“’And you, Ring-bearer,’ she said, turning to Frodo. ‘I come to you last who are not last in my thoughts. For you I have prepared this.’ She held up a small crystal phial: it glittered as she moved it, and rays of white light sprang from her hand. ‘In this phial,’ she said, ‘is caught the light of Eärendil’s star, set amid the waters of my fountain. It will shine still brighter when night is about you. May it be a light to you in dark places, when all other lights go out” (Galadriel, Lord of the Rings).

My friend and I went walking in Crockett Park after work today. It turns out I misjudged the time of the sunset. I thought it was at 7:21, but my Weather app was still on the Gatlinburg setting. The sun actually set at 6:30ish.

So we ended up walking in the dark.

Thankfully, I had my trusty flashlight app. I couldn’t see too much with it, but I couldn’t see ANYTHING without it. It was that dark.

Immediately, I thought of every scary movie I’d ever seen where all those people who go walking at night in the dark have unpleasant things happen to them. Usually by people wearing Shatner masks or hockey masks.

Then I thought of that familiar line “though I walk through a valley dark as death I fear no evil, for you are with me” (Psalm 23:4).

God is with us in the dark.

I read this recently and thought I’d wrap up with these words:

“It is in the dark that God is passing by. The bridge and our lives shake not because God has abandoned, but the exact opposite: God is passing by. God is in the tremors. Dark is the holiest ground, the glory passing by. In the blackest, God is closest, at work, forging His perfect and right will. Though it is black and we can’t see and our world seems to be free-falling and we feel utterly alone, Christ is most present to us…” (Ann Voskamp)