Imagine a Room

Imagine waking up in a room you don’t recognize. It’s as dark as the inside of a coal mine, and everything about it feels wrong. The air’s heavy, like it’s been waiting for someone to breathe it. You stick a hand out, hoping to find something familiar, but all you meet is cold, stubborn furniture. You shuffle forward, slow as a mule in August, and—BAM—your shin meets a table leg that doesn’t care a bit about your feelings.

You try again, slower this time, arms stretched out like a ghost, trying to make peace with the dark. Little by little, you start piecing the room together. There’s a chair to your left, a dresser to your right, but everything feels strange, unfriendly. All you want is a crack of light, just enough to make sense of it all. But no light comes. Nobody shows up to help. It’s just you and the dark, and let me tell you, the dark is winning.

Now, let’s start over. Same room, but this time sunlight from the windows is pouring across the floor like warm syrup. Every corner of the room is plain to see. The table isn’t an enemy—it’s a place to rest your coffee cup. The chair doesn’t bite—it invites you to sit. You know where you are and where you’re going, and for the first time, you can breathe easily. You move with purpose, sure of every step. Life in the light? It’s not just easier—it’s infinitely better.

And this, I think, is where we find ourselves most days, living somewhere between those two rooms. We stumble around in the dark, thinking this is just how life is—hard, confusing, full of stubbed toes and banged-up shins. But God? He’s standing right there, holding the biggest, brightest lantern you ever saw, and He’s saying, “Here, let Me help you.”

It’s not that the Lord wants to keep us in the dark; it’s that we’re stubborn enough to stay there. We tell ourselves we can figure it out alone, that we don’t need Him or His light, and then we wonder why life feels like a blindfolded walk through a junkyard.

But listen to what Paul says: “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6 CSB). That’s not just poetic—it’s personal. God isn’t offering us a flashlight to borrow for a while. He’s offering us Himself—the kind of light that doesn’t burn out or fade away.

The truth is, we’re all walking through some dark rooms. Maybe it’s grief, maybe it’s regret, maybe it’s just the weight of a world that feels too heavy. Maybe it’s a loss that stole the air right out of your lungs, or the kind of loneliness that doesn’t go away in a crowded room. Maybe it’s the daily grind of feeling like you’re never enough, always falling short, stuck in a cycle you can’t break. The dark has a way of making us believe it’s all there is.

But the good news, the best news, is this: God doesn’t leave us there. He shows up with light in His hands and love in His voice saying, “Follow Me.” And if we’re smart, we’ll drop everything and go.

John put it like this: “If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:7 NKJV). That’s not just about seeing where you’re going—it’s about knowing who’s walking with you. When we step into the light, we find more than clarity. We find communion. We find purpose. We find Him.

You see, the light doesn’t just help us see—it transforms us. It turns fear into courage, doubt into faith, and pain into healing. It doesn’t just change the room we’re in; it changes us. But stepping into the light takes trust. It takes surrender. It means admitting we can’t navigate the dark alone. Yet when we do, we discover the light is more beautiful and more powerful than we ever imagined.

So maybe it’s time to stop feeling your way through the dark. Maybe it’s time to open your eyes to the light God’s been shining all along. Because the truth is, you were made for more than bruised shins and broken hearts. You were made to walk in the light of His glory—to know Him, to love Him, and to live a life that doesn’t just get by—but shines so the world can see.