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It’s one o’clock in the morning, but I’m driving – driving for
hours and hours. I pass the grocery
store, then the gas station, until I’m finally miles from any hint of
civilization. Some would call it “the
middle of nowhere,” but I’ve arrived at my destination. I step out of the truck, look up at the night
sky, and immediately my eyes are met with billions upon billions of bright
lights, shining like the very angels of Heaven.
Then I wake up.
I climb out of bed and stare out of my bedroom window. But, to my disappointment, there is not a
star to be seen; only dozens of street lamps, gleaming with a hazy dullness in
the foggy night.
This is light pollution.
Okay, okay, so that never actually happened. It was just a clever illustration to segue to
the point of this post. Even so, we’ve
all experienced light pollution to some extent.
In some places, because of all of the artificial light, it’s nearly
impossible to see the natural lights that the Maker of the universe has placed
in the sky.
In the same way, we can often become light pollutants, preventing those around us from gazing upon the glorious Light of the Bright Morning Star.
(Revelation 22:16, 21:23)
You see, we are to be lights shining in the midst of a crooked
and perverse generation (Philippians 2:14-15), but sometimes we’re shining the
wrong light. There’s only one light that
is acceptable: the light of Christ. This
light is impossible to produce of our own doing, but is the natural effect of
Christ living in our hearts. Every other
form of light is unacceptable, and only prevents the True Light from having
precedence.
If those around us are not seeing the light of Christ
shining in our lives, it is likely that the “light” we’re displaying is only
bringing attention to ourselves. This real
purpose of being a light, however, is that others would look and immediately see
not us, but Christ alone (cf. Matthew 5:16).
In this sense, we are to be like a mirror, simply reflecting the Person of Christ without attempting to be seen ourselves, similarly to the way the moon reflects the light of the sun.