The Light That Changed Time

Thinking about watching the end of the year light fade out and then begin to stay longer has caused me to look at light and its meaning a little deeper this year. The harvest lights fading in the fall, the final Thanksgiving at the end of November and the beginning, Advent of the winter light diminishing faster every day. I have SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and the less light every day has a profound influence on my biological and emotional clocks.

Then there are the clocks and the changes involved from the winter solstice, this year being treated to the amazing Irish and its ancient meanings, thinking of these people long ago in Ireland at Newgrange, living before and at the time Jesus was born. The ancient Festival of Lights, Chunakuh falling the day after Winter Solstice and then Christmas when we celebrate the Light of the World being born. Maybe it is an artificially set date but its meaning was enough to change the way the Western world and really most of the world perceives the ordering of time. That is greater than any Winter Solstice and one of the most profound miracles ever being constantly practiced and observed by humankind!

Tonight is New Year's Eve, 2009 and we are celebrating the end of one year, 2008 considered one of the worst we as Americans have ever experienced, and the beginning of the New Year, 2009 for which most of us are trying to muster up some hope. An example of this hope in my own family is my nephew who has been turning to the stock market as a possible job opportunity, he would like to be a financial manager. He just learned how to buy stocks online. He told his mom proudly that he had recently purchased 1,000 shares of....Ford!! Well, that is why the older generation looks to the young for renewed hope. If Ford goes green even further with their operations and products, well we don't know. I'm just glad I could hear his mother laugh softly as she told the story.

After the New Year settles in, we experience another celebration of Light, Epiphany. Oh, God was so wonderfully wise in filling our darkest time, winter, with such glowing hope!

Christmas Light

When I woke up this morning and went into the living room, a splinter of light was shining on the Christmas tree and on the Nativity scene. It was dark all around except for the light falling on the manger and the backs of everyone looking upon the Christchild. It took my breath away. I ran to get my camera hoping to get a shot before the light moved on. OK, the photo is blurred (I was shaking a bit in awe of this event) but captures enough of the drama of the moment.

Yesterday I watched a video of the Winter Solstice at the oldest burial mound in Europe at Newgrange in Ireland. It was too foggy for the dim, pink light of the sun to illuminate the interior of the structure which is 5,000 years old (older than the Egyptian pyramids) but they did show last years video of it. The structure is based on cruciform or cross shape and is an accurate clock for the winter solstice to strike the interior every year. A place where ashes were placed so that the souls of the departed could find their way into the light.

Today is Chanukkah, a Jewish celebration of the Festival of the Lights, the miracle of the lamplight oil in the menorah staying brightly lit for eight days which took place during a terribly oppressive time for the Jewish people. The Festival commemorates this miracle of Light!

Christians and others are preparing to welcome the Light of the Christchild into their lives this week. The 3 Wisemen followed an amazing star to Bethlehem where they brought their precious gifts and to meet Him even as a baby, humbly born in a manger in a stable to ordinary folks, Mary and Joseph.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

John 1:1