Springing Forward in Pursuit of God’s Light
I’ve never been much of a morning person. I like to stay up late, but I dread getting up early. That’s why I’m not looking forward to this coming weekend, when we set the clocks ahead one hour. So consider this a friendly reminder that while our worship service will remain at 10:30 a.m., it will feel more like 9:30.
There is, of course, a silver lining in this annual ritual: We will gain an extra hour of daylight on Sunday evening, and that additional daylight will continue to grow until late June when we experience the Summer Solstice — the official start of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and the precursor of the longest day of the year in terms of daylight.
As humans, we are naturally attracted to the light. It gives us warmth, comfort, guidance, and assurance. But very often, we find ourselves straying into the darkness, usually by choice, but sometimes by circumstance. Either way, there is a compelling reason for all of us to actively pursue and follow the light.
Scripture is filled with passages about God’s light, including this from the Gospel of John (12:35-36), which quotes Jesus speaking to his disciples: “Walk while you have the light, before darkness overtakes you. Whoever walks in the dark does not know where they are going. Believe in the light while you have the light, so that you may become children of light.”
As followers of Jesus, we are, indeed, “children of the light,” and in that role, it is imperative that we reflect and even illuminate his light through our words and through our actions, so that all may be “enlightened.”