Have you ever been afraid of the Dark? I have. When I was a young child we lived out on a farm far away from the city. One night I had a nightmare: it was an awful dream and I woke up scared to death. I needed my Mama. I got up and ran to her room. Suddenly I ran into a wall and all these people were grabbing me and they wouldn't let go and I screamed and yelled and told them "No, leave me alone, you can't have me. I want my Mama." I struggled and fought and screamed for my Mother. Suddenly the light came on and I turned and there was my mom; I ran and jumped into her arms and she held me and comforted me. I told her that the bad people tried to get me. And she said, "Honey you were in the closet, you must have gone in there by mistake and you got all caught up in your clothes." I turned and looked. I had been in the closet. In my fear from the bad dream I had gone through the wrong door. Without any light I couldn't see my mistake and I had gone from scared to terrified. But here's the joy, like my Mom, God does not leave us in the dark. God creates the light.
God gives us light, Glorious light, to see each other and the world. God created light first, bringing it out of the darkness and chaos, creating it out of nothing. Creation occurs only because God wills it. God created light but did not destroy darkness. God limited the darkness with light. In Genesis we see a bold theological effort informed by a believing passion. We hear beautiful poetry that affirms and confesses God's power and will in our lives. And we hear an understanding that we are part of a creation where both light and dark are allowed and ordered by God. God separated them but did not vanquish the darkness completely. God named them and has power over them. And with God's help we make it from the darkness into the light.
This reminds me of a sci-fi book I read, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin. Near the end of the book, the two main characters were traveling hard and fast trying to cross a glacier. Plagued by clouds and storms and almost out of food, they were worried that they weren't going to make it. Then one day they awoke to a bright cloudless beautiful day and they felt sure that they would make up for lost time...but it didn't turn out that way. Everywhere they looked the light from the sun bounced off the ice; instead of helping them, it surrounded and blinded them. They couldn't see anything; their eyes became sore and worn out and they tripped and fell over every little uneven surface. Then they realized, "We will have to give up for today, we just can't see without the shadows, because the shadows help define the light." I read that and my breath caught in my throat. The shadows help define the light, and I thought... just as our shadows that each of us has in our lives help define who we are. Much of who we are originates from the sorrows that we face in our lives and how we deal with them. The shadows help define our life!
So why do we fear the darkness? We fear the darkness because we fear that which we do not understand, we fear the unknown. And we fear the darkness because it can hurt and we do not want to hurt. We fear sorrow, pain and death. We avoid and fear this type of darkness, even though through this darkness we can be brought closer to God. Yet we often fail to recognize this. We fear this darkness also because it forces us to depend on God. It is in the dark times of our lives that only our faith can help us through. I have a card that someone gave me once that says, "Faith isn't faith until it's all your holding on to." When we're in these times we have to admit that we don't control our lives and submit to God. And it is in these times by submitting that we truly come to know God. In submission we allow God's love, strength, power, comfort, and courage into our lives. It is in and through the tunnel of this darkness that we may move closer to the light of God. It is in pain, sorrow and death that we are offered an opportunity to let our defenses down and relinquish to God what is God's already. It is through this darkness that we are offered opportunities to submit ourselves to God's light.
The monk John of the Cross recognized this darkness, he called it the "dark night of the soul." We all have these times. I experienced a dark night of my soul last year when I was told that my mother had cancer. The doctor who did the biopsy and the initial test explained there was a 99.9% chance that the lump was malignant. I felt so lost, confused, hurt, angry, sorrowed, out of control, and numb. My pain was deep and powerful. I hurt thinking about what my mom was going to have to go through. I was angry that it was happening and that there was nothing I could do to make it better. I cried for healing, for help, for courage. I prayed that I could offer her support and some comfort. I was so afraid of losing my Mama. My Mama who had kept me safe by turning on the light. Now I couldn't keep her safe and I couldn't keep her from the pain. For two long and dreadful days I struggled with this pain.. I cried.. And then I realized that God was at work for God's own purposes and no matter what the outcome all we could do was submit and believe. During this moment of my darkness, in this shadow that is part of who I am, in the end, I must relinquish my pretense of control, and submit myself to God.
On the third day the lab work came back and the official and definitive report was negative. My mother did not have cancer. She is part of the .1%! This is a miracle for us. We did nothing to deserve this miracle, but we see it as a sign of God's presence in the world. Because all light, joy, and happiness are powerful reminders that God is with us. But we must also remember that darkness, sorrow and pain are a part of God's world, too. God made the world to have both day and night. And in each of our lives we all have both. And God is with us through it all and at all times. God is with us with cancer and without cancer --and that is the miracle that we always have. In the darkness we do not walk alone. We may put our hands over our eyes and hide our eyes from God when we are hurting but whether we look or not God is still with us. We are never alone.
Both darkness and light are part of the story of creation, and they limit each other. But what about the light? How do we define light other than simply saying that it isn't the darkness? Light seemed like a simple enough term so I innocently went to the dictionary and found nine pages of definition. Light is used 232 times in the Bible. I realized that there is no way we can talk about all that light means or every instance of it in the Bible in one sermon, or 2 or 20!
But we can say by looking at Gen. 1 that God created the light and 1st John 1:5 says that God is the light. But in John 8:12 Jesus says that he is the light of the world, yet in Matt. 5:14 Jesus tells his disciples that they are the light. All these texts together can seem confusing, but from these texts we see in Gen. that God is the origin of light and in 1st John God is the very essence of the light. And in John 8 we see that Christ is with God in the light. That is not to say that God and Christ are light and nothing more, but instead Jesus and God are like the sun bringing light, life and sustenance to the world. And in Matt. Jesus is telling us that we are like the moon reflecting that light back and onto others. So, we are filled with the light from above and God and Christ illuminate the world through and around us.
That reminds me of a story I heard one time about a young boy that took a trip to Europe with his parents. While they were there they went and saw a lot of the beautiful old cathedrals. When he got back his Sunday School teacher asked him what he had liked best about the churches. The boy said, "I loved the sense of the awesomeness and the hugeness of who God must be." Then the teacher asked what he had learned about the Saints. And the boy stopped and thought about all the stain glass windows he had seen and he answered, "A saint is a person that the light shines through." Once more a child speaks the truth simply and clearly. God's love shines through us just as the sun does through those beautiful windows.
God is also the illumination in the sense that God is the ultimate source of knowing and understanding. God is the ultimate knowledge. Here the emphasis is on perception, the light which penetrates the darkness to reveal the truth and dispel falsehood. God's light provides understanding even through the darkness of deception. Light is a symbol of God's presence in the world and truth and understanding are part of the light.
We are all God's children and we all hide in our closets in fear of terrible things in the dark that will get us. When we cry out for help God responds and the light of God's love makes it possible for us to see the world differently. Just as the light my Mom turned on helped me to see that what I thought were bad people trying to get me were really only my clothes. God's light helps us see that many of our fears are based on misunderstandings of the unknown. With God's help we discover that the monsters in our closet really have no power to trap us or hold on to us. And when we receive the light of God and Christ we must reflect it into the world. This light was separated from the darkness by God's creative power. It is a Light of purity, happiness, life, freedom, true sight, goodness, understanding, truth, love, hope and faith. And faith is with us even in the darkness. It is through our faith that we come to know God, and move closer to the love and hope of Christ.
As we begin a new year let us remember how God began the world. God said, "Let there be light, and God separated it from the darkness and God saw that it was good." We are called to step into the light that God created and offers us. We are called to live our lives and see the world through Christ's light. We must not fear the dark nights of our souls, because through them we can come closer to God. And we must remember... God created the light and God sent his son, and both can pierce the darkness.
© 1998 Rev. Elizabeth Lee Self
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Copyright © 1996-1999 Kevin and Lee Self Last Updated: March 1, 1999 Obligatory Disclaimer |