Let Your Light Shine with Angie Dicken!

Posted by abakersp in Spotlights / 2 Comments

It’s time to let your light shine my friends! Isn’t that what we should be doing daily, letting our light shine for Jesus? Well the wonderful Angie Dicken is having a Facebook party celebrating her book, The Yellow Lantern. This book is a beautiful example of finding the light in a dark place! Be sure to join the Facebook party for games, fun and more!

How To Find Light in Dark Seasons

When I wrote about graverobbers in The Yellow Lantern, I’m thankful to say that the subject did NOT grow from a place of personal experience. But, I discovered that the areas where Josie Clay found light amidst all her dark circumstances were not uncommon to the places I’ve found while walking through seasons of darkness.

During this festive time of traipsing around at night, hiding behind masks, and begging and tricking, the brightness of candles and lights and glow sticks steal the shadowy show. Light is brightest against darkness…actually, if we pay close attention, God has placed beacons of light for us to grow in before darkness even creeps in. The Yellow Lantern offers three beacons I have found to be light-bearing in my own dark seasons:

#1: Friendship

Josie Clay finds friendship in a way that gives her fuel to seek a way out of the darkness. She becomes connected with a community during her dark dealings. In my own dark seasons, God provided His light to shine through the friendships that had grown before the darkness, but perhaps, for my own protection in the nearing darker seasons. Just as Proverbs 17:17 says,

“A friend loves at all times,and a brother is born for a time of adversity.”

The Yellow Lantern is dedicated to my Proverbs 17:17 sisters. God grew us for community. I don’t know that I would have found much light in my dark seasons without those friends He had provided for me.

#2 Gifting

Whether you are an artist or a servant at heart, another place to discover light in the darkness is in the very gifting God has uniquely placed upon you. Josie is an herbalist. She finds her greatest passion and joy in creating remedies for those in need. I am an author—I find my greatest passion and joy spill out as I write. And it’s not just for my own pleasure. It’s a much-needed gifting that points me to light no matter how much darkness brews around me.

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” (James 1:17)

If He’s given us these gifts, then we have what it takes to find light in a dark situation. Good and perfect and ever chasing away those shadows.

#3 Faith

There have been seasons in my life where I feel like faith is this thin, fragile thread. At any moment, it might snap. But it doesn’t. Scripture gives us a hint as to why it might be stronger than I imagine:

“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” (Hebrews 11:1)

Faith, in itself, is a light. It might not chase the darkness away, we might not see any light at all, but Faith provides the assurance that something IS there beyond the dark. Josie Clay makes some choices without knowing that she will ever leave the darkness, but faith gives her the confidence to do so. Of all the beacons God gives us in our dark seasons, Faith might be the most abstract and at times, hidden, but it is the most assured place of everlasting light.

Have you recently leaned into one of these three beacons to shine light in a dark season?

About the Author

Angie Dicken is a third generation Greek American, the granddaughter of strong men and women who endured hardship to grow American roots. My Heart Belongs In Castle Gate, Utah is set near the birthplace of her grandfather, a Greek coal miner’s son, and published 100 years after his birth. Angie is a contributor to The Writer’s Alley blog and an ACFW member since 2010. She lives with her husband and four children in the Midwest where she enjoys exploring eclectic new restaurants and chatting with friends over coffee.

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