Arise! Shine! Your light has come; the Lord’s glory has shone upon you. Nations will come to your light… Lift up your eyes and look all around: they are all gathered; they have come to you. (Isaiah 60:1, 3a, 4 CEB)
The baby Jesus has been born, and the Wise Men are on their way… but it’s still awfully dark outside. Still basking in the Christmas glow? Just turn on the news for the latest dramas and traumas, or check your Facebook feed for the most recent diatribes and tantrums. (Insert “Debbie Downer” sound effect here!)
Perhaps this is the Epiphany, the Lightbulb Moment: that though we’ve lit the Christ candle and sung the birth of the Light, the world’s darkness still looms. The good news is that this is not bad news! The good news is not only that Christ was born, but that—as the carol says—he is born in us. The good news is not only that he is the Light, but that his light has been struck in us.
And what use is a shining light, if not to cast a glow into the dark?
Many of us were raised in a church tradition that celebrated (dare I say, even venerated) those who take “the Light” into “dark places.” We grew up praying for our missionaries, learning about our missionaries, and wondering whether we were called to be missionaries. The most inspiring were those who left home and family, learned new languages, and perhaps even faced personal dangers to take the Gospel to places in the world we could not even begin to imagine. God still calls and equips missionaries. We still pray for them and learn about them and wonder whether we are called to be the hands and feet and loving voice of Jesus in poor, pained, violent lands.
Lift up your eyes and look all around: that poor, pained, violent world is coming to us.
Most likely the news updates and Facebook posts you saw this morning recognized it. (Of course, the news and Facebook may not be aware: That world isn’t just coming to us; it is us.) Are we ourselves willing to let go of home and family, are we willing to learn to speak in new ways, are we even willing to face danger so that we can be the light, wherever the nations gather? Even here?
And are we willing to rejoice in the dark? Because only in the dark is it really necessary to shine.
