In the Dark

Written by Sarah DeWitt on the Fourth Sunday of Lent

“To be human is to live by sunlight and moonlight, with anxiety and delight, admitting limits and transcending them, falling down and rising up. To want a life with only half of these things in it is to want half a life, shutting the other half away where it will not interfere with one’s bright fantasies of the way things ought to be.”
– Barbara Brown Taylor, Learning to Walk in the Dark

In the past several weeks I have been sitting with this notion of darkness and what it means and what its purpose may be. It seems perhaps that my timing for this reflection is odd as we embrace the longer, lighter days of spring and as I prepare to welcome into the world what is sure to be the brightest light of my life, my child. But daylight that lasts until ten in the evening does not exist without the deep black of the night sky. And the beautiful joy of a new life does not eradicate our own mortality – rather perhaps it even reminds us how fragile life is.

We are so focused on the movement from darkness to light, as we assume that this is the proper direction in which to go. As if the darkness is a weakness to be overcome. As if darkness is a physical, emotional or spiritual state from which to retreat, recoil and recover.

Some pieces of our lives will take place in what feels like total darkness. The unknown calling that we try to name. The diagnosis of a terrible tumor. The loss of a meaningful faith community. The death of a small child. The void when we cannot hear God speaking.

I am learning what it means to sit inside those dark moments without attempting to flee, allowing my eyes to adjust enough to identify new graces that flow exactly through the darkness. I was recently reminded that Christ was laid in a tomb, a cave with the entrance sealed. Resurrection itself began in the dark.

Darkness is not the place or state in which God is absent. Instead it seems that as we come to know and embrace the dark, God may begin the most profound transformations within us.

Questions for Reflection:
Where is God in the dark?
What transformation awaits you there?

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Sarah DeWitt
Sarah has been part of St. Mary’s since 2009. She manages the Ann Arbor Farmers Market. Sarah and her husband Steve are expecting their first child in April.
Email: [email protected]