Scotch Cap Lighthouse
Originally scheduled for September 12
On April 1, 1946 the crew of the Scotch Cap Lighthouse
experienced the power of the sea. A magnitude 7.6 earthquake had created a
tsunami in the area. The lighthouse on Unimak Island, Alaska was forty feet
above sea level; it was over sixty feet high. The tsunami erased it from the
island. It is estimated that the wave had to be over a hundred feet high.
Three men died there; the same tsunami went on to kill over a hundred people in
Hawaii.
So it is with the lighthouses built by men. They disappear
in the waves; they crumble of old age or are simply abandoned. The ideas of
men receive much the same treatment.
But one lighthouse remains: Christ, the light of the world.
Heaven and earth may pass away, but the words of Christ will remain forever.
The powers of this world have tried everything available to wipe out this
light. The have persecuted his church in the most painful and gruesome ways.
They have heaped scorn on those who believe. Perhaps most insidious of all is this:
the government of the day comes to “help” the church. Just to fix all those
wrong-headed ideas about right and wrong, of course.
Christ tells us that we, too, are the light of the world. We
are “lower lights,” to be sure, but lights nonetheless. He shines to all the
world; we must shine to as many as we can. Surely, however, we can take a
lesson from the lighthouse – the lens of the light must be clean so that the
beam may be clear. It is the same spiritually. We are commanded to examine
ourselves before communion. In this way we clean the spiritual lens, repenting
of our sins, asking forgiveness. So as you take this spiritual meal today,
take the time to reflect upon yourself. Bring your sins to the light so that
they may be examined – and removed. Then take, remembering the sacrifice which
now makes you clean.
