“Your eyes are windows into your body. If you open your eyes wide in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light. If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar. If you pull the blinds on your windows, what a dark life you will have! Matthew 6:22-23 MSG

I’m wondering what it’s like to be in a “dank cellar”because  I’ve never had a cellar before, let alone a dank one. Dictionary.com describes dank as “unpleasantly moist or humid; damp and, often, chilly.” I imagine most cellars, like basements, tend to be dark as well. Imagine our bodies being unpleasant, chilly and dark, in our souls. I was thinking about examples of what living with blinds on my windows (eyes) has looked like in the past as a parent of a special needs child. I’m not proud of them but here we go: Not being able to see the complete purpose for my child, thinking I’m alone and no one understands, closing myself off to relationships because their family was “normal”, lack of faith and prayer, feeling like I am a horrible parent, anger towards others who are not compassionate towards me, etc. Fortunately I’ve grown tremendously the last seven and half years.

What I’ve learned is that in pain we truly know and see God. We grow and can end up thriving if we can just learn to give up complete control. To say to Him I cannot even get to lunch time with out You leading me, comforting me and teaching me. Sometimes He puts us in a situation, or life does, where we literally cannot stand on our own two feet alone. Where our souls are in so much pain that the only thing we can do is succumb to that pain or reach out to God and say I cant do this, please help! Beautifully put by Ann Voskamp in one of the most important devotions of my life One Thousand Gifts “The vows of the Christ, they are covenant, and He lasts when we lose everything else and all the gifts are in Christ alone.”

To see light and be the opposite is to open our eyes wide to God’s gifts and beauty. Then everything is a gift and can be used by God for good or to show us Himself in such a real way that we’ve never seen Him before.