Words of Advent: Light

Day three of a daily meditation, a practice of free writing on words of Advent this season...

Today's word is light.  

I loved this song when it came out, over ten years ago, and to this day the words speak fresh to me,

     Light of the world, You stepped down into darkness

     Opened my eyes, let me see

     Beauty that made this heart adore You

     Hope of a life spent with You.

Today, I started to sing it, thinking about light, and what illuminated is this word - "down."  Christ is the Light that stepped down, not so much in the sense of location, but in terms of surroundings, stature, position, glory.  He traded in his realms of brilliant splendor for the darkness of flesh and blood and earth.  His light stepped down, entered into our darkness and, unlike any before or after, was not overcome by it. 

Where the Light comes, eyes open and beauty is uncovered.

When the eyes see beauty, there is nothing more natural than adoration. 

photo credit

It is no profound observation that, here on earth, the most brilliant light often shines from the places of greatest darkness. 

The grieving Amish families reaching out in radical forgiveness and love to embrace the family of  the one who murdered their children.

Muslim and Christian women joining forces for peace in a nation torn apart by war and genocide.

Poetry from prison cells.

The younger woman at the nursing home, in a wheelchair with numerous fractures from a motorcycle accident, consoling a tearful neighbor and offering to help in her friend's darkness.

A worship service in the midst of earthquake rubble in Haiti.

The presence of peace in a dark hospital room, sitting beside a loved one who is dying.

A police officer kneeling beside a barefoot homeless man in the freezing cold, placing wool socks and boots on his feet.

Is it any wonder that the ones most intimately acquainted with the Light of Christ are the ones who have known this deep darkness?

More than two thousand years later, after this Light came down, he comes again, and again, and again - and the darkness still does not overcome, not even once. This Light shines into the corners and crevices of darkness in my life - in yours - the places of ache and pain, and even there, is not overcome but overtakes the darkness with light.  As the psalmist cries out in awe, "Even the darkness will not be dark to you....for darkness is as light to you."

In this Light, all things can be made beautiful.

In this Light, I fall on my face and adore.