Wednesday, June 15, 2011

COCKROACHES

When I was fourteen years old I started working for my uncle Kenneth in the darkroom of his portrait studio. 

That started an interest, hobby, and eventually a part time profession that I have enjoyed for more than 60 years.  I think it is safe to say that by the time I was twenty five years old I had spent half of my life in the dark with nothing to illuminate my world but one small red light bulb. 

But I loved that world…It was just me, the darkness, my trays of chemicals, the little red light bulb, and my friends, the cockroaches.   Yes, the cockroaches! Hundreds of them!  
You see, a photographic dark room is a very moist, dark environment and cockroaches love the darkness.   

Every day when I would come to work and turn on the main light, the floor of the darkroom would look like a miniature Indianapolis 500.

Cockroaches would be running ever which direction trying to find some nook or cranny in which to hide, because they knew the light would expose them for the nasty little creatures they really were.
Everyone hates cockroaches.  They are nasty.  They spread disease. They deposit “Little black specks” everywhere they go, and they chew on thinks we don’t want chewed on.  They are evil and I will never know why Noah let them on the Ark.

But some people are like cockroaches.  If they have evil in their hearts, they don’t want anyone to turn on the “Light of Truth.”
  
Listen to what Jesus said in John 20:3..  For every one that doeth evil hates the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.”   What light is He talking about?

Listen to what He says in John 18:12,  “ I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”

In John 12:46 Jesus declares,  “I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness.”
  Does that remind you of another, “Whosoever”?  How about John 3:16?  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

But here is the best promise of all.  1 John 1:7  “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.”

Will Rogers once said, “Live in such a way that you won’t be afraid to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.” 
Is that another way of saying, “Live in such a way that you will never be afraid to stand in the light of God?”
  If you are struggling in darkness, accept the promise of John 3:16 and remember…….

"God will keep the light on for you!"