What is coming upon the world is the Light of the World. It is Christ. That is the comfort of it. The challenge of it is that it has not come yet. Only the hope for it has come, only the longing for it. In the meantime we are in the dark, and the dark, God knows, is also in us. We watch and wait for a holiness to heal us and hallow us, to liberate us from the dark. Advent is like the hush in a theater just before the curtain rises. It is like the hazy ring around the winter moon that means the coming of snow which will turn the night to silver. Soon. But for the time being, our time, darkness is where we are. ~Frederick Buechner from The Clown in the Belfry
Darkness is not where we will dwell forever. We are hushed in fear and hungry for Light.
We are promised this in the Word: “and night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light… Revelation 22:5.
Somewhere between the Word in the beginning and the Word that becomes flesh and the Word thriving in our hearts and hands, there is the sacred silent Light of God come to earth.
This Advent becomes a threshold of quiet stillness, as we stand poised to cross into the Light brought by His Word; He is a flint struck to our wick in our eagerness to abolish the Darkness with the eternal glow of His illuminating Word.
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
Lyrics:
In winter’s house there’s a room that’s pale and still as mist in a field while outside in the street every gate’s shut firm, every face as cold as steel.
In winter’s house there’s a bed that is spread with frost and feathers, that gleams in the half-light like rain in a disused yard or a pearl in a choked-up stream.
In winter’s house there’s a child asleep in a dream of light that grows out of the dark, a flame you can hold in your hand like a flower or a torch on the street.
In winter’s house there’s a tale that’s told of a great chandelier in a garden, of fire that catches and travels for miles, of all gates and windows wide open.
In winter’s house there’s a flame being dreamt by a child in the night, in the small quiet house at the turn in the lane where the darkness gives way to light. ~Jane Draycott
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Beyond the brimming ages Gabriel waits, his foremost message burning on his breath. Through time men slide, creeping through the gates of birth and out again the doors of death.
He sees kings rise and kingdoms fall to dust; he sees unnumbered souls unfleshed; to some he gives slight hints, but the full knowledge must wait, for his best words are not for them.
Then at last, coming from afar he sees, gleaming like a golden pin in time’s folds, Mary, rising like a star above the fretted seas of what had been;
bright hinge on which the gate of Heaven creaks, to her he turns, inclines himself, and speaks. ~J.C.Sharl “Annunciation”
Be patient and without bitterness, realizing the least we can do is make coming into existence no more difficult for Him than the earth does for spring when it wants to come. ~Rainier Marie Rilkefrom Letters to a Young Poet
And in all of this, nature is never spent; There lives the dearest freshness deep down things; And though the last light off the black West wind went Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward springs— Because the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings. ~Gerard Manley Hopkins from “God’s Grandeur”
Kings and kingdoms come and go, reduced to dust over time.
So the Word waited, like the earth waits for spring, for a golden point of light to overwhelm the dark.
She says “let it be”, not “no, not me, not now.”
Transformed, simply by accepting Him: a simple, but oh so difficult faith, like a tender shoot breaking through the crust of frozen earth seeking the Sun, needing now to bloom.
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
Like Mary, we have no way of knowing… We can ask for courage, however, and trust that God has not led us into this new land only to abandon us there. ~Kathleen Norrisfrom God With Us
Aren’t there annunciations of one sort or another in most lives? Some unwillingly undertake great destinies, enact them in sullen pride, uncomprehending. More often those moments when roads of light and storm open from darkness in a man or woman, are turned away from in dread, in a wave of weakness, in despair and with relief. Ordinary lives continue. God does not smite them. But the gates close, the pathway vanishes. ~Denise Levertov from “Annunciation”
This is the irrational season When love blooms bright and wild. Had Mary been filled with reason There’d have been no room for the child. ~Madeleine L’Engle “After Annunciation” from A Cry Like A Bell
Dawn again and the birds of oblivion sing of all hungers
Each day I wake to a pillar of light kindling the room into being once more
A crease in the rug, someone’s future stumble
The pale melt of bedclothes at my thighs
Mine is not the face of peace but of the found-out
The lamp’s diminutive thorn of light sharpens at my bedside— a whole world waiting
The Annunciation by Henry Tanner, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Mary’s response to this overwhelming event is a model for us all when God is leading us over a threshold into the unexpected and unknown.
Even though she is prepared, having studied God’s Word and His promise to His people — she doesn’t understand: “How can this be?”
Articulating it in the song she sings as a response, she gives up her so-carefully-planned-out life to give life to God within her.
Her resilience reverberates through the ages and to each one of us in our own multi-faceted and overwhelming troubles: May it be to me as you say.
May it be. Your plans, Your purpose, Your promise – all embodied within me.
Let it be, even if I don’t understand how it can be.
Even if it pierces my soul as with a sword so that I leak out to empty; you are there to heal the bleeding wound by filling it with infinite light.
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
The angel Gabriel from heaven came His wings as drifted snow his eyes as flame “All hail” said he “thou lowly maiden Mary, Most highly favored lady,” Gloria!
“For known a blessed mother thou shalt be, All generations laud and honor thee, Thy Son shall be Emanuel, by seers foretold Most highly favored lady,” Gloria!
Then gentle Mary meekly bowed her head “To me be as it pleaseth God,” she said, “My soul shall laud and magnify his holy name.” Most highly favored lady. Gloria!
Of her, Emmanuel, the Christ was born In Bethlehem, all on a Christmas morn And Christian folk throughout the world will ever say: “Most highly favored lady,” Gloria
(Jesus said) I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! Luke 12:49
Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God ~Elizabeth Barrett Browning from “Aurora Leigh”
It is difficult to undo our own damage… It is hard to desecrate a grove and change your mind. The very holy mountains are keeping mum. We doused the burning bush and cannot rekindle it; we are lighting matches in vain under every green tree. ~Annie Dillard from Teaching a Stone to Talk
Nine Kinds of Blindness 1. The one where your eyes do not work to see anything. 2. The one where your eyes do not work to see everything. 3. The one where your eyes work, but you cannot see what you have never seen before. 4. The one where your eyes work but you cannot see what is inconvenient. 5. The one where your eyes work but someone is keeping you from using them. 6. The one where your eyes work but you are angry. 7. The one where your eyes work but you are afraid. 8. The one where your eyes work but there is no light. 9. The one where your eyes work but there is nothing but light. ~Paul Pastor “Nine Kinds of Blindness” from Bower Lodge
I need to turn aside and look, blinded as I am, to see, as if for the first and last time, the kindled fire that illuminates even the darkest day and never dies away.
We are invited, by no less than God Himself, through the original burning bush that is never consumed to shed our shoes, to walk barefoot and vulnerable, and approach the bright and burning dawn, even when it is the darkest midnight, even when it is a babe in a manger who kindles a fire in each one of us.
Only then, only then can I say: “Here I am! Consume me!”
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
Within our darkest night, you kindle the fire that never dies away, that never dies away. Within our darkest night, you kindle the fire that never dies away, that never dies away. ~Taize
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When the miracle happened it was not with bright light or fire— but a farm door with the thick smell of sheep and a wind tugging at the shutters.
There was no sign the world had changed for ever or that God had taken place; just a child crying softly in a corner, and the door open, for those who came to find. ~Kenneth Steven “Nativity”
This Advent, I’m trying not to be scared of the dark. ~James K.A. Smith from “Waiting” (Image Journal)
I feel like I’m constantly aware of the world’s anguish, reminded daily in headlines and news updates. The knowledge of others’ grief and mourning, their losses and struggles, is overwhelming.
This world is a fearful place of pain and tears for so many, so much of the time. For my part, I try not to be afraid of the dark…
So who am I to write of moments of incredible encouragement and beauty, posting pictures of the latest masterpiece painted through the filtered light of sunrise and sunset, searching out and sharing the illuminated gifts that exist all around me – while people suffer?
We were certainly not created to wallow in anguish – yet here we are, trying in every way to climb our way out of the dark mess we’ve made. I am one of the countless standing on the threshold of a Light sent to diminish and overwhelm our darkest times.
Three different times, a messenger angel appeared out of the blue, saying “do not be afraid.” Zechariah had been “startled and gripped with fear,” Mary was “troubled and wondered at his words” and the shepherds were “terrified.” They were never to be the same again.
Yet the first words directly from heaven were “fear not.” My first reaction would be: there must be plenty to fear if I’m being told not to be afraid. And this world is a terrifying place, especially in the dark.
It is up to us, overwhelmed by the darkness of these times, to seek out the barn door opening enough to show a light spilling out. We are invited, troubled and doubtful, to come see what is inside.
So too then, we ourselves open: waiting, watching, longing for this glory to come. Nothing will be the same, ever again.
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
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These still December mornings… Outside everything’s tinted rose, grape, turquoise, silver–the stones by the path, the skin of the sun
on the pond ice, at the night the aureola of a pregnant moon, like me, iridescent, almost full term with light. ~Luci Shaw from “Advent Visitation“in Accompanied by Angels
Writer Luci Shaw passed into eternity on December 1, just four weeks from her 97th birthday.
A life-long poet and essayist, in addition to being a wife, mother, publisher, gardener and outdoor enthusiast, Luci was a child of God who continually lived out and articulated the questions of faith, grace, and belief.
It is my privilege to have known her as a neighbor in nearby Bellingham. Her books grace my shelves and I cherish her many personal words of encouragement and mentoring.
Luci has gifted the world for decades with beauty and honesty, composing enriching poetic observations with heavenly anticipation. She was nearly full term, iridescent with light which glowed on those around her.
Below is only a small sample of her work. She was still writing and publishing poetry this year. More of her writing and many books can be found at www.lucishaw.com.
Luci Shaw -virtual presentation for Calvin Festival of Faith and Writing 2022
Last night I lay awake and practiced getting old. Not difficult,
but I needed to teach myself to love my destination before I arrive.
I feel the earth shifting under me. My writing hand shakes—its rubbery nudges clumsy,
my mind going slack, the way a day will lose its light and give itself to darkness,
and that long, nocturnal pause of inquiry— What next? And how long before light
reopens her blue eye? And will I need to learn a new language to converse with my Creator?
So, I am a questioner, one who waits, still, to arrive somewhere, some bright nest where
a new language breeds that I can learn to speak, unhindered, into heaven’s air,
somewhere I can live a long time, and never have to look back. ~Luci Shaw “December the 95th Year”
Luci Shaw at a Bellingham reading at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church -2017
In time of drought, let us be thankful for this very gentle rain, a gift not to be disdained though it is little and brief, reaching no great depth, barely kissing the leaves’ lips. Think of it as mercy. Other minor blessings may show up—tweezers for splinters, change for the parking meter, a green light at the intersection, a cool wind that lifts away summer’s suffocating heat. An apology after a harsh comment. A word that opens an unfinished poem like a key in a lock. ~Luci Shaw “Signs” from Eye of the Beholder.
Luci at a Bellingham reading of her poetry at Village Books in 2016
Today, in Bellingham, even the sidewalks gleam. Small change glints from the creases in the lady’s mantle and the hostas after the rain that falls, like grace, unmerited. My pockets are full, spilling over. ~Luci Shaw from “Small Change”
Out of the shame of spittle, the scratch of dirt, he made an anointing.
Oh, it was an agony-the gravel in the eye, the rude slime, the brittle clay caked on the lid.
But with the hurt light came leaping; in the shock and shine, abstracts took flesh and flew;
winged words like view and space, shape and shade and green and sky, bird and horizon and sun,
What next, she wonders, with the angel disappearing, and her room suddenly gone dark.
The loneliness of her news possesses her. She ponders how to tell her mother.
Still, the secret at her heart burns like a sun rising. How to hold it in— that which cannot be contained.
She nestles into herself, half-convinced it was some kind of good dream, she its visionary.
But then, part dazzled, part prescient— she hugs her body, a pod with a seed that will split her. ~Luci Shaw “Mary Considers Her Situation”
When, in the cavern darkness, the child first opened his mouth (even before his eyes widened to see the supple world his lungs had breathed into being), could he have known that breathing trumps seeing? Did he love the way air sighs as it brushes in and out through flesh to sustain the tiny heart’s iambic beating, tramping the crossroads of the brain like donkey tracks, the blood dazzling and invisible, the corpuscles skittering to the earlobes and toenails? Did he have any idea it would take all his breath to speak in stories that would change the world? ~Luci Shaw “Breath” from Accompanied By Angels: Poems of the Incarnation
because we are all betrayers, taking silver and eating body and blood and asking (guilty) is it I and hearing him say yes it would be simple for us all to rush out and hang ourselves but if we find grace to weep and wait after the voice of morning has crowed in our ears clearly enough to break our hearts he will be there to ask us each again do you love me ~Luci Shaw “Judas, Peter” from Polishing the Petoskey Stone
Down he came from up, and in from out, and here from there. A long leap, an incandescent fall from magnificent to naked, frail, small, through space, between stars, into our chill night air, shrunk, in infant grace, to our damp, cramped earthy place among all the shivering sheep.
And now, after all, there he lies, fast asleep. ~Luci Shaw “Descent” from Accompanied By Angels
Blue homespun and the bend of my breast keep warm this small hot naked star fallen to my arms. (Rest … you who have had so far to come.) Now nearness satisfies the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies whose vigor hurled a universe. He sleeps whose eyelids have not closed before. His breath (so slight it seems no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps to sprout a world. Charmed by doves’ voices, the whisper of straw, he dreams, hearing no music from his other spheres. Breath, mouth, ears, eyes he is curtailed who overflowed all skies, all years. Older than eternity, now he is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed to my poor planet, caught that I might be free, blind in my womb to know my darkness ended, brought to this birth for me to be new-born, and for him to see me mended I must see him torn. ~Luci Shaw “Mary’s Song”
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
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Even in the darkness where I sit And huddle in the midst of misery I can remember freedom, but forget That every lock must answer to a key, That each dark clasp, sharp and intimate, Must find a counter-clasp to meet its guard. Particular, exact and intricate, The clutch and catch that meshes with its ward. I cry out for the key I threw away That turned and over turned with certain touch And with the lovely lifting of a latch Opened my darkness to the light of day. O come again, come quickly, set me free, Cut to the quick to fit, the master key. ~Malcolm Guite “O Clavis” from Sounding the Seasons
And I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David. He shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open… to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness. Isaiah 22:22 and 42:7
Some doors in our lives appear forever closed and locked. No key, no admittance, no way in, no way out. A locked door leaves few choices until the key is offered to us.
We now must make a choice, even if the choice is to do nothing.
Do we drop the key and stay put where things are at least familiar? Do we knock and politely wait for the door to be answered? Do we simply wait for the moment it happens to open, take a peek and decide whether or not to enter? Or do we boldly put the key in and walk through?
Our choice is as plain as the key resting in our trembling hand. Once we approach, drawn to the mystery, we find the door is already standing open with an invitation.
Fear not. For unto us a child is born, a son is given.
He is the threshold between two worlds, between the darkness and the light, a liminal love allowing us to hold the key.
From the fourth stanza of O Come, O Come Emmanuel:
O come, thou Key of David, come and open wide our heav’nly home; make safe the way that leads on high, and close the path to misery.
AI image created for this post
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
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And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.”
And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No.” So they said to him, “Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.”
(Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.) They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”
John answered them, “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know,even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” These things took place in Bethany across the Jordan, where John was baptizing. John 1:19-28
We grow accustomed to the Dark — When Light is put away — As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp To witness her Good bye —
A Moment — We Uncertain step For newness of the night — Then — fit our Vision to the Dark — And meet the Road — erect —
And so of larger — Darknesses — Those Evenings of the Brain — When not a Moon disclose a sign — Or Star — come out — within —
The Bravest — grope a little — And sometimes hit a Tree Directly in the Forehead — But as they learn to see —
Either the Darkness alters — Or something in the sight Adjusts itself to Midnight — And Life steps almost straight. ~Emily Dickinson
I admit that I’ve been stumbling about in the dark, bearing the bruises and scrapes of random collisions with objects hidden in the night.
My eyes must slowly adjust to such bare illumination, as the Lamp sometimes is carried away. I must feel my way along the road of life.
I know there are fellow darkness travelers who also have lost their way and their Light, giving what they can and sometimes more.
And so, blinded as we each are, we run forehead-first into the Tree which has always been there and always will be.
Because of who we are and Who loves us, we, now free and forgiven, follow a darkened road guaranteed straight, all the way Home.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year. Each week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
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There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him.He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.
The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:6-13
God, Who made the sun, also made the moon. The moon does not take away from the brilliance of the sun. The moon would be only a burnt-out cinder floating in the immensity of space were it not for the sun. All its light is reflected from the sun. On dark nights we are grateful for the moon; when we see it shining, we know there must be a sun. So in this dark night of the world when men turn their backs on Him Who is the Light of the World, we … await the sunrise. ~Archbishop Fulton Sheenfrom The World’s First Love
John the Baptist was clear: he was a witness to the True Light Jesus, not the light himself.
He reflected the origin of light, like the moon reflects the sun.
We are naturally wary of prophets, not knowing who to believe and who leads us astray. God warns us about false prophets, yet we have difficulty discerning truth, so turn our backs to it, missing the Light.
Instead, when I see moonlight, I try to remember the message of John the Baptist: seeing the moon glow reminds me the Sun is the true origin of Light. And so as God’s children, we are to reflect the Light as well, bearing witness in the darkness.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year. At the beginning of each week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
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That year I discovered the virtues of plants as companions: they don’t argue, they don’t ask for much, they don’t stay out until 3:00 A.M., then lie to you about where they’ve been….
I can’t summon the ambition to repot this grape ivy, of this sad old cactus, or even to move them out onto the porch for the summer, where their lives would certainly improve. I give them a grudging dash of water – that’s all they get. I wonder if they suspect that like Hamlet I rehearse murder all hours of the day and night, considering the town dump and compost pile as possible graves….
The truth is that if I permit them to live, they will go on giving alms to the poor: sweet air, miraculous flowers, the example of persistence. ~Jane Kenyon “Killing the Plants”from The Boat of Quiet Hours
During my dorm-room years and city apartment dwelling days, this farm girl had to reconcile that no pets were allowed, so I surrounded myself with an indoor garden, every square inch of window sill occupied by a living thing whose survival depended only partially on me.
Those plants sustained me, cheered me, moved me, carried by me to new windows with better light and grander views.
Despite my occasional neglect, they usually persisted, often thrived, and gave back to my shriveled city spirit far beyond any water or repotting I offered.
A start from my grandmother’s old fern divided decades earlier from her cousin’s plant, originally a start from a long-passed auntie, this 100 year old fern traveled far and wide with me until it dried up, turned brown and gave up the ghost.
Having given a start to my sister years before, she divided it so the fern came back home staying happily green in my kitchen window.
Somehow these miracles in chlorophyll knew just what I needed when I needed it: they fed me when I was starving for something alive, something beautiful, something that knew exactly what to do and what to become when I had no clue what would happen next.
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