Light in Dark Places

I regularly drive through urban areas that used to make my heart pound at the very mention of their names. Now it is the favorite part of my week. Not because I am a thrill seeker. Rather, because it's so dark there, every vestige of light is like a beacon.

To some extent I'm speaking figuratively... there are evident signs of poverty, crime, destitution... yet I find all these people there full of love and giving and joy and hope...thus, there is darkness, and then there is light...

However, I am also speaking literally. It is often nighttime when I drive there. Most of the buildings are boarded up, and so they loom as large forgotten forms on dark empty streets... but, in the midst of this, there is this old, ramshackle church that poignantly bears a sign reading "Don't Give Up." I don't know if people even meet there anymore. I only know that when the lights have gone out all up and down those abandoned streets, the windows of that church glow amber and red and blue... Have you ever seen that kind of resilience? It is well worth the drive.

I like to hope that people still meet there. I like to imagine they hold on fast to the true gospel, determined that it won't leave the city, though the rest of us have long jumped ship... Sometimes I get all caught up in the figurative side of this: sin brings corruption and decay, the cross brings restoration and new life... thus, the cross beckons and calls and speaks of other things, much like little illuminated windows among miles of wrecked darkness.
However, mostly I know this: there is nothing more beautiful than light that simply won't stop.
"...and the Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it..."