The Final Firefly

Here’s a great little poem by author Mitch Teemley.  If you haven’t checked out his site, your missing something good. 

I saw a lone firefly last night

Dear creature, why didn’t you turn to the right

when you came to August?

You missed your cue for happiness

Now your time to burn has come to an end

Or can it be

there’s something that only you can see

something so sweetly surpassingly bright

that all else fades

in its perfect Light?

Who turned off the light?

Bob keeps turning the lights off.  I can always tell if he’s been through a room after me when I walk back in and the room is now dark.  He’s even turned off the light with me still in the room, (conditioned response—“oops, sorry, honey!”)

Ostensibly, this is to save power, which means to save money, and my husband definitely loves to save money.  Not that he’s not generous, some might say to a fault, but when it comes to getting the monthly bills, yeah, our house is pretty dark.  One of our girls bought him this gift one year:

Not yet over the rainbow

I had never seen a double rainbow until Bob and I were on our honeymoon (a L-O-N-G time ago), so obviously, double rainbows are kind of special to me personally. 

One of the first things that the Bible records of God creating is light.  I’m not an engineer (both my dad and one of my brothers are, does that count??) but I think I remember a few things about light that are worth noting:

1. It’s one of the fastest things in the universe. How they figured out what the speed of light actually is, I have no idea.  Faster than a speeding bullet (yeah, I’m old); faster than my husband in the morning (which isn’t saying much.)  Bottom line: it’s pretty quick
2. Light is powerful. Too much can blind you, but focused light, as with a laser scalpel in a surgeon’s hands, brings healing.  Without it, food will not grow, but too much and the garden withers.
3. What we normally experience with light is not really all there is. When it hits a prism—voila!  A rainbow.  In other words, there’s more to light than what meets the eye.

I find it intriguing that light was one of God’s first (recorded) ideas.  This gives me a clue as to its importance, not just in my daily walking around life, but as to my inward life as well.  Perhaps more so.  Probably more so.  No, definitely so.  Light—that is, understanding, clarity, wisdom—is integral to life.

1. God’s light, His clarity, wisdom, enlightening kick in the pants (in other words, whatever form it takes) is the fastest distance between two points. No runarounds or red tape or beating around the bush or whatever other metaphors we choose.  God’s way is the best way, getting us to what He had in mind when He created each individual in the first place; however,…
2. God’s illumination, His truth, may have to cut through the bricks and mortar of the walls we have erected around ourselves (or have allowed others to do so), such as deception, or fear, toxic relationships, confusion.  And that usually kinda hurts, but…
3. There’s more happening with the God’s light that we can readily see, at least at first. As I heard expressed so long ago, the question is not “why me?” but “to what end?”. 

As light was the first order of business in creation, so His light is of the highest necessity to me now, moment by moment, in each encounter and situation.  And eventually, even if I can’t (and usually don’t) answer all the questions now, when His light hits eternity, I’ll see that His rainbow was doing its work all the time.