Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese meets Ahmed al Ahmed at St George Hospital in Sydney on Tuesday, in this photo released by the Prime Minister's office.Australian Prime Minister Office/The Associated Press

It is human nature to look for the light in the darkness. The silver lining, God’s open window, the glass half-filled, the ray at the end of the tunnel.

Sometimes this light can surprise, allowing us some relief from the pit where we have taken to residing.

At this darkest time of year and a dark time in the world, a crack of light presented itself on Sydney’s Bondi Beach in the form of one ballsy, fruit-selling hero, Ahmed al Ahmed, a Syrian-born everyman who was meeting a friend for coffee on Sunday but ended up saving untold lives with a shocking, selfless action that was caught on video.

“He made us proud,” Mr. Ahmed’s uncle told the BBC. “Our village, Syria, all Muslims and the entire world.”

The greatest gift of Mr. Ahmed’s heroism, of course, is the life he preserved. But there is also a gift in the narrative he presents, no matter how unwilling we are to feel an ounce of anything positive at this dark moment. A belief in the goodness of man.

Bondi Beach shooting suspects visited Islamist militant hot spot weeks before attack, police say

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