moonlight.

learning to walk in the dark, Advent 1.

Then I said to myself, “Oh, he even sees me in the dark!
At night I’m immersed in the light!”
It’s a fact: darkness isn’t dark to you;
night and day, darkness and light, they’re all the same to you.

~ Psalm 139:11-12, msg

Here in the mountains of North Carolina, the sun drops over the ridgeline by 5pm and the sky is black by 5:30. In the chilled gloaming I can barely remember the July 4 fireworks that wouldn’t start until 9pm! Where has all the light gone? For a sun-chaser like me, it can feel a little desolate. It’s not for nothing that one of our Christmas classics begins,

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone.

Sometimes even the soul shivers and retreats, tempted to simply hibernate until warmth returns. But Advent calls to us saying, Don’t give up! Don’t let your heart grow hard, hope is coming. And in the meantime, the darkness has gifts of its own. Don’t be afraid!

The theme of this series was inspired by Barbara Brown Taylor’s brilliant book of the same title. She boldly explores our association of darkness with all things fearful, along with the church’s tendency to dodge the inexplicably hard parts of life and indulge us with a full solar spirituality. This sort of cosmic dualism “offers people of faith a giant closet in which they can store everything that threatens or frightens them without thinking too much about those things.”

In contrast, she invites us to trust that the God who made the sun also made the moon and, whether literal or figurative, all darkness is occupied by God! There is no diminishment of sense, no confusion or disorientation, no monsters under the bed that can separate us from the warm embrace of our heavenly Father. We need such comfort when we feel lost in the gloom. When the world around us feels like it’s coming apart at the seams… or when it’s our inner world that is fraying and falling. Maybe now is the ideal time to look for a glimmer of moonlight and venture out to uncover its treasures.

What’s it like to wander outside under a full moon? The illumination is soft but substantial, no flashlight required. The world is bathed in an ethereal glow that feels magical. You half expect to hear elves singing faintly in the distance or to stumble into a fairy ring. The beauty can be mesmerizing, showing a side of God’s creation usually reserved for the woodland creatures. The lack of noise awakens a mysterious quiet, a contemplative peace. The night sky evokes a worshipful awe. The artistry is starkly sacred.

But what about the dark when there is no moon? What about when the darkness is an inner grief, fresh from the night of loss? When we feel stalked by disease or divorce or downsizing? What then? Are there any gifts in that kind of darkness.

To rush too quickly to the “yes” implicates us in the kind of “full solar spirituality” Barbara cautions us against. Long before we can access the gifts of the night, we have to feel the searing pain, the terrifying aloneness, the unanswered ache. Jesus’ cry “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” cuts through every glib platitude and forever welcomes the suffering soul in a silent embrace of solidarity. He is forever the “God with us” of Emmanuel adventing. We must long for something before the longing can be sated.

But for those audacious enough to keep their grip on hope, the horizon does begin to lighten, ever so slowly. Morning does eventually break. And then, finally then, the gifts of the night show themselves. Our journey together continues next week.

growing the soul

If you find yourself in some version of night now, watch the old but timeless video of “Endless Night” from the epic Broadway musical Lion King below.

serving the world

If you want to become a person who can truly comfort the broken, watch the video below.

takeaway

hold on.