Sabbath Devotional :: Perfect Brightness — Light of the World

Image from NASA: The sun’s first rays burst over the Earth’s horizon during an orbital sunrise as the International Space Station orbited above the Indian Ocean southwest of Australia. (July 24, 2020)

I have been thinking a lot about light.

This is probably because I have been experiencing a lot of darkness.

During this time when the world feels so strange and unsettled, when there are so many uncertainties, I often feel a heavy weight on my chest. The landscape of our current situation appears bleak and dreary. Dark.

And so I think about light. I visualize light. I ponder light. I look for light.

I seek after a “perfect brightness of hope” (2 Nephi 31:20). That phrase is in my thoughts, my prayers, my meditations, my heart — every day. I can’t say that I fully comprehend that “perfect brightness.” But I am yearning for it and seeking after it.

Even as I struggle to fully grasp or attain that “perfect brightness of hope,” I do know that the light that radiates that perfect brightness is the Light of the World, the Savior of us all. He is the source of that “perfect brightness.” He is the reason we can — and must — hold on to hope.

As I pondered what to write for this week’s devotional, I felt inspired to share a devotional I wrote last year. The analogy I describe in this devotional has stayed with me in a powerful way. When I feel the weight of darkness or struggle to see the light, I think about the sun — and the Son.

If you find yourself in darkness, please remember that the Son is still there, brilliant and bright, unmoving and unchanging. He is the Light of the World — the source of our “perfect brightness of hope.”

Light of the World

As I was driving my girls to school early one morning, we noticed how beautiful the sky was. In the time since we had left our home in darkness, sunlight had been creeping over the horizon, painting varying shades of glorious hues on a canvas of clouds.

I commented on how beautiful it is to watch the sun rise, and my 8-year-old daughter corrected me: “Mom, don’t you know the sun isn’t really rising? The sun isn’t moving at all!”

She was correct. Indeed, the sun wasn’t moving at all. We talked about how strange it was to think about the fact that we were at that very moment spinning through space, while the sun remained fixed and motionless. As we go throughout our days, we tend to envision the sun moving across the sky — rising in the east and setting in the west — as we remain rooted in place. It becomes easy to imagine that the rest of the solar system is revolving around the tiny spot of planet earth that we are occupying at any given moment.

The sun — the light that keeps our planet and all life on it alive — has become richly symbolic to me as I have come to learn more about the life-giving light of the Son of God. The symbolism of the sun has become especially meaningful to me when I think of it as a representation not only of God’s light, but also of God’s love.

I have spent much of my life feeling frustrated and concerned because I can’t always feel God’s love. In fact, sometimes I experience long periods of time when I don’t feel his love manifest in a way that I recognize. While I have learned that there is evidence of God’s love in many places other than my feelings, I have often wondered why I struggle so much to feel it. When I long to feel closeness, when I am reaching out and doing the things that are supposed to draw me nearer to the Lord, why does he often feel so far away? For many years I carried a lot of guilt and confusion about this, concluding that if I couldn’t feel the joy and love and closeness I wanted to feel, then I must not be doing enough of the right things, or I just simply didn’t matter much to God. Both of those conclusions were painful. Both of those conclusions were false.

Feelings are tricky things. They are complex. They are powerful. And they can be deceiving. Our feelings and emotions are impacted by many things: thoughts, beliefs, life experiences, trauma, emotional injuries, brain chemistry, hormones, and physical/mental/emotional health, just to name a few. Here are some things I have learned about my feelings: I won’t always feel the things I want to feel. My feelings are not something I can always control, though I certainly can do things that will impact my feelings for better or worse. My feelings do not always reflect truth. And my feelings change.

This is where the imagery of the sun has become tremendously helpful for me, especially when I think about it in relation to the Son of God.

The sun is always there, always shining brilliantly, always emitting light and heat into the universe. Yet we don’t always see it. Sometimes layers of clouds conceal it from our view. Every night, we are turned away from the sun and we sit in darkness, the sun completely out of sight. Yet the sun hasn’t moved. Its brightness hasn’t dimmed. Sometimes we bask in its warmth. At other times, we cannot feel its heat. Temperatures drop, and we find ourselves turning on furnaces and bundling up in layers. Yet the temperature of the sun hasn’t changed. It is still there, as brilliant and bright as ever.

Just as the sun is constant, unwavering, and unmoving, so is the Son of God. So is his love for me. And just as my sojourn on earth includes a regular rotation away from the sun into the darkness of night, my mortal experience also will include periods of darkness. Just as storms come and temperatures drop, my mortal experience also will include figurative storms and times when I don’t feel the warmth I yearn for.

When I am not feeling the things I want to feel, especially when I am not feeling God’s love in the ways that I desire to feel it, I think of the sun. I remember that my view from beneath the clouds is obstructed and my perspective is limited. But the sun hasn’t moved. It hasn’t gone cold. It is still there, constant and unwavering. Radiating warmth and light. Giving life. And then I think of the Son. I remember that the Son is still there, constant and unwavering. He has not moved away from me. He has not become cold toward me. He is there — always. Radiating warmth and light. Giving life. Whatever I may be feeling in the moment, his love has not changed. Feelings will come and go, like clouds moving across the sky. But the Light of the World is everlasting and eternal.

“He is the light and the life of the world; yea, a light that is endless, that can never be darkened; yea, and also a life which is endless, that there can be no more death” (Mosiah 16:9).