It might sound like difficult work, washing dishes for about two hundred people three times a day for a couple of weeks, but I still think of it as one of the best jobs I have ever had. We would wake up right before breakfast, eat, then wash dishes, take a nap, wake up in time for lunch, eat, then wash dishes, take another nap, go lay by the pool, go to dinner, eat, then wash dishes, and then stay up all night. Pretty soon I had completely switched from being an early riser, who loved the day time, to a night owl, who could not wait for the sun to go down.
Mostly at night we would keep to ourselves, but a few times we used the shade of night to play pranks on the male staff members or to go steal kisses from the girl leaders under the shadow of the moon. As Alex, Brooks, and I had grown up at camp we knew most of the trails like the backs of our hands, but learning how to maneuver them in the darkness was this daunting, yet invigorating task. On one particularly dark night, we had been out past our curfew and were headed home when we saw the flashlights of the directors searching through the woods nearby. Fearing being caught out too late, I sprinted away without any thought of leaving my comrades stranded in the woods. Running down old familiar trails in the moonless, cool night air I felt freer than I had ever felt in my entire life.
When I arrived back at the lodge where the dishwashers resided, I waited for what seemed like an eternity for Alex and Brooks to return. Almost immediately after my heart stopped pounding, the guilt began to weigh on my soul. I had left my friends alone in the darkness. After waiting and waiting and waiting. They came sneaking in about twenty-five minutes after I did without having been caught by the directors. After breathing a sigh of relief we sat around for a spell and I kept thinking of what it would have been like to have been blinded by the beam from a flashlight. My eyes hurt just thinking about getting caught in that ray of light. A few hours later when we were all still too excited to sleep we sat out on the porch and watched as the darkness slowly dissipated and the light of the sun crested over the horizon of pine trees enveloping all of camp in its warm embrace.
After two weeks of nocturnal living as a dishwasher, I had a tough time adjusting to being a citizen of the light again. For the entire week break between girls’ camp and co-ed camp I felt so tired that all I could do was sleep and eat. Eventually I did recover, but the contrast of being blinded by a flashlight and sitting peacefully watching as the sun peaks over the trees sticks with me. Today’s reading from the first letter attributed to Peter allows us to think about ourselves as God’s chosen people who are “called out of darkness into his marvelous light.” As we move towards the quiet, dark season of watching and waiting known as Advent, I ponder how it is Christ comes to us and how it is that we share Christ’s light with those around us.
In all my sneaking around at summer camp I never was tied down by a ribbon of light shining from a director’s Maglight. Thank Heavens! Still on a few occasions a friends did catch me in the face with a flashlight. It was not fun. I walked around stunned for a few minutes stumbling. Ironically that light, the thing which helps us to see more clearly, can also be the thing that blinds us.
This can be a difficult time of year for those who have lost someone dear to them or for those who celebrate this season quietly. With so much jolliness around us, it is easy to be swept up into gleaming the light of Christ wherever we are going. Yet, that light and that joy when used like a flashlight often feels overwhelming to those who are not yet ready to step into the light. I know that when I meet those who are walking around in darkness, I often want to so quickly drag them into the light, but I believe when I do this I am denying God’s gift. It is like me sprinting from my friends and leaving them alone, stranded in the darkness.
Instead, if we were to sit together in the darkest part of the night, and we were to study a sunrise we would find that the light does not come all at once, as one stream of light drowning us with overwhelming brightness. Instead it wraps around the darkness slowly, allowing for the night to say its farewells and to kiss the dawn at its arrival. Genesis 1 description of God’s light overcoming the darkness can make us believe that God does not sit with us in the night. Yet, Matthew’s gospel from today reminds us that for God all things are possible.
God is with us in our dark times. Christ Jesus walks with us during those times of doubt, depression, and dimness. Yet, when we are called out of those times of darkness it can be startling to immediately step into the light. Instead of rushing into the fullness of Christ’s light, we can stand still right where we are, feeling the holy light within us and the Holy Spirit whipping through our hair as we wait in the stillness. It is here, in the darkness, that we begin the season of watching and waiting. Let us not be too quick to blind one another with our flashlights of Christ and instead may we, with God’s help, be patient and wait for the coming of the Son.
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