Piercing the Darkness

Strawberries have opened a whole new world of creative food art as I finish my last few meals of my three weeks here in NY to help Mom recuperate. Yesterday's  breakfast was a lightening bug...can you see it? The deviled egg is his blinker. I like his cheery message of being light in the darkness.

It was a whirlwind day after Mom chuckled at her Heal Mama breakfast. we dashed off to the doctor and she got her stitches out! Yay! The doctor said she was his best recovering 80+ year old patient. That made Mom proud. She was wearing her "I won a Marathon" shirt, and the doctor felt her running history had contributed to her good recovery. Lesson: what we do early in life makes a difference in our twilight years.

The Bible is correct in noting our body is a temple and should be treated reverently. While many people with healthy lives do succumb to ill health and affliction, we certainly hedge our bets when we practice life-long good habits. Our healthy spiritual habits, and following God from as early an age as possible certainly help to avoid a life of regret.

But the amazing good news that lights the darkness is even after a life of wandering from healthy habits or a walk with God, He wants us anyway! He longs to have us desire to know Him, and to stumble, no matter how brokenly, into His forgiving arms. He is the ultimate lightning bug in the darkness, beckoning to us out of the worst despair. Isaiah 35: 4-6 tells us that we do not need to fear Him rejecting us when we come to Him --no matter our past, our blindness, our deafness, He will come to save us:

⁴ say to those with fearful hearts,
    “Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
    he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
    he will come to save you.”

⁵ Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
    and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
⁶ Then will the lame leap like a deer,
    and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
    and streams in the desert.

Don't wait! Seek the light that pierces all our darkness!