Be a Lamplighter

Before electricity, the streets of Edinburgh went dark every evening unless somebody did something about it. That somebody was the lamplighter. The Scots called him a "leerie." As the daylight faded, he came down the street with a ladder and a long pole with a small flame on the end. He stopped at a gas lamp, lit it, and walked to the next one. Then the next. Every evening, in whatever weather Scotland decided to throw at him.

In the 1850s, a sickly little boy named Robert Louis Stevenson used to sit at the window of his family's home in Edinburgh and wait for the leerie to come by. He was ill so often that the window was most of his world view. Years later, the man who gave us Treasure Island wrote a poem about those evenings. The boy in the poem lists what everyone else wants to be when they grow up. One will be a driver. One will go to sea. His own father is a wealthy banker. Then he makes his choice:

"But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I'm to do, O Leerie, I'll go round at night and light the lamps with you!"

Of everything a child could dream of becoming, he wanted to be the man who carried the light.

I came across an old saying recently that struck me. It says you can't always tell where the lamplighter is headed, but you can always tell where he has been, because he leaves a trail of light behind him.

Jesus said it this way:

Be a lamplighter by letting your good deeds, your actions, shine for other people's benefit. Not to put on your Instagram feed, but to light other people's paths.

The lamplighter didn't make the flame. He carried it. His whole job was to bring a light that wasn't his to places that needed it. That takes the pressure off. We are not the source. We are the pole.

Nobody stood on the street admiring the lamplighter. They just walked home safely because he had been there. The light got the attention, and that is exactly how Jesus said it should work. They see the good, and the Father gets the glory.

This is a hard season for a lot of people. Families are stretched. Buyers are nervous about payments they aren't sure they can carry. Some have already been told no somewhere else. Plenty of people in our own industry are tired. Every file that crosses our desk is a family standing on a street that feels a little dark right now.

One of our core convictions is to Leave People Better for the Encounter. That is a lamplighter's job description. And notice it doesn't say "leave people better for the closing." Not every conversation ends in a loan. Some people aren't ready yet. They should still walk away with more light than they came with: an honest answer, a clear plan, a call that got returned, the sense that somebody saw them as a person and not a transaction.

That goes for the Realtor on the other end of the phone, the teammate two desks over, and the person handing you coffee on the way in.

The leerie never lit the whole city at once. He lit one lamp, then walked to the next. That's the grind. That's also how a dark street becomes a bright one.

You may not know exactly where today is headed. But at the end of it, people should be able to tell where you've been.