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10 Truths About Darkness (and Where We Can Find the Light)

10 Truths About DarknessIt was 2 AM. I had to use the bathroom, and we were dry camping—in our own yard.

Yeah, that’s a long story. It involved many delays in picking up our travel trailer and a Ford F-150 transmission blowing in the middle of trying to back the trailer into our yard—the day before we were to leave. Fun times.

So the younger kids and I camped overnight in the trailer until the watermelon seltzer I chugged before bed hit my bladder. Then into the woodsy yard I went, in the pitch dark, where foxes, deer, and the occasional bear or fisher cat roam. Needless to say, I wasn’t wanting to take my time getting there.

The back door was locked. I knocked, and the dogs started barking. Surely, my husband would hear me then.

Nope.

Then I banged on the door. More barking.

No footsteps.

Realizing the futility of that after about three minutes, I walked around to the garage door, put in the code, and assumed an unlocked inside door.

Nope.

More knocking and banging. No response.

Finally, I went around to the front door and rang the doorbell. Over and over again without stop.

No rescue.

I knocked and banged and called my husband’s cell phone.

Still nothing.

I finally called my son’s cell phone—the same son who inherited my penchant for not answering the phone.

And there it was—my son actually answered!

“Mom, is that you? Hold on. I’m coming.”

In the fifteen minutes outside brainstorming new ways to communicate my need to sleeping family members inside the house, fear had started to trickle in. It was dark, and in my mind, every noise was the local bear deciding that moment was the one to descend upon my lawn.

My imagination ran wild.

What if a criminal drives by right now to see me in my nightie? What if the police are on patrol and decide I’m breaking in? What if my neighbor is looking out his window at the scene I am making at 2 AM in my own yard?

Darkness makes everything seem impossible, insurmountable, even dangerous.

But is it? Is it really?

What is the truth about darkness?

1. There is a Light. God the Father provided it through His Son Jesus. Read the rest of this entry »

 

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When Light Shines Out Dark

When Light Shines Out DarkWe walked hand in hand down Wright Avenue headed toward her home after a visit to the Five & Dime. I treasured my visits with Grandmom. Her hand was gnarly and warm, securing me somehow in decades of wisdom and life lived that I would not understand for many decades of my own. I guess on some level I knew her street of row homes was unsafe now, that her longtime homestead where she raised her family had become a place that sold dark—filled with poverty, broken families, addictions, violence, racial tensions, and a lack of hope.

But when Grandmom walked down that street, heads of all colors looked up and spoke reverently: “Hi, Mrs. H!”

And her response? She’d know them by name and say: “Hey, Willis, how is your mother doing?” She showed them respect.

From what I remember, she absolutely felt confused and disheartened by the changes on her street—maybe at times even a little scared (she’d been mugged twice in her elder years). But she absolutely chose to stay, to not tremble or cower, and…

…to love.

As we started approaching a scene of a young teen couple arguing, and the boyfriend was punching his pregnant girlfriend in the stomach, I remember my grandmother not shying away from it. She didn’t move to the other side of the street. She walked us right past them. I honestly can’t recall if she had words in those moments or not. She may have. But as she approached, the Light of Christ she carried with her was enough to settle down the violence going on. He looked as though he had been caught in something and wore a look of shame. I had never seen anything like it. I was not more than a 10 year old child at the time, but

that scene has never left me.

I have no idea what happened after we passed. He could have gone after my grandmother for witnessing that, but he didn’t. He could have justified his own behavior by continuing to beat his girlfriend. I really don’t know. What I do know is that he could not keep offending when my grandmother was on the street.

Could not.

Read the rest of this entry »

 

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