I came home from a meeting one evening in the middle of March, hung up my coat and headed across the dark living room when suddenly I faceplanted. As I got off the floor and headed to get some ice, I felt something trickle down my cheek. I touched my face and found blood. I grabbed some paper towel to clean my face and to wrap around an ice cube that I applied to my eye. Then I headed to the bathroom to survey the apparent damage. I saw that the bleeding came out of a split in the skin. Immediate swelling of the eyelid indicated that a black eye was a sure thing. Even my glasses were so bent that I was unable to keep them on my face.

I have no proper excuse for this incident except that I like my independence. I wanted to quickly traverse my living room without the aid of light. After all I knew where all the furniture was and I knew that I could avoid it. A doctor had to told me to always turn on a light when entering a dark room but I thought that was not necessary because I was being very careful. However, there was a Bible verse I should have remembered. “So, the one who thinks he is standing firm should be careful not to fall,” (1 Corinthians 10:12).

What caused the fall? I had forgotten that I was working on a large project and the living room floor was the best place to spread it all out. I preferred walking in the darkness because I didn’t want to take the 2 seconds necessary to flip on the light. In addition, I wanted to do things my way (besides no one would know). Of course, lots of people did know what I had done since I had to explain it to the people who fixed my glasses and the many who asked, “What happened?!” as my eye turned from swollen, to spreading down my face in colors of red, black and blue and then yellow and green before it faded.

Do we also seem to prefer walking around in spiritual darkness without taking the time to engage with God daily? The reason many do, has been explained this way. “The Light has come into the world, but men loved the darkness rather than the Light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come into the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed,” (John 3:19-20). Perhaps my independence wasn’t evil but neither was it a display of obedience and certainly not that of common sense.

When we have committed our lives to live for God, we move out of the darkness into His light. “For you were once in darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, (Ephesians 5:8). When we are in fellowship with God and study His Word, we will bring God’s light into the world’s darkness. “Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path,” (Psalm 119:105.)

Let’s bring the light of the Lord into our lives so that we can help others out of their darkness into God’s perfect light. In addition, let’s be obedient to the instructions God’s Word gives us…whether we agree with them or not.

Author of a second book, “Journeys in Faith, Pursing Obedience,” containing more than 50 additional devotionals written for The Minot Daily News.