Life goes through seasons, some good and some bad, and some just seem to be dark. Those dark season can be overpowering. When nothing seems to change in your circumstances. When one bad thing after the other seems to happen. When you are out of energy, out of money, out of ideas and your hope is dwindling fast. Have you been there? Maybe you are there right now.

In those days, in those season it can be hard to hold fast to the truth that we know to be true. When one day of hurt and pain follows another, when your life feels completely out of control. When stress continues to build and no matter how hard you to try to find moments of peace they seem to elude you. What do we do in those times? How do we keep moving forward when darkness seems to surround us?

Well, an interesting thing happened to me this morning. I have been in one of those dark seasons lately, and just when you think things are dark enough, it seems more hurt gets added. After a very, very rough night, I was sitting in my kitchen this morning, listening to some worship music on my phone, running to the only place where we know peace can be found. As I went to my home screen on my phone, I looked at the background picture. It was a picture I took a few weeks back when my boys and I went hiking. I love the picture because the gorge we were in and the angle of the sun above the waterfall almost made it look like light was about to come spilling through the gorge we had hiked through. Then the thought came into my head, there are beautiful days.

One of the traps of the enemy, especially when we are in dark times, is to get us to forget that happiness, joy, beauty exists. He attempts to get us to focus so much on our circumstances that we can no longer see anything else. Tunneling our vision into darkness. But at that moment, when I remembered, there are beautiful days, it reminded me that there is a light at the end of the darkest tunnel. Jesus is there. He walks with us through those dark seasons. He holds our hand and never lets go. A close friend of mine sent Psalm 23 to a group of us moms earlier this week. She reminded that even as we walk in the darkest places, ones where we can’t see at all, He is with us. He is right beside us, holding our hand and HE WON’T LET GO! As the Bible tells us in Romans 8:38-39 “…nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

On the days where all seems dark, light still exists, there are beautiful moments even in those dark times, we just need to remind ourselves of that. We need others in our lives who will come beside us and remind us when we can’t remember ourselves. We need to put ourselves into a position tho hear God speak, through prayer and worship and we need to look at our faith markers. Write down those beautiful times, take pictures, set scripture around your house, memorize it so that in the dark time, when no light seems to be getting through, you mind can bring to its forefront the truth that there are beautiful days, and one day, those days will be every day. That is the hope we have in Christ.