Darkness vs. LIGHT
I was thirteen. I had to stand there as he told me what he was going to do to me. I had to smile, pretend I welcomed it. He choked me, and then he raped me. He laughed. His breath was awful. Once a week, for the roll of money he handed to my father.
This was a darkness that began when I was born and did not end until I left home at 19.
I could echo the wife of Job: “Curse God and die,” but, oh, I do not. I never did, in fact, and why? There was something that accompanied that darkness, penetrated it. Something that took hold of the darkness and shoved it backward.
Have you experienced such a thing? A time when it felt as if your body was lifted up, your spirit soaring, every cell inside you coming alive and glowing?
This is what it feels like when God walks by.
There’s more to us than our bodies. There’s more to our lives than the stuff of what’s around us now. There’s a voice inside us that cries for more, a voice that tells us to see more, be more than we are.
We lose when we disregard the proximity of these moments. They are our burning bushes. They are our chances to walk on water. They are our turns to be Bartimaeus and get to see, and they are meant to be far more numerous than our narrowed, prejudiced, fear-filled, and “let’s be real”-induced perspectives allow.
When horrific abuse pales in the light of God walking by, we must be led to make the following conclusions:
We need to be concentrating far more on seeking out and experiencing these moments, on inviting God to walk by;
What changes within us will come about as we do? How will we grow? What wisdom can be ours? and,
Just how small do our preoccupations with biblical interpretation, orientation, gender, and who’s actually proclaiming Jesus as savior seem?
God has an intense interest in each of us. In accepting this, in meeting Him on sacred ground, we will find all we need to discern for ourselves how to proceed into each moment, each hour, each day. We will find the Way along the Way. We need only do this for ourselves and encourage, support, and allow every other to do the same.
This is how the Kingdom of God comes, in our seeking of these moments, in our participation with the God who is always coming by.
Reflection
Why have we dismissed the opportunity of meeting God in our everyday? How might this meeting change our perspectives, our thoughts, our actions?
Prayer
Dear God, You are far more HERE than I have been taught. You are far more HERE than I am choosing to realize. Walk by me, Lord. Allow me to experience the power, the drive, the goodness, the mercy, the peace, the joy that transcends what I’ve been led to believe is present in this “ordinary.” May I question my fear of any darkness. Come by here, Lord. Amen.