“When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
- John 8:12, NIV

Could you use a little LIGHT in your e-box today?

Personally, I think I seared off my retinas this week. Okay, maybe not completely. But my daughters had their conference tennis match and I sat in my lawn chair and stared at the sun for about four hours for three days in a row.

First of all, I was near hyperventilating over the intense tennis. It’s amazing how hard you work “internally” when your kids play. Do I get aerobic points for my three-day workout? Would they be “internal” aerobic points? If so, I probably have the most impressively fit spleen in our conference.

Secondly, and adding to the intensity, I think something weird happened to my sunglasses. One eye was at least one shade off—maybe two. Two-shaded shades? Weird. And you realize, of course, that means not only was I a little “too tense” over the match, but I was squinting through “two tints” in the sun shades.

I guess I could’ve given my eyes a break every now and then. But I kept staring because I just love my girls. Retinas? Who needs retinas? My babies are playing tennis! And guess who’s first go give those babies their end-of-the-match humongo-hug! Win or lose, there’s always some major squoozing going on.

Of course, you can probably guess that after staring at the sun for that long this week, I’m practically still seeing sun splotches today. I think I could compare it to having my picture made with a mega-flash for 12 hours.

God’s word is a little like that—only in the best non-retina-threatening way. We look into the light he gives us through his word and it affects how we look at life even when we’ve gone about our day and we’re not looking directly at it. We still see the light!

Every time we come face to face with his truth—glasses or no glasses—we receive an enlightening humongo-hug from the Father. We’re confronted by the love of Jesus. And we walk away different every time. His work of sanctification in us changes the way we look at every aspect of life. We see the Son splotches, so to speak, long after. And, would you believe it, others can see the light splotches through our lives. How glorious!

So let’s keep staring! Why? Because we love Jesus. We can stare at his light and let it affect everything we do, everywhere we go—at the tennis match, at the office, in the laundry room, over coffee with a friend, at the mall doing some shopping—wherever!

By the way, I’ll be doing some shopping for some new shades this week. It’s “tint”-atively scheduled anyway.