Glow-in-the-dark

Remember the Glo Worm craze of the early 1980s? My brothers and I collected and played with them. I remember it being the highlight of my Easter when I discovered Glo Butterfly in my basket one year. Each night I'd climb into bed with my little Glo Butterfly on the nightstand right beside me, lighting my way to dreamland. The only problem with the Glo Worms was that after a day or two, they would lose their "glo". But my mother showed us how to hold them up to a lightbulb for a few minutes before bed each night to make them glow like new.

Funny, I had all but forgotten about them until last Sunday. Our pastor was preaching about light and darkness, and how darkness cannot quench light, but rather light dispells darkness. All of a sudden this image popped into my mind of three children huddled around the lamp, patiently holding our Glo Bugs up to the bulb for their nightly dose of "glo". Without those few minutes of being held in the light the Glo Bugs would have faded, and eventually we would not have been able to distinguish them from the other shadows in the darkness.

Way to drive it home, God. ;) I got the message loud and clear!

We are meant to be lights in a world cloaked in shadows and darkness. But the only way to retain our light is to spend time "walking in the light", fellowshipping with our Creator and Savior. If we don't come to Him for our daily dose of "light therepy" we will soon fade until no one can see the difference. And if they cannot see the light, they will not be drawn to it, and will remain, as we are, lost in the shadows.

I love how God takes such a simple message combined with a simple childhood memory to get His point across. Which brings to mind another simple memory from my childhood.... A Sunday School class full of little children holding miniture candlesticks and singing:

"This little light of mine... I'm gonna let it shine!"