Tag Archives: darkness

Being in Darkness

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Image by Wanyi Huang

This week at common art, I randomly drew with colored markers a cactus growing under the stars. I shared my art with S., who asked me, “Have you seen the sky at night without lights and moonlight?” He described his experiences outside the city with only the starlight singing in the sky. His experience in the starlight shower was so vivid in his brain. When my image reminded him of this joyfulness and mental stillness, he felt gratitude. They finally see the bright stars in the sky when everything is dark. Indeed, Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.”

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Reminders of Healing Power & Promise

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Lent 4B, March 14, 2021

Numbers 21:4-9. Moses prayed for the people.
Ephesians 2:1-10. This is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.
John 3:14-21. Those who do what is true come to the light.

O God of Grace, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will. Amen.

One of the many joys of grandparenting for me is watching Sesame Street! I know I don’t have to have grandchildren to watch it, but they’re a good excuse! Some of you might remember a Sesame Street song called “One of these things is not like the other.” That is an apt song for our Hebrew Scripture passage this morning wedged into a Sunday series of covenant stories during Lent. Remember we started Lent with the story of God’s promise to Noah and then the story of God’s promise to Abraham. Then the promise from God that when (and whenever) we are loving God, we won’t behave in ways that do damage to one another and to ourselves. Next week we will hear the story of God’s promise to write God’s love on the hearts of people so that no one will have to be taught about God, everyone will already know God – by heart. But this week, we have one of those things which is not like the others. We have this peculiar little story from the Book of Numbers.
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Everything happens next.

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Advent 4B, December 20, 2020. The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16. The Lord will make you a house. (Poof!)
Romans 16:25-27. Now to God…be the glory forever. Amen.
Luke 1:26-38. Here I am, the servant of the Lord.

O God in whom is heaven, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

This Advent, Emmanuel Church has begun repenting of – turning-around from — theological and liturgical words and images that set up “darkness bad/light good” teachings, because language is a powerful tool, which we can use in dismantling white supremacy in the Church, especially the unconscious kind. We have stopped using darkness as a metaphor for sin or for evil, because the Bible teaches us that to God, darkness and light are both alike. [1] Therefore, darkness cannot be only profane, and lightness only holy. Dark and light can both be beautiful and grace-filled. Dark and light can both be terrifying and terrible.
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Repentance, Repair & Reconciliation

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Advent 1B, November 29, 2020.  The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 64:1-9. O that you would tear open the heavens and come down.…We are your people.
1 Corinthians 1:1-9 So that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Mark 13:24-37 Keep awake.

O God of Repentance, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Today marks the beginning of a new Church year with the first Sunday in Advent. The Christian new year doesn’t begin with festivities or celebrations, but with lamentation in Isaiah, with a letter from Paul written in response to reports of in-fighting – of quarrelling in the church in Corinth, and with the Gospel of Mark’s “apocalypse” – Jesus’ prediction of the end of life as his disciples know it. The end, according to Mark, will be a very good thing because of the enormity of suffering, because of the desolation being experienced. I get this at a deeper level than I ever have before because of the revelations and devastations of this past year.
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