Photo taken of the sunset at Newport Pier, CA on July 10, 2010
"Brightly Beams Our Father's Mercy"Hymn No. 335 verse 3
Trim your feeble lamp, my brother, some poor sailor tempest tossed,
Trying now to make the harbor, in the darkness may be lost.
Let the lower lights be burning! Send a gleam across the wave!
Trying now to make the harbor, some poor sailor may be lost.
.......................................
The last verse of this song is asking each of us to be a "lighthouse" to those who might be lost at sea. Even though this photo that I took on the Newport Pier is not really a lighthouse, I think it illustrates an important concept. I framed the sun to appear as a light within a lookout point on the pier. The reality is ...there is only one true light... the light that illuminates all things, and that comes from Christ. We can not be a "light" ourselves without having the light of Christ within us. We might think we have light.. but is it artificial light?.. or does it shine from our testimony of Christ?
This hymn and picture remind me of a talk I heard in sacrament from a fellow who lived in a coastal town. He said that the "lower lights" spoken of in the hymn refers to the lights of homes along the shore leading up to the lighthouse. There is a big light at the light house to lead the boats into the shore but when things get really dark and stormy, the ships need the lowere lights in the homes along the coast in order to safely guide themselves towards the port where the big light of the light house will take them the rest of the way. I feel that each of us can be one of those "lower lights" in our lives and help guide people to the big light of Christ.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. :)
ReplyDeleteMy father mentioned to me yesterday that he came across some history involving pirates. These deceptive pirates would create a false "lower lights" set up along a rocky and/or dangerous areas of the ocean. These "false lights" were not lights of homes on the coast, but traps, so that when the approaching ships thought they were entering in a safe harbor, these ships shipwrecked and crashed, to which the pirates then looted the ships.