The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned.
The Prophet Isaiah
Snow is falling outside my window. In the abstract and theoretical, it is beautiful. The flakes are big - the stuff of fluffy snow, easy to shovel, brilliant for play. A couple of inches have already accumulated. I see it on the ground and the top of our bird feeder. Birds are wisely taking cover - not willing to venture out and gathering in a nearby hedge.
Outside downtown Boston, usually easily seen at this hour, is hidden by the clouds and fog of this winter storm, while inside white lights cast a welcome glow on this grey morning.
I am lost in thought, wordless longing in my heart. It's an other-earthly longing - a longing for wholeness, for wrong to be made right, for the broken to be fixed, for the hurt to be healed, for my own soul to rest instead of restlessly wander.
How weary we all grow from tragedies - the only thing that seems to connect us in this disconnected world. And even tragedies bring on the cynics and the tragedy police, willing all of us to grieve more than we are able when the crisis happened half a world away.
How I long for Isaiah's light. How I long for the light to dawn. Like a sleepless night where I just can't wait until the clock tells me it's time to get up, like an endless trip where I can't wait to land, like a boring talk or class that I think will never end - no, none of those do justice to the deep longing for a world to be made right and the light to dawn. It's a longing all its own.
I look over at the white lights, noting how their glow creates warmth and hope on this grey day. This is what light does. It illuminates, it radiates, it brings hope. This is why we long for Isaiah's light.
This longing for Isaiah's light takes me into the New Year, urges me on to a faith that is based not on an ideology, a mantra, or a dogma, but on a person. "In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."
Isaiah's light, a light that shines in the darkness - a light worth staking my life on. The day is still grey, but the light shines on.
