Light is wonderful – until it isn’t. The flip side of living in a land of near-total darkness in winter is that it’s a land of almost constant sunlight in summer – the land of the midnight sun. Where we live, the four hours of darkness at summer solstice aren’t even full dark. Many Alaskans use blackout curtains and sleep in eye masks because the light is relentless.
Too much light is exhausting, and it can also reveal things you’d rather keep hidden. My husband replaced the lights in our garage from fluorescent lights to LED. It was amazingly bright! Then we groaned; we had no idea the back wall was so grungy. The light illuminates, the light reveals.
During worship, we confess the ways we turn away from the light of Christ. Each week, we confess that we’ve turned away from God’s illuminating love. But we’re not the only ones. We’re here as a gathered body to support each other in faith and love and then to be sent out into the world to shine together.
This message is excerpted from “Light in the darkness” by Lisa A. Smith in the January/February 2023 Gather magazine.
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