Following the Light Long Enough to Be Redirected

I didn’t notice it right away.

I had been sitting with the end of 2 Kings longer than usual, moving more slowly than I normally would, when a pattern began to surface. Not a lesson. Not a conclusion. Just a repetition I couldn’t shake.

Light kept showing up.

And it kept being misunderstood before it was redeemed.

In 2 Kings 20, Hezekiah asks God for a sign of healing, and the sundial's shadow moves backward (2 Kings 20:8–11). It’s a miracle tied to time and the heavens themselves. Shortly after, Babylon sends envoys to Jerusalem, drawn by curiosity and wonder at what has happened (2 Kings 20:12). Awe travels quickly.

Discernment often lags behind.

Not long after, Hezekiah’s son Manasseh builds altars to the “host of heaven,” turning attention from the Creator to the created order (2 Kings 21:3–5). What once pointed beyond itself becomes something to cling to, something to control.

Judah is eventually exiled to Babylon. The story feels fractured. Judgment feels final.

But Scripture rarely stops where we think it should.

In Babylon, Daniel is placed among the wise men, the magi, interpreters of dreams and signs (Daniel 2:27–28, 48). He does not adopt their practices, but he lives faithfully among them. He names God as the true revealer of mysteries and speaks of a kingdom that will never pass away (Daniel 7:13–14).

Centuries later, men from the East see a star and follow it (Matthew 2:1–2).

They do not worship the star.

They let it lead them to Jesus (Matthew 2:9–11).

I would not have seen this thread if I had rushed. It required staying with Scripture long enough for the text to begin speaking across time. Kings to Daniel. Daniel to Matthew. A slow unveiling that only comes through attention.

And somewhere in that slow reading, the story stopped feeling distant.

I’ve always been a seeker.

I looked for meaning in my work, in my roles, in being competent and needed. I also sought guidance in places I now recognize as misdirected. I’ve sat with psychics. I’ve held crystals. I’ve chased clarity wherever it promised certainty or peace.

I don’t share that as a tidy testimony. It isn’t tidy.

I share it because, reading Matthew 2 again, I recognized myself in the Magi more than I ever had before.

They weren’t neutral wanderers. They were shaped by a system that mixed truth and error. They paid attention to the heavens because that was the language they had been given. And God met them there without affirming the system itself.

He didn’t discard their seeking.

He redirected it.

What strikes me now is how much time that redirection took.

Daniel never sees the Magi.

He never knows how his faithfulness echoes forward (Daniel 12:3).

He simply stands where he is placed and tells the truth he has been given.

The Magi don’t explain the star.

They follow it until it leads them to worship.

This isn’t a story about getting it right quickly.

It’s a story about staying long enough to be reoriented.

Scripture teaches this, but only if we let it slow us down. Only if we resist the urge to extract answers and instead allow patterns to emerge. The Bible is not in a hurry. God is not in a hurry (Psalm 27:14).

I’m learning to trust that God works patiently with misdirected longing. That He is not startled by mixed motives. That fruit may grow long after a season has passed, in ways we will never see or control (Isaiah 55:8–9).

Perhaps the invitation is not to find clearer answers faster.

Perhaps it’s to linger.

To sit with the Word.

To let Scripture read us back over time (Joshua 1:8; Psalm 1:1–3).

To follow the light long enough for it to be redirected.