I heard the President of Master’s College & Seminary give a devotional at a meeting I attended a few weeks ago that has stuck with me, and is very appropriate during our Fast & Pray Days. It started with this scripture:

“Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, ‘children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.’ Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life.”

— Philippians 2:14-16a

He asked us to close our eyes and picture ourselves way out in the country, far away from any city lights, on a clear, summer night. Imagine yourself looking up. What do you see? Everyone at the table said the same thing - stars.

He said that if the earth were the size of a grapefruit (and so, try to imagine the size of a person in that context), then the distance to the stars in that night sky is as far as from here to Los Angeles. (I fact-checked this and found that it was off because the distance was too short. So, the comparison isn’t perfect, but the point is well made.) Yet, even through those miles and miles of darkness, you see light. The darkness far outweighs the light, but the light is able to break through the darkness.

Remember, as you pray this week, we are living in a “warped and crooked generation.” (But for the grace of God, we’d be a part of it.) And though the darkness seems to be everywhere, the power of a life transformed by the Spirit is like a star in the night sky. That’s what people are drawn to.

Let’s pray that we would have this kind of impact, shining among this generation, pointing each one to Jesus, no matter how dark the night may seem.

Praying with you,
Pastor Tracy