Welcome to The Light, where we pause together in the quiet between the noise.
In Lebanon, Tennessee, Pastor Greg Locke announced the death of his twenty-year-old son, Evan Roberts Locke, following a fatal overdose. There are no words adequate to this kind of grief. A father who has stood before thousands now stands in the most private darkness any parent can know. We hold that gently.
From that tenderness, we turn to a story of a different kind of battle. Two soldiers, Nafi and Kamran, fought through years of armed conflict, and when their side prevailed, found themselves adrift at desks in a capital city. Nafi speaks honestly about an addiction to the internet, to Twitter especially. Kamran reflects that the real test was never the war itself, but the stillness that followed it. That observation carries something worth sitting with.
And then, because faith has always made room for laughter, this week brought a fresh collection of Christian memes circulating online, drawing smiles from communities that know how to hold the sacred and the absurd in the same breath. Joy, too, is a form of witness.
That is this hour's reflection. Carry the light gently.
