Darkness and Light

I follow a rather famous person on Twitter because he, like me, has MS. Let me share three of his recent tweets:

Number 1: Time off. On Cape Cod. Needed sun.Warmth.Got rain. Freezing. Shivering. Great way to relax. Are you kidding me? This is why I am an atheist.

Number 2: The search for peace is heartbreaking.  No road maps. Little reason for hope.  We cannot go home again.  Who can?  Life can be so sad.

Number 3: So much sickness and pain out there.  People search for answers when there are none.  I wish we cared. Our friends need us.  Where are we?

I could not help but think about the connection between the statement of unbelief in the first tweet (something this writer often expresses) and the sad and dark spirit seen in the last two. Now, what I like about this man is he is, to use a trendy word, authentic. He writes it as he sees it, and he takes his own unbelief seriously and realizes it leads to a dark place, but for him that is reality. He doesn’t play this game of saying there is no meaning in the universe, but we can still all be positive.

However, that is still in great contrast with the Scripture I was able to share with  a group in Charlotte as I spoke to them on Saturday (via WebX): “[God] comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God” (2 Cor. 1:4).

I reminded the group that in Christ, even in pain and chronic illness we find peace, hope, meaning, and, more than that, purpose and mission. Jesus transforms what looks like a prison into a calling and what looks like misery into ministry. He moves us from darkness to light.