Bread Crumbs – Devotions for Life

I have never refused God anything!

Florence Nightingale

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She was known as the Lady with the Lamp for making nursing rounds at night, checking on injured soldiers while the rest of the medical staff slept.

Perhaps the one thing Florence Nightingale refused God was darkness.  

She insisted on being light in darkness for soldiers traumatized by injuries.  May 12 is Florence Nightingale’s birthday, which is why this week is National Nurses Week.  

While you take time to give thanks for those nursing saints who care for us in the nighttime of our fear and who compassionately tend to our broken and failing bodies, let us remember that we too have been called by Jesus to be light in a world of darkness.

God’s first act was to create light, to illumine the dark expanse before creation.  

Light brings life and hope.

Refusing to be Christ’s light in the world, may be the greatest sin of Christians.    

Jesus said,

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.  Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”   (1)

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1. The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2001), Matthew 5:14–16.