Light on the Darkest Day

    For many today is a dark day, especially in the wake of the tragedy that happened exactly one week ago (for as I write this, it is 9:30 AM) in Newtown, CT.  Darkness shrouds the nation and world for there are many unanswered questions, and the pain is great. 
    It is a dark day for many today because, despite Christmas being a time where Joy and Hope come, it is also a time of great grieving for those who have lost family members and friends.  This special time of gathering together and sharing life is transformed by death into a period of pain and loneliness that can become a pall over simply living.
    It is physically a dark day, as this is the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.  Starting tomorrow the shift of the earth’s rotation on it’s axis is such that, little by little, the nights grow shorter and days grow longer, but today there is more night than day.

    Darkness is fascinating, mysterious, and sometimes scary, for we are creatures who need to be able to see what is around us.  We desire to know, rather than sit with the unknown.  We want to see and believe rather than believe it what we can’t see.  We seek that which is visible, even though there are far more things in life which are invisible and in which we trust.
    Yet despite our fear of darkness and uncertainty, it is in the midst of the darkness and in living through the uncertainty that we are shaped and molded.  When we go through the pains of daily living or the extremities of death, divorce, addiction recovery, and/or physical dis-ease, we can emerge on the other side as ones who are stronger, more faithful, and even more hopeful.  And yet, not everyone does.
    There are many who cannot emerge from that darkness.  For some depression or mental illness is a factor, but for many the darkness remains because of inward focus or inability to perceive a greater reality. Some may call it low self-esteem, others learned identity, but the darkness can easily take up residence when one continues to listen to the messages of the world or internal messages that tell us that there is no hope, or this is just how the world is, or even I just can’t do it.  To emerge from the darkness, an invitation is given to turn toward the light.

    We are just days away from the coming of the Light of the World, and what often gets forgotten about the story of Christ’s birth is that the days into which God entered this world through the Christ, were dark days.  This was a period of Roman occupation.  It was a time where persecution was the norm and survival was a challenge for many.  It was into just such a time that Jesus came to bring light.
    As we read in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus came to Shepherds in fields, and in that day and age if there was ever a profession that was looked down upon and despised, it was shepherds.  They were dirty, rough, avoided people who lived dark lives, and yet it was to them that Jesus came.
    Matthew recounts how God’s messengers spoke to a young peasant girl and told her she would bear the Son of God, and how her betrothed, Joseph, was also spoken to and told that his fiancé was pregnant with God’s child.  Imagine being the recipient of such truth.  Dark days.
    And yet, the words of angels rang true, and the life that came was the life that grew to become the Light of Life.  Through Him the darkness was dispersed, and that same Light enters our world and enters our lives again.  Even more amazingly, the Light’s focus, those upon whom God aims His light, are those whose lives have been shattered by darkness.  Those who most need to see, because they are blind and the uncertainty is just too great.  To them, the Known One, the One who Knows, invades the unknowing and brings clarity and hope.

    It is the shortest day of the year.  It is a dark day for those who grieve.  It is even a day when the world perpetuates a Mayan myth that this is the last day, and yet despite the darkness, in the grief, and even in reflection upon the last day, the Truth of God’s love is that the Light of the World has come, is coming, and will come again.
    One of my favorite hymns is “I Want to Walk as a Child of the Light”.  I love this hymn because it speaks to the Truth of God’s coming Light, but is also calls us to live in that light and allow that light to live in us.  The first verse and chorus are:

I want to walk as a child of the light;
I want to follow Jesus.
God set the stars to give light to the world;
The star of my life is Jesus.

Refrain
In him there is no darkness at all;
The night and the day are both alike.
The Lamb is the light of the city of God;
Shine in my heart, Lord Jesus.

    On this darkest day, in these last days before the Great Celebration, look for the Light.  Seek the Son.  Walk in the Light and walk as a child of the Light, for indeed, always, there is hope.  Indeed, always, the Light of the world comes.