No Lights, Bring Light

There are loads of things going on in the planet right this minute, but only two things seem to take precedent. Britney Spears' horrible meltdown and the Californian winter storm.

I'll focus more on the latter, yet I think both subjects do deserve some sort of commentary.

So, the power went out last night in my desert land. It was out for about an hour. Good Lord, an hour never felt so long before. After the family and I gathered some candles, we all went to our respective rooms and sat under candle light. Candle light..it got me thinking...The age before electricity was so incredibly different then our world today I gather that there was less noise than today, an atmosphere to help support the quieting of the soul. It seems as if we don't know how to use silence to our benefit these days. There's always something buzzing...always something on. It's become a comforting whisper. But take all that away, all that fidget, all that noise, and a bit of anxiety creeps in knowing that your trust and security was not in something solid at all, but mostly temporary at best.

So I decided to read. I'm continuing to read this book titled, "Dreaming with God". It's truly fascinating and tends to probe and possibly irritate at times the deep things of the heart. I think that everyone wants to be not just a dreamer, but a good or even great dreamer. That sort of continually reaching for more, envisioning higher, in turn, changes us in the process. We become strong again, loving again, courageous again. But if we never choose to stretch that muscle, the atrophy will grip us, making us slaves to fear.

Anyway...In the dark, under candle light, I had this thought:

What would everyone in the world do if there was no power for one whole hour. How would that one hour shape our lives, shape the community. Would fear and looting be ushered in right away, or would patience and hope settle? Right now, just thinking off the top of my head, I think that something ridiculous and harmful would surface, and rather fast.

But if we knew ahead of time that we would have no power for an hour, how would we prepare, what things would we plan on doing in that time frame. I have a feeling that those would be the things that actually matter most in our lives.

Electricity has changed everything--from technology to our sleeping patterns (we now stay up much later, verses back in the day, when a majority of people went to sleep after sunset). We don't know what electricity is really, but it's such an integral part of our lives.

But take away that 'light', and what light to we bring to this era?