On August 14,2003 a major power outage struck the Northeastern United States and Eastern Canada. It was the largest power outage in history and affected an area of close to 9,300 square miles of some of the most populated areas in North America. People became trapped in elevators, traffic lights didnt function at rush hour, and vendors watched helplessly as food spoiled from lack of refrigeration.

At night, cities whose lights usually shone so brightly that they were visible from hundreds of miles away in outer space were blacked out by the loss of power. For city dwellers many activities became extremely difficult or even impossible as they tried to manage in the dark.

For fifty million people who were in the complete darkness that night it was a time they shall never forget. Fifty million people were in physical darkness due to the power outage.

But millions upon millions of souls are in spiritual darkness because they have either not heard the truth of the gospel, or they have heard it and declined to receive its gracious offer of life.

Refusing the good news of the gospel, they have refused the only message that ever could bring light into their lives. I am the light of the world: he that believes on me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life.

It is only through the light that is in the Lord Jesus that we are enabled to see ourselves way we truly are before God. By it we are enabled to see ourselves as sinners under the just condemnation of a righteous God. Because we are sinners unable to help ourselves we can see for the first time that we are in dire need of a Savior.

Also, in the light of the Lord Jesus, we can see clearly the wonderful grace of God. His grace led him to send his Son into this world where he would eventually be nailed to the cross and die in the sinners place. In ancient times, when a king or a ruler showed one of his subjects favor and gave them a gift it was considered an act of grace. At the cross, the supreme ruler of the universe opened his heart to you and me and gave the greatest gift he could possibly give. He gave his Son. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth on him would not perish but have everlasting life.