trouble getting going with my devotions, because so many other things were crowding into my mind. They weren’t bad things, and actually are things I need to deal with today, but when I let them get ahead of listening to God, I’ve got some repenting to do. My problem is in feeling I’ve got to figure everything out on my own, and for that matter, thinking I can! I’m not to abandon the mind God has given me, but I’ve always got to remember that it’s totally insignificant compared to God, and so rest, relax, and rejoice in Him, whatever is going on around me.

Father, thank You for this reminder. It’s one I need quite frequently! Help me keep my focus on Jesus so that I will walk in the light consistently, instead of just occasionally. I do desire that all of Your purposes for me may be fulfilled as You intend, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!