Capture Your Grief, Day 4: Dark and Light

March 21, 2015 | Home | Longview, Texas

Day 4: Dark and Light

I have various tattoos, all with deep meaning to me...there's one on my right foot that I designed myself as a visual depiction of my core belief of God's provision and sovereignty. As a college freshman my desire was that it would be a conversation piece giving me the opportunity to share my faith; but what I didn't realize is that God in His goodness would use it more in the following years as a reminder for myself more than others. It's an olive branch that depicts peace, a lily pulled from the verses of Matthew 6, and an array of puzzle pieces scattered to their side. Puzzle pieces come in all forms, covered in all colors, cast in both dark and light. When you hold a single piece in your hand it may be complicated and beautiful, it may be plain and monotonous, it may be dark, it may be light. The seasons we walk are the same. Once all of those pieces are put together you can see a stunning image, a purpose, a plan. Once all of those pieces are a part of a whole you can see not only the colors that fell together to create beauty, but also where the deep streaks of darkness provided contrast and shadow for those very things... without each other the picture you observe would be two dimensional, it would be ordinary, it would be bland. God has continually reminded me that He is none of these things and that he wants more for his children than a two dimensional existence. That he is good in every season, no matter what the piece in my hands may look like, and that when I find myself in darkness or in light I can know that he is sovereign in his timing and plan. I'm grateful that just as we are able to see things coming into view as we snap more pieces of a puzzle into place, that God will also reveal to us where our pain and loss have provided an arena for growth and beauty.


Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,  yet I tell you, 
even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass 
of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more 
clothe you, O you of little faith? 

Matthew 6:28