Readings: Isaiah 52.7-10; Psalm 98; Hebrews 1.1-4; John 1.1-14
May I speak in Jesus’ name: Son of Man, bringer of Peace, one with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Christmas lights have been on my mind these past few weeks, for many reasons, not least of which being that I hadn’t put ours up until a couple of days ago.
But the other week, I was driving at night and noticed the different colours and styles people had decorated with. It was beautiful. And it struck me anew that we require the darkness to see this particular beauty, and I remembered listening to a podcast with theologian Alexander Shaia who said that we “decorate the darkness.”
Not our homes; we decorate the darkness.
And of course we don’t get the fullness of the symbolism in Australia because we are in high summer, not the depths of winter.
John speaks of Christ as life and light; that the life, that is Christ, is the the light of the people, and that light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. I once read a translation that said, “the darkness did not understand it.” And I think about that this year when things in the world at large are growing darker. When we in Australian have witnessed the worst massacre in our country since Port Arthur, and the politicking that has come in its wake, and on top of all that we each have our own challenges whatever they look like: health, grief, loneliness, cost of living, etc.
Our world can be pretty dark at times, and this is right where Jesus is born. In the mess. Isaiah calls to the ‘ruins of Jerusalem’ to ‘break forth together in singing; for the Lord has comforted his people.’
The ruins sing!
When has your life or the world felt like it was in ruins?
When has that been the time when you’ve known Christ’s presence most deeply?
A time when you’ve acted in righteousness, equity, grace, and truth in spite of the darkness surrounding you?
How often has the darkness not understood that spark of light within you?
When we see reports of people , victims of rimes etc., forgive the perpetrator, can be difficult to understand, because we can hold such fear and anger for them. it is easy to empathise with fear and anger, we know those emotions deeply, they aren’t hard to imagine, and they have their rightful place which helps us to keep our families safe and so on. But they also need to be in the back seat, not the driver’s seat. If they are driving, we will certainly be led down a dark path.
Instead, we look for the light.
Fred Rogers once famously said that in times of trouble, look for the helpers, that if we highlight the stories of the helpers we will have hope. Forever intertwined with the story of the Bondi shooting will be the stories of those who acted to disarm the shooters: Boris and Sofia Gurman, Ahmed al-Ahmed, police officers Jack Hibbert and Constable Scott Dyson, plus many, many more.
Mr Rogers didn’t stop by telling the children to look for the helpers, he commissioned the adults to be the helpers. To be the lights decorating the darkness.
As Christians we believe that we can only be the light through the power of Christ, the Light of the World, who came and pitched his tent among us; who has joined us in humanity to show us what righteousness, equity, justice, grace, and truth will truly lead to:
A life of hope, peace, joy, and love.
Let us go and celebrate this life, putting it into action and being the Christmas lights decorating the darkness and pointing to the True Light of the World, Jesus.
Amen.