The Shadow
in Giggles on January 30, 2020
Have y’all ever stopped to think about shadows? Probably not. It’s okay. I have to admit, I come up with some pretty strange ideas. Today, I want to talk about shadows…all types of shadows.
When my kids were little, my oldest son, discovered the art of shadow puppets on a Sunday morning…on the back of the Senior Pastor’s robe…during the service…thus, entertaining several rows of parishioners behind us with his shenanigans.
Parents have shadows…dark, deep shadows under their eyes from the time they bring their babies home, until…well…I’m still waiting to find out when those shadows leave. I’m fairly certain this is just how my face looks now.
I watch shadows fall across my back patio in the afternoons, as the sun sets in the afternoons.
The thing about shadows is this: they have a tendency to distort our reality.
Shadows are only a version of the actual object.
I was listening to my Alexa while I was decorating my Christmas tree after Thanksgiving last year, and a Blake Shelton song came on that I had never heard. I stood in the front room of my house, completely motionless, and just listened—absorbed, actually, the words of his song, entitle Savior’s Shadow. It wasn’t necessarily a Christmas song, but it was beautiful.
The first verse was sweet and simple. Humor me: “I’m standing in my Savior’s Shadow—He is watching over me—I feel the rain, I hear the thunder—As He cries for me.”
Those few lines got me thinking about another few simple lines. The Twenty-Third Psalm. Before too many of y’all start to roll your eyes, hear me out. Psalm 23:4 reads, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil…(emphasis added)”
We are surrounded by shadows. Even now, as I am typing this, I can see my own shadow on the wall beside me cast by my lamp. Here’s the thing about a shadow: if we can see our shadow, that means the light is behind us. Sometimes, we just need to turn around.
In the Blake Shelton song, he was standing in his Savior’s Shadow, yet he could still feel the rain, and hear the thunder. Duh. A shadow isn’t going to protect us from the storms of life. Even the psalmist knew that eventually he would have to walk through the valley of the shadow of death, but that’s all it would be…a SHADOW of death. Turn around and look to the Light. Life gets complicated and messy. But, have confidence in the Shadow you’re standing in.