Sparks in the Dark

Thanks to http://earthsky.org/tonight/waxing-moon-closer-to-jupiter-on-january-21

One of my first thoughts this morning was of the moon and Jupiter so close together last night. What makes the night sky so beautiful to us? Why are diamonds best displayed on black velvet? What makes candlelight so alluring in a darkened room, and Christmas tree lights most pleasurable in early morning or late at night?

Is it the contrast?

"And God saw that the light was good, and God divided the light from the darkness." Genesis 1:4.

I'm thinking light may be the first principle of art, and contrast the second. The focal point of a painting is often the spot where the lightest lights and the darkest darks meet.

In human behavior we focus on the heroic and the despicable. The bland majority gets little notice. The higher a person rises in the esteem of others, the greater the shock when he falls.

Seven hundred years before Messiah, the prophet Isaiah wrote of him, "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined."

Is this not one of the beauties of the Lord, the contrast of his pure life with that of every other human being upon the earth?