Christmas Eve Meditation 2019

Sermon

Thank you all for being here tonight. A few years ago there were rumors of ice on the night of Christmas Eve, and while we did have our service, we were missing some of the wise folks who decided to stay home where it was warm and dry. It’s good to have a nice, full sanctuary, and that happens because you are here.

So often during the service, I wish you had my vantage point from the front looking out, especially as we sing Silent Night in the candlelight. It’s so beautiful – all those glowing little flames, people singing, hearts full of one thing or another. It reminds me of a well known little quote, attributed to everyone from Confucius to Eleanor Roosevelt, though it’s actually a line from a sermon from 1907:

“Better to light one candle than curse the darkness.” So tonight I’d like to talk with you for just a little bit about darkness and light.

Brené Brown says, “The dark does not destroy the light; it defines it. It’s our fear of the dark that casts joy into the shadows.” 

There is a beauty to the night that we often forget – maybe it’s an inborn fear of not being able to see, or the way it gets so cold when the sun goes down, but the night can be beautiful. It’s quieter, and if there’s a full moon or it’s a clear night, you feel such a sense of awe at the glories of the skies.

As much as we fear the dark, we need the dark in our lives. We need winter so that all those things underground can do their work of growing, unseen by us. We need the dark for sleep, for the rest we all need. A baby needs the dark of her mother’s womb so that she can form and grow. We need the dark.

As poet John O’Donohue writes, 

“Light cannot see inside things.
That is what the dark is for:
Minding the interior,
Nurturing the draw of growth
Through places where death
In its own way turns into life.”

And really, without the dark it is harder to see the light. This service would not nearly as beautiful if we kept the lights on while we sing Silent Night. It’s the contrast between the two that makes both more interesting, if not more beautiful.

But it’s our tendency to say if two things are different, one must be bad and one must be good, and so there is this line of thought that if light is good, then dark must be bad. I say we need both, and we need to acknowledge the beauty and power in the darkness and the light, as well as the vulnerability we have in the darkness and the light.

So what does that mean for our daily living, and what does that mean for faith, and what does that mean for this particular Christmas Eve?

Knowing that we need both darkness and light might help us get through the rough days. If you are a person of faith, you may already know that having faith that God exists, that believing that there is a God who loves you more than you can know, does not mean that life will be carefree and easy. It simply means that whether in darkness or light, you are not alone.

On this Christmas Eve, we are here to remind each other of that, because if the birth of Jesus means anything at all, it means that he came so that we would not be alone. It means that by taking on mortal flesh, God would know what it means to be human – to know joy and to know suffering, to know disappointment, to know friendship and love.

This is my ninth Christmas season in Portland, and only now, after nine years, I am beginning to dread the wet, gray winters, that sense of endless damp and drudge. But a friend reminded me the other day that from here on out, more light comes every day; the nights will start to shorten and the days lengthen. Thank God for the solstice.

Even though we need not fear the dark, and even though we need the darkness, there is something about the turning of the year that brings relief, if not hope itself. Maybe that’s why those ancient church fathers chose the solstice time to celebrate the birth of Christ – because nature would echo what faith sings: the hope is being born again, this very night.

So, knowing that the Light is on its way, let us sit in darkness for just a little while longer. I leave you with words from the poet Jan Richardson:

…this is what
I can ask for you:

That in the darkness
there be a blessing.
That in the shadows
there be a welcome.
That in the night
you be encompassed
by the Love that knows
your name.

Glory to God in the highest. Amen.