The Value of Light

Matthew 5:14 – “You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden.”

It’s hard to appreciate the value of light in today’s time and culture. We’ve come so far, even in the last 100 years, through inventions of electrical light sources. Less than 150 years ago, our primary source of light came from burning oil lamps or sitting around a fire. In more recent years, there’s definitely been more effort placed into producing light. Nowadays, we just flip a switch.


The analogy of us as believers being compared to a light for the world doesn’t seem so significant in such a lit up world as we have today.  But we’re not a light just to a world in partial darkness, we’re a light to a world in complete and total darkness.

I remember when I was a child, my family took an annual journey from Chicago to Memphis, and we always stopped in Missouri at a place called Meramec Caverns.  This location was a Jesse James hideout. (I’m not sure if that’s true, but it always sounded good.)

As an adolescent at the time, I remember going into that cavern tour. It was well-lit with colored lights that made the stalactites glimmer in colorful beauty. But I also remember once we were deep in the cavern, without warning, they turned out the lights! I grabbed my mom’s and dad’s hands tight when those lights went out, because once they were out, you couldn’t see even your finger touching your nose. It was true and total darkness.

For purposes of understanding today’s scripture and the significance of what God is telling us, you almost have to see the world in such total darkness. Not with the night light in the corner but rather in complete and total darkness. Then contemplate that in that cavern’s darkness, we are not just another light.  We are the light Jesus Christ projects to this world.

You are the light Christ has chosen to shine through in darkness. Be proud. You are a big deal.

Have a blessed day.

~Dean Burnetti


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