We have reached that great time of the year when light has become longer than dark. It gets light earlier each morning, and the sun sets later every evening. This will continue for another 2.5 months or so and then the days will slowly begin to shorten and nights lengthen. This is how the world works based on the way that we have agreed to measure time. There are folks who each year suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder which brings on a feeling of melancholy and even depression when the nights are longer than the days. The treatment is often to use special lamps that mimic the sunlight and to sit under it for a prescribed amount of time. Our world is dark right now and people are feeling despondent because there doesn’t seem to be much light right now. Physician and wise healer, Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen, tells a story about the birth of the world that helps us rediscover our own light and how to shine it into our darkness. She writes, “… In the beginning, there was only the holy darkness, the Ein Sof, the source of life. And then, in the course of history, at a moment in time, this world, the world of a thousand thousand things, emerged from the heart of the holy darkness as a great ray of light. And then, perhaps because this is a Jewish story, there was an accident. And the vessels containing the light of the world, the wholeness of the world, broke. And the wholeness of the world, the light of the world, was scattered into a thousand, thousand fragments of light. And they fell into all events and all people, where they remain deeply hidden until this very day.

Now, according to my grandfather, the whole human race is a response to this accident. We are here because we are born with the capacity to find the hidden light in all events and all people, to lift it up and make it visible once again, and thereby to restore the innate wholeness of the world. This is a very important story for our times, that we heal the world one heart at a time. And this task is called ‘tikkun olam,’ in Hebrew – ‘restoring the world’.

We are here because we are born with the capacity to find the hidden light in all events and all people, to lift it up, make it visible. Perhaps we come together in practice so that we can take part in restoring the world. Everywhere we look we are presented with an opportunity to help, to heal: ‘It’s about healing the world that touches you, that’s around you….’” Indeed…the blessed assurance that we have as followers of the God of our understanding is that we are all able to shine light into the darkness around us. It is not the “Pollyanna” light of “everything will be alright – puppies and bunnies and sunshine”! No, it is the hard won, realistic and resilient light that comes from working through the pains, challenges and setbacks of our lives. It is the strong light that is the result of overcoming what life throws at us – not just on our own, but with the help of the light of the others around us.

Because the reality is that our individual lights can become quite dim – they can be almost overwhelmed by tragic events. As Dr. Remen notes, however, each of us has the ability and the responsibility to search for and to be the light for others and our world. When things look most bleak, then we are called to rally together to shine our lights out against injustices, evil, corruption and graft, greed, and all manner of sins and transgressions. We who follow the God of the light understand that things in the world have been dark before and that God has stimulated good people to lift up their light and to be at work in the world repairing it – acting on tikkun olam.

You may be feeling lost in the dark right now. If this is so, then I invite you to find your way to a faith community this week. There you will find folks who are tending their light and the light of others around them.

They are looking for ways to spread the light and to go to places to find more light.

They really need you to bring your light to their activity.

Darkness always gives way to the light of day – be the light for someone else this week.

The Rev. Albrant is pastor of Mineral and Mount Pleasant United Methodist churches.