By
Wendy Greiner Lefko
“Bye!” our 2 ½ year old
son, Daniel, said oh so sweetly as he smiled, waved at me and closed the
door between us. He wasn’t
going anywhere, and neither was I. He
was politely trying to keep me from gaining entry into the room he was
occupying because he was busy getting into things he knew he shouldn’t
be. He assumed if I couldn’t
see what he was doing, it was ok. He
also wrongly assumed that I’d let him.
His most recent attempts at avoiding any form of discipline or
correction for something he knows all too well is wrong, is by either
closing his eyes, or putting his hands over his eyes, or as in this
instance, retreating behind a closed door.
It appears he figures if he can’t see me, I can’t see him and I
won’t know his misdeeds. His
actions clearly showed me two things—he’s wise enough to know that
what he’s doing is wrong, and he’s foolish enough to think that if he
blocks me from his view I won’t be onto him.
Of course, as a mother, sometimes the hardest part of discipline is
not in administering it, but in refraining from laughing when I see his
ingenious, albeit misguided, attempts at concealing mischievous behavior,
even before the age of 3!
But our son’s knowledge of
right and wrong and his repeated attempts at hiding it (and himself) from
me is a reminder of the human condition that we all struggle with.
More and more in this world we see God removed from every facet of
our lives, from our schools to “self-help” books, from our Pledge of
Allegiance to the Ten Commandments etched in stone on courthouse steps.
It seems the world wants to take out any reference to God from our
very existence. I believe it
is an innate attempt to squelch any sense of the Holy Spirit’s
conviction in their lives. Just
as God described in His Word, the darkness flees the light because it
knows it will only reveal man’s sinful condition and need for a Savior.
If the world can block out the Light, if it can’t see God, they
figure God can’t see them, and it makes the way they want to live their
lives seem “ok”. Without
absolute truth, there is no absolute wrong.
Even we, as His children, can do the same thing, relegating God to
a compartment in our lives, seeking Him out only when we have a need, but
closing off our very hearts from Him so we don’t “look so bad” in
our own eyes. If we can’t
see Him, we figure He can’t see us, and can’t shed light on our
misdeeds. The wonderful truth is that even when we shut the door on Him,
or close our eyes to Him, He is still there.
My prayer is that we open
wide the door of our lives to let in the Light that we so desperately
need, so He can fill our lives with the Light of His love.
“Men
loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For
every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light,
lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to
the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in
God” (John
3:19
-21).
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