John 1:1-5
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life,[a] and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
In this season of Lent, in this season of winter, I think a lot about darkness. It helps that I’m also reading multiple books involving darkness, both Barbara Brown Taylor’s Learning to Walk in the Dark as well as Chris Hoke’s new book about ministry to the “damned”, those in gangs and prisons. Often in this season I fall asleep before ten and wake up after six: it’s just so hard to stay awake and alert when the universe seems to be saying, “it’s cold, it’s dark, bundle up and hibernate.”
When I first moved to Rochester I became an insomniac. I would wander my apartment, write, think, pray, feel. It was a stressful time, and difficult to lose sleep, but learning to walk in the dark became an incredibly fascinating practice. It is amazing how different the world looks at night. Sometimes it seems scarier, sometimes calmer. In my life I have often been afraid of darkness, both physical and spiritual. As a child, my parents often awoke to me asleep on the floor next to them; I would never read books or watch movies about the demonic realm; when I met people who were depressed I became nervous, afraid this deep realm of sadness was contagious. However this season of winter, of lent, of study, of insomnia, is teaching me the beauty of Christ’s light that shines in the darkness. Not because the darkness is evil and Christ avoids it by turning on lights, but the opposite. Christ walks through the closed doors of fear, the dark veil of blindness, as a God-man light of love and persistence. We can descend to no depth of darkness where Christ has not already been. Embrace the dark, sit in it and wait in this time, because God is there with you, and has much to teach you in that place.
~Katy Lee
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