Deep in the Root

Deep in their roots, all flowers keep the light.

This winter image, offered up by poet Theodore Roethke, embodies the spirit of Advent. Beneath the frozen-over ground (unless you live in the desert, or at the beach, in which case we don’t want to hear about it–just pretend it’s frozen, ok?) …under all the ice and snow; attached to that shriveled brown stem left over from summer’s abundance; way below all that we can see, the flower keeps the light. Something is happening in the darkness. In its own season, we will behold the new life that’s been waiting.

Maybe you can use that gentle reminder of unseen promise this year, if you find yourself struggling when the world says you *should* be jolly.

Hold onto that frozen over flower, if you’ve lost someone you love; if you are battling illness or depression or heartbreak; or if the coming year bears an ominous weight of uncertainty.

Or maybe you are just a person who watches the news. If you find yourself sinking into despair at the desperate refugee situation, half a world away; or the raging gun violence, hateful political rhetoric, the overt homophobia and Islamaphobia and racism in our own back yard… Forget the weather report, we have other kinds of ice to break through. Whatever hurt you’re holding, hold also to this winter good news —deep in their roots, all flowers keep the light. 

 In the beginning, God said let there be light, and there was. This was the first wonder of creation, as we know it. The sudden illumination of the void. “And God separated light from darkness.”

Notice though… God did not banish the darkness completely.

Maybe it’s because some things can only be seen in the dark.

Think about how many more stars you can see at night, if you get away from the constant glow of street lights and tv and computer screens that overwhelm our neighborhoods. Just ask the folks who live in the country, or go camping on the weekends.  Or think about the subtle magic of Christmas lights, the cheer they can bring to a home of any size or stature. You don’t run those in the day time. Alhough Kentuckians are rumored to keep them up all year long… But even we don’t keep them on in daylight hours. What would be the point?

We need darkness to sleep. Ask anyone who’s ever worked third shift, or lived in Alaska.

Ask any photographer, who’s ever spent an hour in that little room, waiting to see what art emerges from the developing tray —ask him what the dark might be good for.

Or what about the abiding calm of a candlelight vigil, following some tragedy or act of violence? Those gathered lights against the night sky are a powerful witness to the hope of the human spirit.

As much as we may struggle against it—the darkness has its purpose.

The prophet Isaiah was waiting for a new kind of ruler—one that would rule not with violent force, but with justice and peace. He said that:

A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
 The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.

 This new king would be from the line of David, but would far surpass David himself in righteousness and integrity. (David wrote great music, but he was also kind of a skank. Such is the rockstar life, I guess…) The promise of this leader full of ‘wisdom and understanding’ was an ancient one—but a hope long abandoned by the people of Israel. The family tree that might yield such a branch was long withered and dead.

But —Isaiah said that dead and dried out stump might yet flower. A single, green growth shooting up in its own season with a new song, a new story for God’s people in the wilderness. God had been working towards that future plan all along, in some subterranean place they could not see with mortal eyes.

Deep in their roots—all flowers keep the light.

We, too, wait for some profound sign of God’s presence —still living and moving and breathing good news among us. We want that green growing thing to come up where we’d long given up hope.

It could be that sometimes, we can only see that truth lit up against some present darkness.

This is not to say that God causes evil and illness and heartbreak —but it is a promise that God is always at work in those seemingly hopeless places… Bringing about transformation, moving us towards some glimpse of holiness that could illuminate goodness; but can only be seen against the dark.

Oswald Chambers, a turn-of-the-last century theologian, talks about the ‘discipline’ of darkness. Maybe any darkness in which we happen to find ourselves really is an invitation to discipline —to the practice of waiting and trusting God’s ultimate ability to transform the shadows.

Chambers says “When you are there…remain quiet. Listen, and God will give you some very precious message for someone else when you get into the light.”

In other words… when you find yourself in some hurting place, or some uncertain place… it could be that God will use that time to make a minister out of you. Not plunging you into suffering on purpose; but rather, working through some otherwise unbearable moment to teach you some truth of becoming. One that will allow you to serve someone else in their own waiting place.

Some things, you can only learn in darkness.

Sometimes, darkness has its purpose. And sometimes, darkness is only there to make us mindful of the light.

During this season of Advent, we light candles of hope, peace, joy and love. We light them against the present darkness, and in celebration of all that is becoming in unseen places. We take joy where we can; we seek hope wherever we go; we make peace where we are; and we love and are loved, through all kinds of weather.

We draw that light into the center of our being, and we store it up in our roots for the long winter ahead.

I LOVE this arrangement of “Lo, How a Rose…” Enjoy.