Readings
1 Kings 8:10-15
And when the priests came out of the
holy place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, so that the priests
could not stand to minister because of the cloud; for the glory of
the Lord filled the house of the Lord.
Then Solomon said,
‘The Lord has said that he would dwell in thick darkness.
I have built you an exalted house,
a place for you to dwell in for ever.’
‘The Lord has said that he would dwell in thick darkness.
I have built you an exalted house,
a place for you to dwell in for ever.’
Then the king turned round and blessed
all the assembly of Israel, while all the assembly of Israel stood.
He said, ‘Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who with his hand
has fulfilled what he promised with his mouth to my father David.'
1 Timothy 6:13-16
In the presence of God, who gives life
to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before
Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep the
commandment without spot or blame until the manifestation of our Lord
Jesus Christ, which he will bring about at the right time—he who is
the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords.
It is he alone who has immortality and dwells in unapproachable
light, whom no one has ever seen or can see; to him be honour and
eternal dominion. Amen.
John 1:1-14
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.
Darkness and Light
Preaching
at midnight, heading into the deep darkness of
a village with few street lights,
is an ideal time to preach this sermon. I
love the stillness and silence of darkness. As a child it terrified
me, yet now I will happily walk or run up the mile towards
Children's Farm
in the dark. But
then I know my way around the mile walk, and let's be honest, it's
not exactly easy to get lost. The
poplars guide our feet and the owls accompany our path. But
what about being lost and alone in a woodland at night? Imagine the
noises, the rustling in the undergrowth, the something that brushes
against your face as you stumble and trip over unseen tree roots.
How long would it be before you curled up tight and wished and waited
for the
clear light of daybreak?
Darkness
and light are two key images throughout the Bible. The
model that most people speak of in church circles is that Jesus came into a dark world
to save us from our sins. We
use images of darkness to describe our state as being deeply sinful
and in need of salvation. That's
exactly the kind of thing that we find in the Gospel reading we had
from St. John when
he writes:
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.
All
the way through the New Testament we get this imagery of light = God,
darkness = sin. When
something appalling happens in the world around us it gets referred
to as 'A dark day', giving the impression of the absence of the light
of hope, of decent humanity, or of God.
But
this isn't the only use of the imagery of the absence of light.
Right
back at the beginning of the Bible the very first words that we hear
God say are, 'Let there be light', and some scholars have suggested
that at least in part the intention of the writer of this part of
Genesis may have been to express God's desire, 'Let there be
understanding.' That's
why we say, 'I see' when we understand. I believe that this
is and always has been the desire of God; that we would be able to be
in a close and intimate relationship. And
it is this desire that leads us to an alternative way of thinking
about darkness. It
is not simply about the absence of God; it is also about an absence
of an understanding about the nature of God, and nowhere is that
summed up better than in the first reading we had from the Old
Testament.
This
story comes from the blessing of the first temple that Israel built
for God, and when the presence of God came and dwelt within the
holiest inner sanctum of the temple it was as if a great thick cloud
filled the place. The
most telling words are when Solomon says, 'The Lord has said that he
will dwell in thick darkness.' Now
it's vital that we understand that this is not
a metaphor for evil; it is a metaphor for being unknowable. And
why is God unknowable? It is simply because if God is who we believe
God
to be, the one through whom all things have come into existence, then
God
is far, far, far beyond the comprehension of beings whose brains are
smaller than the average football.
Why
does God dwell in darkness in the Old Testament? Why does he hide in
a thick cloud? I suspect that it's because if he showed his true nature then anyone
who drew near would be overwhelmed. An
example of this is the practice that Jewish priests developed that
whenever the High Priest entered this holy inner
sanctuary, he would have a piece of rope tied around his waist. This
meant that the other priests could pull him out with the rope if he
was overcome by the presence of God. I
suspect that this may also be why sometimes the nature of God in the Old
Testament seems quite harsh compared to the New Testament. It is not
God who has changed, it is our understanding of God's nature, and
hence our interpretation of God's actions.
And
that leads us to the second reading we had, one which comes in the
New Testament and
which declares a very different truth about the nature of God. In
the Old Testament the nature of God is so hidden that it is as if he
dwells in deep unknowable darkness. Yet in his first personal letter
to Timothy, St. Paul declares a different truth about God. No
longer is God hidden. Instead he dwells in unapproachable light.
The
power and glory of God is utterly overwhelming. Maybe some of you
have had one of those experiences when just for a moment the veil
between heaven and earth is drawn back and the sense of the presence
of God is so strong that it is difficult to bear. I
have
had an unexpected encounter where that presence has inspired fear because of its
power, and another where I felt so loved it was beyond anything I
could have imagined. But
the clear contrast is that in the Old Testament there is a
darkness shrouding God and in the New Testament we have instead a
great, bright, glory-filled appreciation of his nature.
What changed?
I want to suggest that it
was the coming of Jesus, born as one of us yet born from above,
somehow both fully and completely human and yet also fully and
completely divine. We
call him the Son of God but he also called himself the Son of Man.
Both
are vital and both are essential. Were
he just the Son of God then we would be in no better state – God
would still be unknown and dwelling in darkness. But
as the Son of Man, Jesus was essentially the metaphysical translator
of the nature of God. If
you want to know what God is like, look at what Jesus did:
He
hung out with the people everyone else rejected.
He spent time
praying with and healing lepers, the untouchables of his age.
He
called the religious and political authorities to account and told
them they had no comprehension of the real nature of God.
He
overturned the tables of those who tried to make money out of
religion, spoke in great depth as a twelve year old to religious
teachers, wept tears of sadness at the death of his friend Lazarus
and put his arms around Peter after Peter
had denied ever even knowing him and drew him back into the fold. He
treated women as important, spent time with prostitutes and told the
meek, the scared, the fearful and the timid that they would inherit
the earth.
And
he started the whole ball rolling by being born as a pauper in the
midst of cow dung of
an unmarried mother
and was laid in an animal's
feeding trough.
And maybe we get it.
Maybe we can understand.
By
everything that Jesus did we finally comprehend that God chooses to
close the gap between us and to be known by us through knowing Jesus.
And
that's what makes Christmas so special, because it is the moment that
God steps out of the deep, unfathomable darkness and says to all
those who want to know, 'Look, this is what I am like, and I will
always be here for you, and there is nothing you can ever do that could make me love you less.'
The Gospel reading we had ended at verse 14. I want to end this by
reading verse 18 to you, because John summarises the whole Gospel for
us in this one sentence:
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.
Jesus has made God known. May we find time to step outside the
tinsel and the alcohol to say to God, 'You have made yourself known
to humanity. Now I want to get to know you myself.'
