We Need Some Light

“Where is my child?…Did you go out of the store?...What were you thinkin’…Someon is gonna snatch you up and put you in their car?...Next time I’m gonna leave you at home.” That’s part of what I heard last night standing at the checkout in Wal-mart waiting in line behind this mother. She was hard to miss, not because she was talking loudly, but because she was dressed like a prostitute. And then heard some of the difficulties she was having with money, with a wad of money, and couldn’t afford to use her debit card. The moment that caused her consternation came when she realized her child had run off. She didn’t go running after her though, she sent her friend to go look for the child (why her friend didn’t do that initially – who knows).

After my purchase, I was walking closely behind the woman out of the store, trying to think of a way to approach her. But it seemed her mind was still on her child’s running off, because she didn’t stop talking all the way out ot the parking lot. So, I didn’t see it as an approachable moment.

On my walk home, I was pondering these things and the evidences of the hardness of life here in this area. It’s like fog that rolls in after Noon and stays there through the night. Then, by morning it’s clear, but Noon comes again and the fog gets thick again. In our area, the fog is dense on Folsom and Zinfandel. And then, when you walk into our subdivision, the fog is still there and it lifts here and there as you get closer to home.

But fog still rests on some of the houses here too.

I have heard it said, “they are doing the best they can with what they have.” The pagan dressed like a prostitute is doing what she can to get by in this world - to try and make sense of where she is and where she is going. But she's groping and the world has nothing to offer her, let alone she can't figure it out - and she won't. I prayed for her and those like her in our area on my walk home, praying for them to receive the good news of Jesus Christ.

There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. 10He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.11He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. 12But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, 13who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:10-13