The first time I read those words I thought, wow, that’s rather depressing, the darkness always being there first. It’s a cold, bleak, discouraging sort of thought. Shiver inducing and unsettling.

But recently I read Reaper Man again and the words meant something entirely different to me. This time, I read joy into the words and their previous coldness melted in a wave of smiling warmth. I thought about the dark, and how it is the absence of light. And I decided there was something lovely about that. That the dark is always there waiting, waiting to be dispelled. Because that’s what light does. That’s what light is.

I think that’s a big part of what life is about and what we’re here on this earth to do. To be a light. To choose that. And I think we need the dark, because it’s the backdrop against which the light shines forth so wondrously.

“Then Jesus spoke to them again saying, ‘I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.’” John 8:12