Shadows and Light

Today I have the privilege of guest posting at Hannah’s Prayer Ministry’s blog called Held. You can check it out here. Let me add that Hannah’s Prayer Ministry is a wonderful place for women struggling with infertility. Those women have walked the roads of infertility and found intimacy with God. They will not promise you a baby, but they will pray for you and that God has His way. They are blessings to me. Remember to check them out here.

As a child shadows mesmerized me. I loved watching my shadow and my parents’ shadows as we walked in a parking lot or to the park. The shapes each shadow took at different times of the day filled my head with wonder. I especially loved it when my shadow made me look like a giant {most likely because I am the shortest in my family}.

Shadows, however, are not things. They have no power or weight or substance. You can walk through them or on them. They cannot hurt you. Yet they are dark. Sometimes shadows change our perspective. They turn an alley into a place where murderers can hide. They turn open closet doors into monsters and trees into aliens. As with me, they often make the actual object casting the shadow bigger or distorted and scarier than they really are.

The same is true of life’s deep dark times. They are only shadows distorted and large. Oh but the truth? The truth is that if we have Jesus as our savior, we are walking with the Light. Light that shines on the object that is casting the shadow.

Light that reveals the truth. The reality that as Paul says all our dark times are, “…light and momentary troubles” (2 Cor 4:17). Yet the Light of the world shines an even greater perspective on these dark difficult times. Paul finishes his sentence  in 2 Corinthians 4:17 by adding that our troubles, “are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.”

So our troubles are but shadows and walking through these shadows with the Lord results in eternal glory that is greater than all the dark shadows put together. My heart trembles at the thought.

Do I look at all my difficult times as shadows? No, but I pray that God will give me His perspective. I pray that I can see my dark times for what they really are…shadows. Oh it is by His grace that our time here is but a breath and through His Son’s sacrifice that our eternity can be so magnificent.

When we see our shadows through His light, then we can say with David that “He is with me.” (Psalm 23)

What has helped you as you walked through life’s shadows? Join in the discussion. I cannot wait to connect with you.

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