A Light in the Darkness
“…while sorrow is real, the final word is joy.”
The Rev. Kirsten Linford
On Wednesday, NPR ran a little piece on the growing tradition of Blue Christmas services in mainline denominations. You can find it here.
I appreciated this piece for many reasons, not the least because here at last was something in the media about the Church as a place of hope and healing. While individual politics came up, it was not the point. Compassion, companionship, caring for one another, sharing each other’s burdens: these were the features of our faith at the center.
A particularly moving part of the piece reflected on our hymns this time of year. Our Advent hymns have lamentation built into them as we pray for Jesus’ return and reign of peace, but our Christmas hymns have some of that too. From Hymn 89:
Still through the cloven skies they came
with peaceful wings unfurled,
and still their heavenly music floats
o’er all the weary world;
above its sad and lowly planes
they bend on hovering wing
and ever o’er its babble sounds
the blessed angels sing.
Jesus did not come into a tidy world, and God knows we remain very untidy indeed, but the Light of Light broke through the darkness to sit with us in the mess we make and guide us toward something better. O come, Emmanuel, God with us, and redeem our sorrow for joy.
in peace,