The cave

The painting just would not come together…Filly had been working on it for days. Dis-satisfied, she threw down the brushes and stared at the painting.
It had all the things that she struggled with. Rocks, for example…there was no rhyme or reason to any rocks she thought. And caves..darkness…and water without the waves. All things that were elusive. The people in the painting, people she loved, were too small to see or paint details. They were in the middle of the water in the middle of the cave. The oppressiveness of it seemed overpowering.

Sometimes that was what seemed to have the platform, or the attention of the world. So many things that seemed wrong that needed fixing. As an artist, how to paint the rocks, the faint light hitting the rocks, the incredible turquois of the water that was so perfect it looked fake…If she tried hard enough to fix what needed fixing, then the world would be beautiful, the painting would be beautiful..she had thought.

That was when Filly stopped. She HAD been trying to fix everything for days and days and hours and hours. She picked up the phone and dialed a number.
“I hope you like the painting I am sending you for your birthday because I have tried and tried and I just can’t get it any better” Filly said.
“I am not good at rocks or caves or tiny people with no details.”

“Well thank you but I just wanted the painting because it is a beautiful memory for our family about standing in the light…in spite of the darkness.”

“That is what I see, and what I am paying attention to, is the light” she continued.

The light, the way, the truth. The solution to darkness of thought, the way out of the cave. The family stuck together in that cave. They stayed close. They kept looking up, kept smiling. Kept trusting God.

Suddenly Filly noticed that the light was in fact shining on all of them. It was filtering through the cracks, could not be blocked out, and brought in with it the gold of clarity, faith and trust in God. Anything that suggested otherwise did not come from God.

The rays from the sun she painted to be more noticeable. She stopped paying attention to the rocks or the water and focused on the light. She added gold to the light. She signed her name.

The world, like herself, could trust in the all powerful and all knowing God to keep leading, guiding and providing the light. It was the light, that chased all the clouds of doubt, and fear, away…in her painting, her thoughts, but more importantly, in the world.

Because God was the actual artist, of all creation, and he was all about the light, not the darkness. How simple and perfect.