The Dark Candle

A man had a little daughter. His only and much-beloved child. He lived
for her… she was his life. So when she became ill and her illness
resisted the efforts of the best obtainable physicians, he became like
a man possessed, moving heaven and earth to bring about her
restoration to health.

His best efforts proved unavailing and the child died. The father was
totally irreconcilable. He became a bitter recluse, shutting himself
away from his many friends and refusing every activity that might
restore his poise and bring him back to his normal self.

One night he had a dream. He was in Heaven, and was witnessing a grand
pageant of all the little child angels. They were marching in an
apparently endless line past the Great White Throne. Every white-robed
angelic child carried a candle. He noticed that one child’s candle was
not lighted. Then he saw that the child with the dark candle was his
own little girl. Rushing to her, while the pageant faltered, he seized
her in his arms, caressed her tenderly, and then asked: "How is it,
darling that your candle alone is unlighted?"

"Father, they often relight it, but your tears always put it out."
Just then he awoke from his dream. The lesson was crystal clear, and
its effects were immediate. From that hour on he was not a recluse,
but mingled freely and cheerfully with his former friends and
associates. No longer would his darling’s candle be extinguished by
his useless tears.

Psalms 56:13 (NKJ) "For You have delivered my soul from death. Have
you not kept my feet from falling, That I may walk before God In the
LIGHT of the living?"