This little light of mine

I don't posses that enviable quality to be joyful and chirpy all day every day. I am not a depressive person by any stretch of the imagination and anybody that knows me knows I love to laugh. Too much for some people's taste but, hey, I am alright with that.

Be that as it may, I am in my head quite a bit and I usually face tough questions on a daily basis and I don't shy away from views meant to discredit my own. G. K. Chesterton said in his book, Heretics,

 ''Ideas are dangerous, but the man to whom they are least dangerous is the man of ideas. He is acquainted with ideas and moves among them like a lion-tamer. Ideas are dangerous, but the man to whom they are most dangerous is the man of no ideas. The man of no ideas will find the first idea fly into his head like wine to the head of a teetotaller. ''

I don't think everybody should expose themselves and their beliefs to daily scrutiny and attacks, but it so happens that I do. I envy people that shelter their views and live surrounded by people that happen to see things the way they do. Sadly I belong to a category of people all of my own. I am no lion-tamer. I am a wanna-be-lion-tamer. I don't have the experience and wisdom to tame even a lion cub yet, but I can't help but wanting that skill. Why? Because it so happens I LOVE lions best and I'd like to be around them without being torn apart. Lions? They are ferocious and unpredictable beasts, lazy most of the time but when they charge... my word! They are amazing! (Instead of lions, read ideas.)

To some people it sounds brave, to others it's sheer stupidity, however that's what I do and in consequence I struggle a lot.

Some days I wake up with a heavy heart. It literally feels like a heaviness on my chest and I feel sad and defeated. And I know for a fact I can stay in that mood for days if I don't control it and if I allow it to go far enough it will grow into pessimism and despair. Mr Chesterton (whom I am aware I quote way too much) said in The Everlasting man, that ''pessimism is not being tired of evil but in being tired of good. Despair does not lie in being tired of suffering, but in being weary of joy.'' I never want to get tired in hoping in the good and I never want to end up far enough from God's ways that I'd be weary of joy.

Darkness has a way of presenting itself in all its enormity until it convinces you that there is no light left in the world and if there still is, it's so far away that it will never help you see even your own hand let alone the path. It is loud and it's strong. So strong that you feel like an ant about to be squashed. But to quote Gandalf, 'Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love. Why Bilbo Baggins? Perhaps because I am afraid and he gives me courage.' (J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit)

Those words always put a smile on my face. It gives me hope that I might not be a strong wizard that can fight alone; I might be a ridiculous hobbit, but I can inspire someone to be strong.

I don't need to focus on how powerful and gigantic darkness is. He doesn't know there's a little flame inside me and inside everyone that has believed in Jesus. He doesn't know that we might disagree, we might be scattered all over the world and we look like insignificant dots, but gather two or three of us
and you'll have enough light to keep walking and hoping. Gather enough of us and we might just set the darkness on fire.

So I don't despair. I cling onto The One that has called me to follow Him and I know I won't get lost. 

by Cristina Pop