🙌It's the Friday Call to Worship!🙌

The South African school year just ended, but it ended extra early for my differently-wired son. His sparkle has been losing its luster since the middle of this year. School breaks, weekends, and our family's accommodations brought no relief or restoration. He loves his school, family, soccer team, and the church community growing around him more than you've ever seen a six-year old love. But even good old-fashioned childlike zeal costs him much. His small, specialized school caters to him better than I can at home, yet getting there and staying there chips away at him. It's not just autism. It's also a nervous system disability and an autoimmune condition.

My son couldn't quite make it through the end of his first school year and stopped going to soccer months ago. He can't connect with himself, much less others. Every part is our family is impacted. It feels like more than we can hold.

BUT THEN... In the middle of a very hard day this week, I saw a familiar flicker in his big brown eyes. It felt like I was watching from outside my own life when my son put on his soccer boots and went to the last soccer practice of the season. He scored goals, celebrated, and laughed with his friends. His coach gave him a medal for a year well done like no time was lost.

All the hard things were forgotten when I saw my child fully alive. In fact, I experienced a deeper joy on that soccer field because of how hard it was to get there. When light breaks into a dark valley, the light is the only thing that matters. The darkness is just the stage to show how bright it is. It's so good you can't keep it a secret, even if you have to tell about how dark it was before it was light.

He trusts us with so much when He calls us the light of the world. (Matthew 5:14)

Listen to We the Kingdom's "Light of the World - Sing Hallelujah".