This Little Light of Mine....

    Darkness.  Despair.  Hopelessness.
    Until recently, these were words that had a vague meaning for me.  But to be quite honest, I had not truly experienced them.  Oh, I thought I had.  In my selfish world, when I was the center of my life, there were times when I thought that was where I was.  But since I have come back to Christ, and I have devoted my life to trying to live by His example, my perspective has changed.  When I thought I was in those places, experiencing those feelings, it was all based on my perspective, not God's. Now, I understand that what I can see is not the whole picture.  I realized how little I had actually suffered in my past, and how ridiculous it was to associate my life with such pessimism.  I had no concept of the depth that those words can go.
    These past few months, my eyes have been opened in wonderful (and scary) ways.  My first encounter with the true meaning of these words was in Arizona.  When we joined with 3:18 ministries for a week, doing God's work on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation, I saw what darkness, despair, and hopelessness is.  Parks designed for fun that are ravaged by layers of graffiti.  Broken bottles that seem to cry out with the agony of the generations of teens who broke them, the glass shards so abundant and so thick on the ground-- no, IN the ground-- that it feels like darkness has taken root in the place.  Kids who know death so well that even the accidental death of a friend is met with a shrug and "oh well, that's how it goes."  Just--sadness.  It had a profound effect on me.  Broke my heart for them.  And left me overwhelmed.  This is a place where we can do our best to shine God's light (which we did), but it seems like we were just candles in a hurricane.
    Then, my lovely wife got into a geography class at LBCC.  But what she thought was going to be basic geography is actually cultural geography.  The second assignment focused on Eastern Europe and Russia.  And while she was reading about them-- highest murder rates in the world for "modern" nations, suicide rates that are the highest anywhere, alcoholism numbers that are astronomical-- that same feeling of being overwhelmed hit me again.  And don't even get me started on Africa, where they don't even keep records.
    And now she is doing an assignment on the ethnic strata right here in Long Beach.  Another shot to the system.  There is that same profile again, only in a much more condensed area, right in our own backyard.
    Such a sense of loss.  Darkness so deep that the people in it are numb to pain.  I can only imagine the tears that must flow when God looks down at these areas of the world.
    And yet, here we are, the family of God, clinging together like the army at the Alamo.  We come to church, and we take comfort in ourselves, in being together.  We build our defenses against the onslaught of the world.  We picture ourselves as a lighthouse, standing against the crashing waves, a beacon for those who are looking for rescue.
    If seeing these things and learning about them has taught me anything these past few months, it is that our view of the church may be a bit wrong.  I can't remember where I read it (if anyone reading this can help, thanks), but I read recently that the church should be more like a M.A.S.H. unit.  We should be here to encourage each other, but our main goal is to strengthen and then send each other out into the fight again.  At the time, I liked the concept.  Now I realize that the author may have hit the nail on the head.
    I'll take it a bit farther.  We see ourselves in the church as a lighthouse, but maybe we need to think smaller.  Instead of preventing a crash, maybe we should act as the rescue party.  You see, the world has already crashed.  There are places here that have been wrecked for so long that they have not seen God's light in years, decades, maybe ever.  The people there are surrounded in darkness, and they are so absorbed in that way of life that they don't see any other choice.  Just imagine how bright a candle, or a flashlight, would be for them.  Maybe we, every individual in Christ, are God's flashlights.  And imagine God's joy when he sees the bright centers of the world, His church, spreading out, even as tiny flickers, into the darkness, finding survivors to bring home!  Even better, imagine what He can do once His light has reached their eyes!
    It makes sense to me, and seems to be in line with His calling for us.  I just never realized how big of a task we have in front of us, and the depths of darkness that we can penetrate when we follow God's will.  And now that I have been awakened to what is out there, how can I go back to sleep?  I can't.  I can only devote myself to following Christ's example, and to being the best light I can be.
 
This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine!