'In the beginning was the Word, and
the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.
All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into
being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of
all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome
it.
There was a man sent
from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so
that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came
to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming
into the world.
He was in the world,
and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He
came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who
received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of
God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of
man, but of God.
And the Word became
flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a
father's only son, full of grace and truth. (John testified to him and cried
out, "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me ranks ahead of me
because he was before me.'") From his fullness we have all received, grace
upon grace. The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came
through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is
close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.'
--John 1: 1-18
About four miles from my childhood home in Flat
Gap, VA there was a house. It was a
small, unassuming place, but there was one peculiar thing about this little
house. It had these blue Christmas
lights that covered it. Now the blue
lights were not the peculiar bit. What
was peculiar was that those lights stayed up ALL YEAR LONG! They never come down. Sometimes, even in the springtime, we would
drive by that house and see those lights on.
I never knew why they left them up, and though my family has since moved
away from there, I'm betting those blue Christmas lights are still up.
Blue Christmas lights. Enough said. NOT the house from my childhood!
This week we get a different take on the Christmas story. It's actually the one that we heard on Christmas morning, for those who may have attended such a service at your local Episcopal parish. John does not have a manger, shepherds, or even a Bethlehem. John's
Christmas story echoes the creation story of Genesis, they even begin with the
same words en arche, "in [the] beginning." There God breaks through the darkness of
chaos by saying, "Let there be light." But the light being created is not the sun; after all, that does not get created until the fourth day. The light being created in Genesis is the light of love and consciousness. As Christians, of course, we interpret this as God speaking Jesus into existence into the world. Mirroring this dynamic, John's prologue refers to Jesus as the Logos or Word, which is the light of all creation. The Word through which all
things were made steps out into the darkness and burns brightly in the middle
of it. Whether you believe Jesus was born in a house (Matthew) or in a manger (Luke), is irrelevant here. That message, the message of the light of God coming into the world is physical form, is John's whole point, and indeed the point of Christmas iteself.
When
we think about this incredible feat, that God's light has come into the world,
how can we not want to leave those Christmas lights up all year long? If those lights serve as a reminder of
Christmas, a reminder that Jesus has come among us, why on earth would we not
want to them to burn throughout the entire year? Aside from the ridiculously high electric
bills.
Jesus
has come into the world. It is a world
that can be very dark and scary at times.
We could use a little light. Regardless
of how you feel about blue lights at Christmas time, I think we could stand to
have more folks like those old neighbors of mine, who keep those lights up to
serve as a reminder of God's love for us in Jesus throughout the year, even if
that wasn’t their intention.
But
notice that John does not say that the light destroys the darkness. It shines in the middle of it. Sometimes it's just a flicker. Sometimes we can barely see it. Sometimes it's a single candle or a blue Christmas light. But it's there. It's always there. God's light, the light of Jesus, can never be
extinguished.
Here’s
the thing about darkness, it doesn’t really exist. Darkness is simply the absence of light, but
once you bring light in darkness
scatters and is gone. Darkness is
literally no thing. John’s proclamation
that the light that burned at creation in the darkness of chaos has come into
the world is a reminder that that same light, Jesus, has never left the
world. There has never been a moment that the light wasn't in the world, thus there has never really been a moment when the world is truly in darkness. And if
we are the Body of Christ, then surely that must mean that the light is in us,
too. I wonder what it would mean for us
to know that, to see it in ourselves and in one another. To borrow from Thomas Merton, I wonder what
it would mean to tell people that they are walking around shining like the sun (or Son, for that matter).
I
heard a story once of a old abbot whose monastery was falling apart. There was disunion among the brothers, and
the abbot was losing patience. The
community would fold, he thought, if something drastic didn't happen. So he consulted the town's old rabbi, said to
be the wisest person around. "What
do I do?" the abbot asked.
"The monks are fighting everyday, and I'm afraid that our community
will die." The old rabbi said
simply, "The Messiah is in your midst." The abbot was shocked. The Messiah? He ran back to the monastery and shared the
news with his brothers. They were
elated but did not know which one of them could be the Messiah. So they decided to treat one another as
though each were Christ himself. They
did this for each other and for every visitor to that monastery, treating
everyone as though they themselves were Jesus.
And the monastery thrived.
