Have you ever witnessed a meteor shower? If you haven’t, then I highly encourage you to try to catch the next one; it’s a fascinating experience. The first one that stands out in my memory as really spectacular was in college. A trio of us carried blankets up a tall ladder and sprawled out on the roof of one of their houses out in the country, miles away from city lights. And we waited.

It was chilly and dark; it took a while for my eyes to adjust, but as they did, the stars seemed to multiply in the sky. And then, one of us spotted a shining streak, and then another. And another! A dozen or more meteors must have lit up the East Texas sky that night.

The creation story in Genesis 1 tells us that God devoted two entire days to defining light here on the Earth. The Sun governs the daytime, and the moon is in charge of nighttime. The stars provide more light and oversee Night and Day, separating darkness from light (verses 3-5 & 14-19). Light is a recurring theme in the Bible. God himself masqueraded as a column of fire to be a nightlight to the Israelites as they fled from Egypt (Exodus 13:21). The New Testament refers to Christ-followers as light to the dark and sinful world around us (Matthew 5:14-15).

My favorite references to light, however, are near the end of the entire Bible – the last few chapters, in fact.  The book of Revelation says that there will come a day when we are united with God in all of his glorious wonder, and he himself will be Light. We will not even need the Sun (Revelation 21:23-24 & 22:5). What a remarkable day that will be, indeed!

In the meantime, however, we remain here on Earth, among the shadows. We face a choice: we can give into the darkness and keep our faith-lights turned off, or we can bust holes in the darkness like dozens of meteors streaking across the night sky. Individually, a meteor may not seem very bright, but several of them are a wonder to behold.

If God created the moon and stars to govern the night, and then Christ instructed us to be the light of the world, then what are we doing to break through the darkness?