It is darkest just before the dawn. God speaks into our impossible situations.
Aug 22 in General
This is one of my favourite quotations, an excerpt from a book written by Martin Luther King called ‘strength to love’.
‘We visited the beautiful beach of Cape Comorin (called Land’s End) where the land of India comes to an end. Nothing stretches before you except the broad expanse of rolling waters. This beautiful spot is a point at which three great bodies of water meet, the Indian Ocean, the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal.
Seated on a huge rock protruding into the Ocean, the waves unfold crashing against the base of the rock, to the West the magnificent sun, a great ball of fire, appears to sink into the very Ocean itself, just as it is almost lost from sight, I turned around to see the moon, another ball of scintillating beauty appearing to be rising from the Ocean. When the sun finally passed completely beyond sight, darkness engulfed the earth, but in the East the radiant light of the riding moon shone supreme.
An analogy of what happens in life – we have experiences when the light of day vanishes, leaving us in some dark and desolate midnight – moments when our highest hopes all turned into shambles of despair or when we are the victims of some tragic injustice and some terrible exploitation – During such moments our spirits overcome by gloom and despair, we feel there is no light anywhere. But ever and again, we look towards the East and discover that there is another light that shines even in the darkness and the ‘spear of frustration’ is transformed into ‘a shaft of light’.
Dawn arrives at the end of the darkest night, light gradually breaking forth like the birth of a child, signalling new life, new beginnings; illuminating our surroundings and changing the world around us. Nothing has changed and yet everything. What once was deemed tragic with fear lurking between the shadows, is transformed by those first sun rays… and there, hope sparkles.
Two men on the road to Emmaus had just lived through the darkest moment; nothing made sense, why if Jesus had come as the so awaited Messiah, had he been crucified? why had God allowed it if He was indeed His son? how was death consistent with all He had said, His promises? How to make any sense of the circumstances, such pain, such desolation, such darkness. How could the enemy be so strong? … and now His body was missing. A man (Jesus) meets them, walks with them: ‘was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things…?’ Luke 24:26. He reveals a perfect and elaborate plan, the light shines and reveals, opens their eyes; ‘were not our hearts burning within us while He was talking with us?’ it was but the beginning of a new chapter.
It is at its darkest just before the dawn, before anything can be born there is travail, yet it was when the earth was formless and void and darkness was upon its face that God said “Let there be light”; He awakened the dawn: The first day.
Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.