The next 3 weeks our days will grow darker and darker and some days it can feel like the world is too. Our spiritual ancestors used this time of year, when the light diminished and the hours of darkness grew longer, as a backdrop to tell the story of our time in spiritual darkness. They termed this season “Advent”, meaning arrival/coming. It is the beginning of what is called sacred time, a time to tell the story of the anticipation of the arrival of the Light of the world.
The four Sundays leading up to Christmas are spent studying the ancient prophets and their promises that one day the Light of the world would come and defeat darkness. This journey begins in the dark wilderness outside the Garden of Eden, far from the glory of God’s love and light, where shame, guilt and fear rule, where brother kills brother, where humans enslave other humans, where every thought of man’s heart is on evil continually.
Over the next few thousand years, the world would grow so darkened by evil and cruelty that a group of men called magi — royal priests who anointed and served Babylonian/Persian kings — would travel 900 miles following a light from the heavens that led to a stable in a village, because they were searching for a ray of hope that things could somehow, someday, be different than it had been for all human history.
Today at the beginning of Advent, we begin that same journey to Bethlehem, beginning far north in Galilee in the day of Isaiah, 2,700 years ago. The land of Galilee had the cruel misfortune to be situated in a corridor connecting the great northern and southern empires of the ancient Near East, so that it was frequently subjected to “the boots of the trampling warriors.” The fertile fields of Galilee were too often turned into bloody battlefields and the city of Megiddo in the heart of the Jezreel valley was destroyed by war an astounding twenty-six times. The valley of Megiddo (Armageddon) would eventually become a grim poetic way of speaking of war itself.
To try and imagine what life was like for the ancient inhabitants of Galilee, watch the nightly news and see what your life would look like if you had been born a Palestinian in Gaza. How different would the landscape, and likely your outlook on life and the world, look, how dark and hopeless would it all seem? If you grew up in a land that had been destroyed and rebuilt and destroyed in wars and conflicts going back generations, would you be able to see anything good in all of the darkness that is your daily life?
There was plenty of gloom and anguish in the land of Zebulun and Naphtali in the days of Isaiah, as yet another war looms ominously on the horizion, but the poet imagines a future when those living in the gloom of Galilee would see a great light and rejoice as people do when a long war is finally over.
Isaiah 9:1-2, “Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the nations, by the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan—The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.” The poem tells us that this great day of light and joy will be brought about by the birth of a child (Isaiah 9:3, 6-7), “You have enlarged the nation and increased their joy; they rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest, as warriors rejoice when dividing the plunder…For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.”
Seven hundred years later, those magi made the long and dangerous journey to the village south of Jerusalem in search of a different kind of king. Perhaps the Israelites brought their message of hope and light to the nation of Babylon during their seventy years in exile there. However they heard the message, they believed it and fully put their trust in the certainty of it, going to great expense and effort, risking their lives for the hope that they could catch even a glimpse of this King of kings and Prince of peace. They had live long enough in the shadow of the reign of cruel kings like Nebuchadnezzar who would toss men into the fire for refusing to worship him or cold hearted Pharaohs who would throw infant boys into the Nile River as a means of population control over his slaves. They came looking for a different kind of king, and the ancient prophet Isaiah promised one was coming in Israel.
When that child became a man He made His own journey up to Galilee to preach the arrival of the kingdom from Heaven (Matthew 4:12-17), “When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee. Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali— to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah: ‘Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.’ From that time on Jesus began to preach,‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’
The word repent refers to turning around, what we think of as a u-turn. When you realize you are going the wrong direction you turn around and head in the other direction. Jesus was telling the world that the kingdom from Heaven had come down to earth and all they had to do was turn around and move toward it by coming to Him. “When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12). Decades later Saul of Tarsus would tell the story where he was blinded by this light, but through the grace and mercy of God he received his sight again so that he might devote his life to spreading this light (Acts 26:17-18), “I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.”
Here’s the thing about light and dark: the darkness cannot extinguish the light (John 1:5), however, you can turn your back to the light. Do you know what happens when and object comes between the sun and something else? A shadow is cast. The light of the world that came into being on the first day of Creation (Genesis 1:1-2) has never gone away or gone out, but mankind has largely turned its collective back on that Light and the dark shadow of evil has fallen upon the world because of it. If you feel like you are lost in the dark all you have to do is turn to the light. “This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all…if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.” (1 John 1:5,7).
Our spiritual ancestors, Adam and Eve, turned their backs on that light in the Garden of Eden, and the dark shadow of evil has fallen on the world ever since, but God has promised one day, “there will be no night there—no need for lamps or sun—for the Lord God will shine on them. And they will reign forever and ever. Then the angel said to me, ‘Everything you have heard and seen is trustworthy and true. The Lord God, who inspires his prophets, has sent his angel to tell his servants what will happen soon.’” (Revelation 22:5-6).
The dawning of that day began 2,000 years ago with the light from a star shining down on a manger and it was magnified throughout all the earth three decades later when that child was lifted from a cradle to a cross. Everyday that light grows brighter as the dawning of a new day approaches when there will be no more night. For all of us, the dawning of that day can begin today, as we turn from the darkness to the light and live our lives in hope rather than despair.
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