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“In Him was life, and the life was the light of all people. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
The gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke might be called the journalistic gospels: what happened, to whom, why, and with what consequences? But the fourth gospel, commonly called “John’s” but possibly by Lazarus or someone else, is the gospel of the poet, the mystic. It’s the gospel that doesn’t take a very special human and try to show that he is also God. Instead it begins with God, and the mystery of why and how God chose to become human. As the Christmas carol says, “veiled in flesh the godhead see…”
The fourth gospel is the only one with no Transfiguration story; did you know that? That’s because it’s basically a 21 chapter Transfiguration story. “We have seen his glory,” it says, right here in the beginning. And that glory is on display throughout the narrative.
It’s a poet’s gospel. So it’s fitting that this gospel begins with poetry that’s like a cascade of words and phrases, tumbling all over each other, trying to “capture” what cannot be captured, ever. I am so in love with this text, have been for years. Maybe you are too.
But for some readers, there’s something jarring here, and it appears right off the bat. Jesus brings light, and the darkness—the wicked darkness—will try to overcome his light, but will fail. Light = good, darkness = evil. It’s actually a theme that runs throughout this gospel: e.g. Jesus proclaims to his audience in the Temple, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)
If you’re wondering what’s so jarring about that, it’s that culturally, historically, the tendency to equate light with good and darkness with evil has also been turned on human beings. It’s been racialized, weaponized. The guys in the white hats are good, and the black hats are always the bad guys. We speak of having “dark motives,” we have “dark moods,” or we go through “dark times.” I don’t know much about the “dark web,” but just from the name I can tell it’s not good. Sounds sinister.
And it’s just a short step from all that to Africa being the “dark continent,” full of “dark” people who are up to no good, and need to be controlled. Meanwhile, the word “fair” simultaneously means both light-skinned and beautiful. “Who’s the fairest of them all?”
Maybe this sounds far fetched to you. But if we love our neighbor, we don’t get to dismiss their concerns, and there are those who argue that this language and imagery are hurtful, and should be abandoned altogether. The problem is, again, it has deep roots in our spiritual heritage, and there’s no real substitute.
There is an alternative way, though, one that’s demonstrated by a children’s book Kate brought to my attention recently, called God’s Holy Darkness. It starts out with these words:
“Darkness and blackness and night are too often compared to lightness and whiteness and day and found deficient. But let us name the beauty and goodness and holiness of darkness and blackness and night.”
The book then goes through all these Bible stories in which the Lord, who looks a lot like a giant squid, is present in the darkness: the deliverance of the Hebrews from the Egyptians, for example–the first Passover–happened at midnight. Then it looks at darkness in creation and finds beauty there: the deep ocean, dark and teeming with life.
But we can take this deeper. Even spiritual darkness, when God seems totally absent, is not always a bad thing. And the church (not this church, the church) has not done a very good job of teaching us this. We talk a lot about the presence of God, but we don’t say much about the experience of feeling that God is absent. What do we make of that?
Of course, God is never really absent, but it can feel that way at times. And the church has not systematically taught us how to interpret this. We may get help from a particular book or sermon, but the spiritual journey is long and takes us through dark places at times. It just does. Not knowing why we can’t see our way, or where God has gone, we may assume we’ve done something wrong: we’ve sinned, we’re unworthy, God is bored with us and has gone off to find someone more interesting to travel with.
But we’ve had lights along the way who have taught us better. The 16th c. Spanish mystic John of the Cross wrote about the “dark night of the soul,” and how God allows this, both to help us become spiritual grownups, and to invite us into greater closeness. Let’s look at each of these.
First, as Kelli said a few weeks ago, our story with God is a love story. Think about it: in a romantic relationship there are typically a lot of wildly exciting feelings at the beginning. That’s delicious; we love that. But what if it stayed that way?
For one thing, we’d never get anything done, but then, we’d never know if our partner stayed with us because of a true commitment to us, or just because of the good feelings we bring them. Maybe all we really represent to them is a steady supply of dopamine and oxytocin. It’s really only when you’ve gone through hard times with your partner, and they’re still there, that you know they really love you, and not just what you do for them. No darkness? No way of knowing.
Second, and here John’s strategy is similar to the children’s book I mentioned earlier, darkness has its own beauty: “The light shines in the darkness.” Lots of lovely things happen after nightfall: most of us put work aside, and gather with family or friends, or settle in on our own, to enjoy a good meal, to rest and recover from the day. Night can be a time to draw close, to express love, and this is exactly what John of the Cross is talking about. Listen to his description of lovers finding each other in the night:
Oh, night that guided me, Oh, night more lovely than the dawn…
I remained, lost in oblivion…
All ceased and I abandoned myself,
Leaving my cares forgotten among the lilies.
This is church, so I left out a lot of the juicy bits, but you get the idea. John is saying that, once God has weaned us off our dependence on good feelings, including the feeling that we’re in control of things, we’ll be ready to risk going into the dark, where we aren’t in charge and we just have to trust.
And then a different kind of light, what John calls “radiant darkness,” takes over. It’s dark, not because light is absent but because it’s so powerful that we’re dazzled by it, and can’t “see” in the way we’re used to. “The light shines in the darkness.”
So the answer to our habit of equating light with good and darkness with evil is not, I believe, to abandon the language of light and darkness. No. It’s to redefine, to broaden, our understanding of darkness, including the holiness and beauty and love that darkness can hold.
If you’re in spiritual darkness because you’re committing egregious sins, then…stop doing that. But know that if you’re serious about the spiritual journey and find yourself in the dark, you may actually want to celebrate that. Even if you don’t feel like it! Because sometimes we can’t see God, not because God is so far away, but because God is so close, and drawing us closer.
Meanwhile, it’s the fifth day of Christmas, and by now it’s easy to feel like the holiday excitement is wearing off, and we‘re just going to slip back into the Great Darkness of our region in winter. Seasonal affective disorder may be closing in, but even for those of us who don’t suffer from it, it still seems like a long time before we’ll start seeing those first crocuses, snowdrops, and daffodils poking their brave heads above the soil.
But instead of waiting in desperation for the light to return, I’d invite you to welcome and even celebrate the darkness. Let’s take a lesson from the Danes, who have given us the concept of hygge (HOO-ghe). Hygge is all about coziness and contentment, settling in with a fire, a warm drink, a good book—simple pleasures that can only be experienced in the chill darkness of a northern winter.
And it’s worth remembering that nonstop light is hard on people too. It throws off our circadian rhythm and makes it hard to sleep, so that people actually get depressed and irritable during the months of midnight sun, too. Physically, as well as spiritually, we need both light and darkness to thrive.
But if your darkness is about sadness or sickness or grief—things that cannot really be cozy-fied—then your version of hygge might be to simplify, minimize the expectations you have of yourself, make sure your needs are met—for food, light, sleep, therapy, whatever—and allow yourself to be cherished by God and others. Even if you can’t feel the divine embrace, remind yourself as often as you need to that you are never out of it.
Know that the light is shining, even in darkness, even in your darkness. In pain, in weariness, in grief and loss, “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” The darkness just makes the light brighter when it does come into view. While the light remains hidden, though…take the arm of your community, and walk with us. We’ll get there together. Merry Christmas.