I stood at the window of a certain “fast food” restaurant this week, waiting in line to get some spicy chicken. As I stood in line I noticed the crowd seemed a little disgruntled. My turn finally came, and the lady smiled and gave me my order. As I turned to walk away I told the customer next to me “Have a blessed day”. She replied, “I will, if they ever serve me!”. I thought about that all the way home – “I will, if they ever serve me”. What this lady was saying was that her happiness or blessedness was based on what another human agency did. Now that is strange – to base our happiness on the performance of another human. 

Years ago coal was one of the major sources of energy in America. Coal was used for heating, for electric generation (if you had electricity), and it’s oil was what you put in your lamps so you could see at night. In order to supply America men had to go underground and work, mining that black gold from pitch black caves. It was dangerous, dirty, and often fatal work.

No miner going into a cave ever thought of going to work without his light. The miners usually wore these lights on their foreheads, strapped to steel mining helmets. That light, shining before their eyes, allowed them to see in the darkness. If a man lost his light he had to rely on the light of the man next to him. The problem with this was you had to rely on another man to get where you were going. Your happiness or ability to live for that day depended on whether the person next to you was shining the light where you wanted to be. A good miner kept his own light in his own life so that he was never trapped alone in that dark, dreadful place. His willingness to cling to the Light and follow the Light meant the difference between life and death, happiness or misery, success or defeat.

So it is with Christ! The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ came ” … To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” (Luke 1:79) Just as it was with the coal miner, so it is with us. Every day we wake and go about our business in this cave called “life”. Our lives are lived out under the looming shadow we call physical death. We need the Light that only the Lord Jesus Christ can give. We “put on” Christ, not just on Sunday morning, but at all times. We must remember that He is Lord, and He is Light, and He is Life itself, and unless you have opened the door of your life to Him, believing in Him, trusting Him – then you still wander in darkness. It is not what I do that saves me, but it IS Whom I trust as Lord and Savior that makes all the difference for all eternity. You can choose to be saved your own way, but that would be as useless as a miner strapping a chicken on his head. Jesus said “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” (John 8:12) Who’s guiding your life? Is it another human agency, what someone else does? Is it what you call luck, or fate? Do you have a chicken strapped to your head? Or are you, like the smart coal miner, walking in the Light? Have you turned your eyes upon Jesus, trusting Him with all your heart? That’s the only sacrifice that God will accept for sin – and the only relationship that will keep you walking surefooted through the rugged terrain of this cave we call “life”.

Come join us at Riverview 798 Santa Fe Pike Columbia TN 

Sunday services 8:30 am, 11 am, 6 pm