Five days ago the early morning walk began in darkness compounded by heavy fog (which seemed to add a deeper chill to the temperature lingering just above freezing). It was easy to limp a bit and grumble a bit more as I battled the first half-mile of the climb. And there where the wooded mountain makes a sharp wall on the left, the moon suddenly cleared a beam through trunks and branches--cutting a narrow path between the road and the sky. It captivated me the way a sunrise cannot: that swath of light momentarily illuminating the world, as if an unseen switch had been thrown. The woods, to quote Robert Frost, were "dark and deep" silhouetted in columns either side of that pure white light, and vanishing away at the skyline.
The image has lingered, altering my narrow, frail perspective.
Sometimes the waiting for daybreak feels impossible, and the intervening hours of darkness seem impenetrable.
But they are not.
Remarkably, that pre-dawn searchlight was just a reflection of the sun inviting me today to imagine summer has not passed. The Bible verses learned in childhood come back, "the greater one to rule the day and the lesser one to rule the night." And echoing a deeper truth, the words of John beautifully illustrated by the dispelling of the blue-black night: "In Him was life and that life was the light of man. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."
Tipping my head back to feel the last rays on my face, I pause to be encouraged by the truth so clearly displayed this week -- storing it up for a darker day.
The sun shall be no more your light by day,
Nor for brightness shall the moon give you light;
But the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory.
Your sun shall no more go down, nor your moon withdraw itself;
For the Lord will be your everlasting light,
and your days of mourning shall be ended. Isaiah 60
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