Morning breaks after the longest night of the year, which seems a fitting time to write about darkness.  As we have descended into the darkest month of the year, we have had to face a long winter isolated from others, mourn the way it should be right now, and envision a new Christmas season. 

A Christmas that looks nothing like how we anticipated it would.

Where schools and businesses are shut down.  Jobs are lost.

We are scared and frustrated.  Mourning separation from loved ones.  Mourning loss of loved ones.

Light

However, while life may not look exactly the way it did, we do have hope that the current darkness will end.  It will end and be replaced with light.  We know the light wins because the Bible is full of references to light.

You are radiant with light…  Psalm 76:4

In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.  John 1:4

The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.  Romans 13:12

And maybe the most famous “light” verse? 

The very beginning of the Bible.

The very beginning of the earth.

Genesis 1:1-3

In the beginning Elohim [God] created hashomayim (the heavens, Himel) and haaretz (the earth). And the earth was tohu vavohu (without form, and void); and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Ruach Elohim [the Spirit of God] was hovering upon the face of the waters. And Elohim said, Let there be light: and there was light (Orthodox Jewish Bible)

First this: God created the Heavens and Earth—all you see, all you don’t see. Earth was a soup of nothingness, a bottomless emptiness, an inky blackness. God’s Spirit brooded like a bird above the watery abyss. God spoke: “Light!” And light appeared. (The Message)

And there was light.

But…

There was something else too.  Did you catch it?  It’s easy to read over it because we are focused on God and the light.  What came before the light?  The darkness.  I read over 50 translations of Genesis 1:2 and almost all used the word “darkness” (a few used dark fog, blackness, or dark).  So in the beginning, when it was just God, there was just darkness.  And it wasn’t bad; it just was. 

Yet we read verses like “this present darkness” (Eph 6:12) and “in him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5) that contrast it with the goodness of the light. We think of darkness as a place of depression, being lost, hopelessness.  It’s a place of evil and lies. 

Yet maybe the lie is that we need to be afraid of the darkness…so that we’ll miss the beauty that can be found there.  What hides itself in darkness may be evil – but darkness itself isn’t evil, this darkness that was with God in the beginning.

There is beauty in the darkness

In space, there is darkness.  It isn’t evil; it just is.  And it’s the backdrop for God’s amazing work.  It’s what He uses to lovingly swaddle the earth:

“when I made the clouds its garment and thick darkness its blanket…”  Job 38:9

Last night Jupiter and Saturn were lined up so they looked like one massive, glorious star.  It has been 800 years since they were this close to each other and visible from Earth.  What a gift after the year we’ve had! 

But do you know what made this rare event visible?  The darkness.  This actually happened 400 years ago as well but, that night, Earth couldn’t see it because Jupiter and Saturn were on the horizon too close to the setting sun – there was too much light to see them.

Don’t believe the lie that darkness is exclusively bad.  It exists because God wants it to exist.  It exists for our benefit, for our rest.  It exists so we can see His creation in the sky that we couldn’t otherwise see in the light.

That darkness is where God resides.  He fills it.  He fills it with awesome power and color and light.  So be wary of evil, but don’t despair in the darkness.  It’s where God displays his greatest beauty.