Where Once Was Darkness...

I hate waking up before the sun. It's seven o' clock in the morning here, Christmas Day. The sky is dark grey and cloudy- no star could be seen here. Even the white of the snow on the ground fails to truly relieve the darkness of the world. Gusts of wind shake not only the trees outside, but our entire house. It sounds cruel out there. On this of all days, I am reminded that we have an adversary who seeks us; prowls around like a roaring lion. He has no need of sleep and can go anywhere that pleases him. He pliantly searches out all of our fears and weaknesses- he brings the worst of us out into the open and attempts to exploit it for his own purposes. He wants to bring us down with him- and he knows his time is short.

He knows what his future is; he can constantly see God's wrath and a lake of fire before his eyes. And he knows what our future could be- in the presence of the Almighty and Everlasting God, where he can never again enter.

The thing about this darkness outside is that, in about an hour or so, the sun will break it. Its full radiance may not break through the dark barrier of these storm clouds, but it will become light outside. And on this of all days, the light will again shine on the deeds of men. It's important to remember, here in the darkness- where despair so easily engulfs, where the wind howls, and the heart within you shrinks with fear: the debt has been paid, the gulf has been bridged, and the battle for our souls- won. Jesus, whose birth we celebrate this day, came to the earth. Fully God, yet born a man- to live as one of us, to be a witness to the actions of the adversary on earth, to teach and to assist, to die, horribly, and finally to rise again from the grave- thereby becoming our hope fulfilled.

So in the darkness, in the utter despair that sometimes seems to be our world in this time before the second coming, it is so important for us to believe,

There shone a Great Light.