Isaiah 58: 9B-10
"If you remove from your midst oppression, false accusation, and malicious speech; if you bestow your bread on the hungry and satisfy the afflicted; then light shall rise for you in the darkness and the gloom shall become for you like midday. "
Notice the word: "gloom". It means darkness here. We know at times the dark can be scary. When we cannot see we are uncertain which way to go. Stand blindfolded in a dark room for a few minutes and feel how vulnerable it seems.
A friend confided in me that lately she had awakened almost every morning in the dark with a terrible sense of anxiety. So to combat that she decided to wake 15 minutes earlier, when she really had wanted to stay in bed 15 minutes later, and she took that extra time to pray. She found through her prayer the source of her anxiety was repressed angry feelings toward someone very close to her. They had exchanged very hurtful words months ago and had not spoken recently. She and the person have since resolved this issue and she is as she says : "anxiety free".
She now welcomes the darkness of the morning instead of dreading it. She lights a candle and looks forward to her prayer time. She is a living example of these scripture verses. Let's pray today for someone we have exchanged hurtful words with and see if we are inspired to respond with a generous act, a kind deed. One good deed can lead to another and then light up the gloom and spiritual darkness that sometimes surrounds us.
