 Dr. John E. Harnish Senior Pastor |
Stumbling in Darkness, Looking for Light
Sermon:
Scripture: |
|
If you are like me, you’ve probably seen them, but you didn’t know what they were. You’ve seen them on cereal boxes and campaign buttons, store displays and CD covers. My earliest recollection is a button from the 1960 presidential campaign. Tilt it one way, you see Richard Nixon; tilt it the other way, you get Henry Cabot Lodge. This seems like an insignificant advertising gimmick, but it really involves a quite complicated and intricate technology. They are called “lenticular” images. Our five clergy were on a retreat recently, and at a Burger King we saw a poster advertising the latest gimmick for children, which even used the word “lenticular.” But five fairly intelligent, master’s degree-holding, theologically-trained clergy—even including one Episcopalian—had no idea what the word meant. Jeff went so far as to bet me five dollars that I couldn’t use it in a sermon. So now he pays up! Lenticular images produce a sort of 3-D effect; different perspectives give you different ways of seeing and of understanding the message. Janet Smylie’s internet web search produced an article about lenticular images which ended with this intriguing sentence: If the sight of a lenticular picture isn’t enough to make you stop in wonder, the fact that it’s made up of so many different images surely should be. (www.depthography.com/times.html, Matt Lake, “An Art Form That’s Precise But Friendly Enough to Wink”) I would say, if the sight of the crèches and the candles, the carols and the choirs of this night are not enough to make you stop in wonder; if the word of the prophet and the wonder of the star, the song of the angels and the saga of the shepherds, the silence of a stable and the adoration of the Magi on this night are not enough to make you stop in wonder; the fact that Christmas is made up of so many different images surely should be. There are so many different angles to the story, so many ways to see, sense, feel and grasp the message. The interwoven, lenticular images of Christmas all combine to give us a glimpse of the Christ. One of the most powerful images is that of darkness and light. That’s where our celebration of Christmas on December 25 came from, of course—the pagan holiday of winter solstice, the darkest and longest night of the year, then the gradual turning toward light and the hope of a new spring. It’s a wonderful story of the power of the Gospel to redeem even a pagan feast, to transform and make new, so that an ancient ritual takes on an entirely new meaning. It’s the image of the darkness of midnight, slowly overwhelmed by the glimmer of candlelight; the darkness of our world, shattered by the light which shines from a stable; the darkness of our souls, filled with the light of new dawning and new birth. It’s a powerful image of Christmas, the image of darkness and light. In reality, I suppose it’s hard for us in our contemporary, electrified, urban world to comprehend real darkness. In the world we live in, is it ever really dark? There is always the ambient urban glow on the horizon, always a streetlight or neighbor’s pole lamp not far away, always the glow of the microwave clock and the VCR timer. Even at my cottage up north, even in the dead of winter, there is always the flicker of a few cottage lights across the lake and the dim glow of Beulah on the ridge or Frankfort in the distance. I think the only time I have ever really experienced total darkness—deep darkness, soul-penetrating darkness—was years ago in Kentucky when we visited Mammoth Cave. Far below the surface of the earth, we followed the narrow trail into a large cavern, and with appropriate warning, the guide turned off the lights. Utter blackness. I could feel my eyes straining unsuccessfully to pick up the slightest glimmer of light. I literally could not see my hand in front of my nose. The darkness seemed to penetrate my skin and sink deep into my soul. In the words of James Weldon Johnson, “It was darker than a hundred midnights down in the cypress swamp.” Writing in a day before electricity and ever-present ambient light, Isaiah understood darkness— real darkness, deep darkness—and into that kind of darkness Isaiah brings the word of hope and the promise of dawn: The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light. Those who live in the land of deep darkness, on them the light shined. It was a word of hope for Isaiah’s day, and it is a word of hope for our day. It’s a word of hope for a nation which feels like it has been stumbling in the darkness of fear ever since 9/11—some justified, some manufactured—fear of the violence from without and now the fear of spying from within; the darkness of fear which distorts our thinking and disables our decision-making. It’s a word of hope for times when we feel like we are stumbling in the darkness of personal grief over a private loss or anxiety about an uncertain future. It’s a word of hope for a world where the darkness of evil is omnipresent and light is hard to find. For people like us, Isaiah has good news: “Those who stumble in darkness have seen a great light.” When the curtain goes up on Shakespeare’s Hamlet, we know we are in a dark, deadly world. The opening scene is set in the middle of night. It’s obvious that “something is rotten in Denmark,” and as Hamlet says, “The time is out of joint.”
But even in the foreboding gloom of that dark opening scene of Shakespeare’s dark tragedy, he plants a word of hope in the promise of Christmas coming:
Some say that ever ’gainst that
season comes Shakespeare promises that even in the darkness, the foreboding, the fear of Hamlet’s day—even then, “’gainst the season of sorrow...the bird of dawning singeth all night long.” Those
who stumble in darkness have seen a great light. One of the most powerful images of darkness and light I ever experienced was on my first trip to Estonia in the early 90’s for a meeting of the World Methodist Executive Committee, the first time the council had met in a former Soviet state, only a few short years after the fall of communism. The light of Methodism in the Soviet Union was all but extinguished during the Soviet years. It was totally destroyed in Russia, Latvia and Lithuania, and only a small cluster of congregations in Estonia managed to survive. Now with the change, they welcomed representatives of World Methodism to their nation with great joy. While we were there, the Estonians experienced another great national tragedy. The passenger ferry ship, coincidentally named “The Estonia,” sank in the Baltic Sea, taking with it over 800 lives. Given the small population of Estonia, it seemed almost every family knew someone who died that night. The next day, as we walked down the city streets, flags hung over every door, and in every shop window, every home, even on every check-out line, there were hundreds of small votive candles. Candles of memory, of sorrow, but candles of hope and comfort. And I thought: that’s a symbol of the life of this church during the fifty years of persecution; just a small candle burning in the darkness, just a flickering witness against the power of evil, just a glimmer of light in the despair of the Communist years. But now, look! The people who must have felt like they were stumbling in darkness during those long years of suffering, on them the light has shined. The light has shattered the darkness and in the end, the darkness did not overcome it. Father Samuel Rayan, Jesuit theologian in India, wrote it years ago. Bishop Peter Storey of South Africa, now a professor at Duke Divinity School, quoted it as a mantra during the years of struggling against apartheid. For Peter and the Methodists of South Africa, it came to describe their courageous witness, and the symbol for it became the candle surrounded by barbed wire which always burns on the communion table at Central Methodist Church, Johannesburg. It is a simple statement of light shining in the darkness. From India to South Africa to Birmingham, here it is:
A candle light is a protest at
midnight. In days of war and torture and terror, we lift up the lamp of justice and peace which says, “I BEG TO DIFFER.” Amid the darkness of bigotry and prejudice, we share a common loaf and lift a common cup and say, “WE BEG TO DIFFER.” When national priorities reflected in national budgets favor greed instead of those in need, and the vote of just one person makes all the difference, we witness the compassion of the Christ and say, “WE BEG TO DIFFER.” When we feel like we are stumbling in the darkness of gloom and despair, weraise our voices as a protest at midnight, singing:
Joy to the world, the Lord is
come, let earth receive her king; Tonight we gather here as sons and daughters of the light. We gather as a community of hope, a people of peace. We witness to the One who is born to be the light of the world, and in our gathering we are bold to say to the darkness of our day, “WE BEG TO DIFFER. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness will never overcome it.” Just a small candle light, a protest against the darkness of the world, seen through the lenticular images of Christmas, darkness turning into light. The people who stumble in darkness have seen a great light. Those who live in the land of deep darkness, on them the light has shined. For all the boots of the trampling warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. For unto us a child is born, Unto us a son is given. And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Some of you are old enough to remember with me growing up in the 50’s. If you don’t remember it, just watch one of the favorite movies of the season, The Christmas Story, and you will pretty much know what it was like. By the way, I never had a Red Ranger BB gun. I am sure my mother thought I would blow my eye out. I remember the first Christmas we had a television set. As I remember, the picture was always “snowy”—fuzzy figures in black and white on simple stage sets. Someone who remembers those days with me will remember the performer—it might have been Perry Como—but whoever it was, I remember one of those early TV personalities used to close his show singing a somewhat schmaltzy chorus which still speaks a word of truth. I’ve tried to research it and the best I can find is that it was a song based on a quotation from Eleanor Roosevelt during the war years, which originally came from an ancient Chinese proverb:
It is better to light just one
little candle than to stumble in the dark. The Mammoth Cave guide let us stand there in hushed silence, allowing the darkness to sink into our bones, our eyes widely dilated, straining to catch any sliver of light. Then in one stroke, he lit a match. Not even a candle. Just one little match and instantly, the darkness was gone! The darkness was completely shattered, scattered and defeated! Just one little light and the darkness was completely overwhelmed. “The light shines in the darkness,” says John, “and the darkness will never overcome it.”
|