Shining Light
It was a Sunday and my cousin had, after months of resistance, convinced me to go to church with him. Church was an old concept, a broken memory in my mind. It was tough for me to walk through those doors and not be skeptical. I decided to give it a chance anyway. Looking back, I have no idea why I agreed to go, maybe I wanted something to complain about later, who knows.
During the service, I remember worship being so beautiful that I felt my attitude change and I was more open to what was happening around me and what my heart was feeling. During the last song, I remember praying, really praying, for the first time in years. I kept my eyes open because I didn’t want anyone to know what I was doing and I didn’t want my cousin to start praying with me or something.
“If this is for real, God…If this is where I’m supposed to be…If this is what my heart has been missing these past couple of years, please…show me something. Make the distinction in my heart, let me know this is You, that this is real.”
The sermon ended and the worship leader was being led by the Holy Spirit in spontaneous worship. Beautiful words were pouring out, words about hope and Jesus being our rock and a shining light. I looked at my cousin and asked if the worship leader was just making that song up on the spot and he said “Oh yeah, he does it all the time.”
I met Dylan that morning and started serving with him on the worship team a few months later.
Fast forward a little over a year. Dylan is working on a new album and I was so blessed to be a part of it. I was sitting in my living room one day, trying to write lead lines for the songs on the album. I threw on an acoustic take of the now finished version of Shining Light. The very first lead line I played over that song is the same lead line that ended up on the album.
It’s crazy to me that my first experience with Dylan and Living Water, I witnessed the beginnings of Shining Light and about a year and a half later, I was contributing to the sound of the song.
In a way, Shining Light reminds me of where I’ve been, how far I fell, and who I am now and where Jesus has brought me. It reminds me that hope is real and that I am never beyond God’s reach.
That Sunday was the end of the loneliest season of my life and the start of my true life in Jesus, and Shining Light will always be a reminder of that to me.