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John 12.35-36

Jesus said to them, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” After Jesus had said this, he departed and hid from them.

I knew the church building of my childhood like the back of my hand. My father was a pastor and so both my parents spent full Sunday mornings at post-church coffee hours and elders’ meetings and potlucks. I attended for as long as I could but spent most of my time exploring the building. The church was filled with backstage wooden staircases, hidden closets, and doorways, invisible to the untrained eye. I loved to roam around in that church. One of my favorite places was a triangular closet, wedged beneath a stairway—a storage place for holiday decorations. It was completely dark. And quiet. I loved to crawl in there after service and listen to the gentle footsteps coming down for coffee hour and the muffled voices hovering above my head. I sat in that womb-like space and felt tucked into the church, wrapped in sweet darkness and the voices of my church family.

The darkness was not scary, it was safe and sweet. I needed it. I was sometimes overwhelmed by all the people, all the ideas, all the chatting. I needed that quiet darkness to help me come home to myself.

Jesus said “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness does not overtake you. If you walk in darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light”

Jesus does not speak about Darkness as a moral negative or with judgement. I think Western thinking can lead us (or maybe just me!) too quickly into binary thinking: darkness = scary, or bad, or far from God. But if we carry this bias into the text, I think we miss what Jesus may be saying. Jesus is speaking practically. In darkness you can’t see clearly-- you need something to guide you, something to orient you. As Jesus prepares his friends for his departure, he is acknowledging a reality, a human experience—there will be uncertainly, there will be unknowns, there will be change, there will be darkness. So he tells his friends to cherish the light, to memorize the light, to hold the light near so that when the unknowns find them, they will have comfort, a guide, and courage. I think Jesus’ call to his friends is a call to us all: become children of light—become students of seeing in the dark, become people who can remember what matters most in times of not knowing or of uncertainty, become friends with darkness, or at least acquaintances.

There are times we are meant to live in clarity, and times we are meant to live in ambiguity; but the paradox is lovely—sometimes it is in the ambiguity, in the seasons of not knowing, in the darkness--when one’s truth shines through with brilliant clarity. Just as we need to cherish the “light,” when the light is with us, maybe too we can cherish the darkness, when darkness is with us. Maybe there are moments we need to crawl into the dark, unknown, triangular closets of life and listen for the voices of love, coming from on high and coming from deep within.

Psalm 119:105-106

Your word is a lantern to my feet* and a light upon my path.

I have sworn and am determined* to keep your righteous judgments.

Who holds the lantern? Who is the light? The obvious answer is God, right? We hold the lantern, and God is the light. And there’s mercy and comfort in that. All I have to do is hold this lantern right here and walk the path that God is guiding me down. So easy, right? So simple. And yet, I have so many follow up questions. There is no mention of whether the path is curved or straight, hilly or flat, scattered with jagged rocks and rough branches or clean and freshly paved. There’s no mention of who I may meet along my path. Who journeys with me? Who is on an opposite path which may appear more brightly lit and easier somehow? How do I know this path, my path, is actually the right one for me? Is there one single right path or are there multiple out there, equally fruitful and enticing? And so on and so forth.

These verses from scripture remind me of one of the most profound things I have been taught during my medical residency training. A faculty member once told me that the best clinician has to learn how to live with uncertainty. The clinician uses her medical knowledge to bring her to a certain point along the winding path to diagnosis, then faith takes over; she may never ascertain the exact etiology of the patient’s disease but in using her best medical judgment she is less likely to do harm to the patient. In trusting in the facts of the case, her intelligence and her instincts, the clinician is likelier to get closer to the truth of the matter, the heart of the thing.

During these days of early sunsets and winter chill, of science deniers and alternative facts, of so much research and information pouring in at all times, in this time of Advent, I find it so difficult to just hold the lantern and focus on the light to guide me. I’m only human after all, and prone to distraction, jealousy and resentment – easily angered and hounded by fear. Am I doing the right thing, thinking the right thing, being the right thing are among the circuitous thoughts that plague my brain during this global pandemic. Oftentimes, I begin work before daylight and leave well after nightfall, and am in a flurry of panic during every moment in between wondering if anything I’m doing is making any difference, if I know anything at all. And I’m a pediatrics resident! Not always in an ICU or surrounded by the very sick and dying, which makes me feel slightly ridiculous to be so overwhelmed.

So, the thing I love the most about this passage is that it gives a narrative solution to my distress and grief. There is no mention of the difficulty or ease of the path, because instead I am reminded to center myself and trust in God. Trusting in God and walking my path is how I keep my ever-renewing vow to honor God’s judgments. I am reminded that all I need is my lantern, The Light, and my vow. I am called to see all that can be done if I am faithful, steadfast and true. Trusting in God is the only way to travel to the place the lies just beyond fear, resentment, anger, jealousy and distraction which will always be there along my path. Trusting in God is how I illuminate my best self. My comfort is to understand that God is always there as my guiding light as I journey forward one step at a time.

Psalm 27:1-4

The LORD is my light and my salvation;
whom then shall I fear? * the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom then shall I be afraid?

When evildoers came upon me to eat up my flesh, *
it was they, my foes and my adversaries, who
stumbled and fell.

Though an army should encamp against me, *
yet my heart shall not be afraid;

And though war should rise up against me, *
yet will I put my trust in him.

It has been a difficult time for everyone during the past eight months. Lives lost, jobs disappeared, and loved ones could not gather together to share laughs and love. While this pandemic is once in a 100 year event it nevertheless reflects the tribulations that men and women face when alone without the Savior and without faith.

In Psalm 27 the Psalmist speaks about God as being his light and his salvation. In his faith there is nothing and no one to fear. Pandemics, conflicts and illness are all around us but the one constant is faith in God‘s almighty power and his love and compassion toward us as individuals. All what we need is to trust in his mercy and his love for us, his people. In this time of unimaginable stress I come to God in prayer, praising his name and affirming my faith in his power and mercy.