Here I am

Invitation

Close your eyes. Breathe in and breathe out. God is here
with you in this place. Be still and turn your mind and heart upon Him.

Scripture Reading(s)

As we enter this fourth and final week of Advent, I want to invite you to find a quiet space and read Psalm 40:3-10 & 14-16.  Read it a second time, aloud if you can. If you have the time, read it again a third time, being attentive to what words seem to move you, questions you might have, or thoughts and feelings that the text evokes. Do the same with scriptures below.

John 1:9-13
1 John 1:5-10
Psalm 126
Revelation 21:1-8

Reflect

“But the night won’t last forever
morning’s still on its way.
So hold fast and firm to hope brave heart
and trust beneath a thousand stars
believing that Love has made way.
Love has made a way.”

— Jalene Buyer, Love has made a Way

If you have ever spent any significant time in the dark, you know of the painful re-entry into the light. When you get used to being the dark, the light can feel blinding. I feel this so very strongly when my 4 year old decides its time for my husband and I to get up in the wee hours of the morning and she turns on our bedroom light. Something in me reverts back to my teenage years as I forcefully pull the blankets over my head in a huff.

Sometimes we have lived in the darkness for so long that the light feels like an invasive intruder. Sometimes we have inhabited the pits that we find ourselves in for so long that we have donned our prison walls with decor and made ourself at home.

Before our first daughter was born, I had the privilege of working with women in addiction recovery. I was a case manage for women in after-care, who had successfully completed their first year of a recovery program. While there were many women who made a full recovery and were able to go on to living lives that were meaningful to them, there were also many courageous and beautiful women who could not loose themselves from addictions grasp. Many of them ended up back in the clutches of addiction, into life on the street, or have passed on from the suffering of this life.

For many of these brave women, addiction was all they knew. One sweet lady would often come and sit outside my office at the beginning of each day, donned in her bathrobe with coffee and cigarettes in hand. One morning, I sat outside and joined her. As she sipped coffee from her lip-stick stained mug, she confided in me that many times the women would end up back on the street simply because that is where they felt at home. Their fellow prisoners of poverty and addiction became their family (no matter how dysfunctional), and their prison walls both literally and figuratively were more comfortable to them than their freedom.

I have never felt more exposed than when I worked with these women, because even though our circumstances were vastly different, our struggle with darkness was exactly the same. We are all a bit afraid of the light, even though we deeply long for it.

We aren’t told how long our Psalmist spent in the dark of his pit. All we know is that God heard his cry to leave the dark and He responded by lifting him out and into the light. While the light might have been blinding in the short-term, the Psalmists response to God’s deliverance in his life wasn’t to jump back into the pit he came from, but instead to sing a hymn of praise to the One who lifted Him out. There was no longer a cry of agony on his lips… there was a song; A song that would testify of God’s character, and of His love and work within the psalmist’s life. It was a song that would invite others to see God and to put their trust in Him too.
In response to God’s transforming presence in his life that lifted him from darkness and into the Light, the psalmist profoundly and reflectively says this:

“ Sacrifice and offering you did not desire - but my ears you have opened
  Burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not require.
   Then I said, “Here I am…”

There was nothing that ours Psalmist could offer back to God to pay for his deliverance. There was no religious sacrifice that God required from him. No offering he could give. The only gift that the Psalmist thinks to give back to God is simply himself.

Here I am.

Oh friends, this is the profound invitation of Christmas. Can you take a deep breath with me and read these words from the gospel of John?

“The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through Him, the world did not recognize Him. He came to that which was His own, but His own did not receive Him. Yet to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” (1:9-13)

The invitation of Christmas to all of us hiding among the shadows is simply to receive Him who is the true Light. There is nothing we need to do, or sacrifice, or re-pay. God gave Himself fully and completely to dwell among us and within us to all who would say to Him, Here I am.

And yet?
Despite the beautiful invitation of being lifted out of darkness, we so often choose to hunker down in our pits.
This isn’t anything new, though, is it?
Humanity has been mastering the art of hiding since the Fall. Fig leaves, addiction, workaholism, escapism, false-humility, perfectionism …  all different methods, same strategy: to stay hidden, to stay in the dark.

Friends, the women that I had the honour of walking alongside in addiction recovery? They had a leg up on me. The whole point of a recovery program is to live exposed before God and others, to admit that there is a God that is bigger than us, that we are not self-sufficient, and then to live in the Light that He gives. And the women who chose to live this way? In the midst of  all their brokenness and rough edges, they were some of the most radiant people I have ever met. They were living in freedom in a way I had never experienced before.
Why?
Because they had said, Here I am to God.
These women laid the whole of their tattered and beautiful lives before the God who promised to lift them from darkness. They believed in His name, received the gift of His Light, and they had the right to call themselves children of God.

My brokenness and darkness doesn’t always look so obvious. I have often decorated my pit so nicely that I forget the darkness I am in. I can hide real good behind perfectionism and false-humility, and no one is the wiser. But the truth is that I am in desperate need for a recovery program too.

The true miracle of Christmas is that Jesus invites us to receive the Light that leads us all into recovery. In the Light of Jesus all is exposed and we finally see. Its often painful, convicting, and oh so bright, but as much as the Light exposes, it also brings with it Hope and Life. Like a glorious sunrise casts fresh vision upon the horizon, so the light of Christ gives us new eyes to see and invokes a new song of praise on our lips.

Friends, when we receive the Light of Jesus, it doesn’t mean that all suffering disappears. Even our Psalmist found himself in another pit at another time. But we are no longer slaves to the dark. We learn how to live as children of the Light, whose hope is grounded in the One who came in humility all those Christmas’s ago, and will come in power to dispel darkness for good once and for all.

So, in these last few days of Advent, can you hear the whisper of Christmas to you, even in the darkness of night?
Morning is on its way.
And as the night gives way to the light of dawn?

Oh friend, I pray that you can say with all your heart to the God who gave all of His: Here I am.

Respond

Take a few moments to be present. What thoughts and feelings do you have after today’s scripture reading(s) and reflection? What might God be speaking to you?

Pray and ask God to reveal to you places in your life where you might be sitting in a place of darkness. Do you want God to lift you out of this pit? Why or Why not?

The Psalmist of Psalm 40 responded to God’s deliverance by singing a hymn of praise. Take some time this week to write out a letter of thanks to God for the ways you have seen Him work in your heart and your life. Then, follow in the footsteps of the Psalmist and choose to proclaim the good news of who God is and what He has done to someone else. Who might need to be reminded of God’s faithfulness?

In this season of your life, where might God be inviting you to say, Here I am to Him? What would this look like for you? How would it change your relationship with God?

Pray

Jesus, You are the Light of the World. You came into the world to give light to all mankind, and yet people loved darkness instead of Light. Yet, for all who would receive you and who would believe in Your name, you called children of God. Saviour, I pray for a humility that recognizes my need for You and a receptive heart to receive the light of life that you shine forth in the darkness. As I celebrate You this Christmas, the only gift I can offer is all of me. May I say an honest, Here I am in response to all You are and all You have given to me. Amen.