Category: Darkness

Darkness, Dreams, Light

New Light Chases the Darkness Away

Rev Kathy

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It was an old dream proclaimed by the Prophet Isaiah. He dreamed of an earth filled with justice, righteousness and peace. He dreamed of a world where children do not fear, a world where all people live in God’s light. The people of God have dreamed the very same dream, just as we dream it today. Hear the words of the Prophet:

With righteousness he will judge the needy,
with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.
He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;
with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.
Righteousness will be his belt
and faithfulness the sash around his waist.
The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them . . .

They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.

– Isaiah 11:4-6, 9 New International Version (NIV)
We must keep dreaming, seeking the dream with hearts and hands, giving ourselves to the work of justice. Bishop Steven Charleston, as always, eloquently expresses the thought.

I dream the old dream, the one that has been with us for centuries now, passed down from heart to heart, shared by great leaders and simple believers alike, the dream of a day when the scales of time will tip, when the long suffering will end, when justice will finally bring the peace we deserve. The tyrants will be history. The wars only a distant memory. The Earth will sparkle beneath clear skies, every hungry child will be fed. I dream the old dream, the one you have dreamed too, the one that arises in the long hours of night, before the new light chases the darkness away.

We dream of the day when tyrants will be history, wars a distant memory, where every hungry child will be fed, and the long night of suffering will end for every person. Though we may experience the deepest, harshest darkness, it is the new light of our dreams that chases the darkness away. May this be our prayer.

Darkness, Light

Supernatural

Rev Kathy
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Light Pillars. Photo by Timothy Joseph Elzinga.

A northern Ontario man was surprised to wake up in the middle of the night, 1:30 am, to see beams of brightly colored lights shooting up into the sky. Timothy Joseph Elzinga came out onto the street in the freezing weather to watch the lights as they changed between yellow, red, green, and blue. The phenomenon is called light pillars.

Light pillars appear when either natural or artificial light bounces off ice crystals floating close to the ground. In this case, the air was so cold that ice crystals were forming in the air, reflecting the city’s street and business lights. “It was very bright in person, like nothing I’ve ever seen. It almost seemed supernatural.”

You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

– 1 Peter 2:9

I am not a person who likes darkness. Darkness is disconcerting to me. In fact, I like to be sure the lights are on in whatever room I happen to be.

Although I love the writing of Barbara Brown Taylor, I literally suffered through her book, Learning to Walk in the Dark. She embarks on a journey to understand darkness, which takes her deeply into unlit caves and other dark places. She learns to eat and cross the street as a blind person, discovering the mysterious ways of “dark emotions.” She rereads scripture to see all the times God shows up at night. She eloquently describes a spirituality of the nighttime, teaching us how to find God even in darkness, and giving us a way to let darkness teach us what we need to know.

Still, the book did not dispel my dread of the darkness. It is true, though, that to get to the light, it is imperative that we walk through the darkness. Without a doubt, life offers periods of darkness to every person. And when we walk through dark times and finally make it to the light, we will have strengthened our spirituality.

So we travel on with faith and courage, grateful that time and time again, God calls us “out of darkness into his marvelous light.” And that reality is supernatural.

Darkness, Stars

Looking into the Stars

Rev Kathy

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Photograph by NASA, The Hubble Heritage Team and the Westerland 2 Science Team

“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” – Oscar Wilde

Students of the stars never run out of interesting information. Astronomers tell us that stars are not spread uniformly across the universe, but are normally grouped into galaxies along with interstellar gas and dust. A typical galaxy contains hundreds of billions of stars, and there are more than 100 billion galaxies in the observable universe.

The photo above was taken to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Hubble. The super telescope snapped this shot of the Gum 29 nebula and Westerlund 2, a ruby-colored cluster of about 3,000 stars.

Enough of the science. The important thing is how we experience the vastness and beauty of a starry night. Looking up at the stars causes us to lift up our vision, to raise our sight above the mundane things that earth sometimes gives us. The stars sprinkle our darkest nights with twinkles of light. In some ways, starlight brings hope in the midst of darkness. I love the poetry of Sarah Williams. This is what she writes in Twilight Hours: A Legacy of Verse.

Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light;
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.

Most importantly, the stars remind us of the enormity of the universe, while also reassuring us that as finite as we are, we are a part of God’s infinite creation.

When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?

Psalm 8:3-5 New International Version (NIV)

Looking up into the stars is a wonderful way to spend a few moments of life. Don’t forget to look up into the sky.

Darkness, Hope, Spiritual growth

Wounds and Light

Rev Kathy

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The dark night of the soul is a journey into light, a journey from your darkness into the strength and hidden resources of your soul.

– Caroline Myss

Lately I have been thinking a lot about darkness. It’s not a very good place to be, but it’s my current reality. Melancholy has edged in on my usually bright being through memories that I would rather forget. Perhaps this is a reflection time for me, giving me a chance to revisit some wounded places and apply additional healing balm to them. Perhaps God wants to speak clearer to me in the darkness, at a vulnerable time.

The darkness doesn’t feel good to me, though. Each day, I dread nightfall in fear that its darkness will punctuate the darkness of my spirit. I am recalling dark, long nights when I was in the hospital. I am remembering some of the wounds of my spirit that happened so long ago. I am examining those wounds with a boat load of anxiety.

In this, perhaps God has a purpose. Perhaps I need to more fully develop a spirituality that prevails even in darkness. Perhaps, as Barbara Brown Taylor suggests, I need to learn about walking in the dark. Perhaps I am being called to explore what I might gain by embracing the darkness. Perhaps I need to lean into Taylor’s encouragement to “turn out the lights and embrace the spiritual darkness, for it is in the dark that one can truly see.” (Learning to Walk in the Dark, 2014) Is it not true that the time when we most closely draw near to God is during a dark night of the soul?

Yet I long for brightness to return. I miss the days just a few weeks ago when all felt well in my world. Still, I am making the best of it, knowing that this phase will eventually pass. I am stretching to reach the light and bring it near. I am holding on tightly to God, who represents for me all that is light.

Sometimes, just a thought, a word, a memory can bring a little light and hope into my spirit. I ran across this quote by Rumi just yesterday. It lifts up hope in me.

The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
― Rumi

Courage, Darkness, Faith, Fear, God's Faithfulness

Dark Night of the Soul

Rev Kathy

A photo by Tobias van Schneider. unsplash.com/photos/44t1AZNIMIE

When I walk through the darkness, I do not walk alone. Even though I feel utterly alone, the presence of God is real. Dark times of life are sometimes called “Dark nights of the soul.” A dark period of life is felt as a deep-seated spiritual crisis.

One person who experienced this is Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Ten years after her death, a collection of her private letters was published. The letters revealed that, for the entirety of her public ministry, she endured unceasing feelings of desolation and abandonment by God, her dark night of the soul. It persisted from 1948 almost up until her death in 1997, with only brief interludes of relief in between.

Saint ThĂ©rèse of Lisieux, a 19th-century French Carmelite, wrote of her own experience. Centering on doubts about the afterlife, she said, “If you only knew what darkness I am plunged into.”

So when we experience such darkness, we can at least know we are not alone in the experience. Still, dark nights of the soul are frightening and very real. They challenge our faith and make us question our relationship with God. Sometimes they happen suddenly. But more often, they are the result of a great loss or disappointment, triggered by some external event or some disaster.

Barbara Brown Taylor writes this from her book, Learning to Walk in the Dark.

When we can no longer see the path we are on, when we can no longer read the maps we have brought with us or sense anything in the dark that might tell us where we are, then and only then are we vulnerable to God’s protection. This remains true even when we cannot discern God’s presence. The only thing the dark night requires of us is to remain conscious. If we can stay with the moment in which God seems most absent, the night will do the rest.