January 23, 2005

Finding the Light

By Julianne Stokstad

It is a wonderful time of discovery for me now and I want you to know I am enjoying my days here immensely. It is a joy getting to know you, this church and how it works, and San Rafael. I am very happy to see how important interfaith dialogue is here in Marin County.

Last Wednesday, I attended an interfaith program at Santa Sabina, just behind Dominican University, to study spiritual practices of different faith traditions. The purpose is to learn about the different religions and how the various spiritual practices can be used to effect positive change in each of us, in our community and in our world. Last week's program was led by a young dynamic woman, Rabbi Chai Levy. We learned from her through story, song and dialogue about the foundational Jewish teachings. What especially caught my attention was the idea from Jewish mysticism that there is a hidden light or spark of God in everything. The world has been a broken place from the beginning and it is our human job to find and bring forth the hidden sparks through acts of loving kindness, service and living according to the Torah.

I love the idea of a divine spark in everything and it isn't new to me. In fact, in every religious tradition, light is understood as an expression of the divine. People who have come to know and live within the divine are said to be enlightened. Enlightened ones and mystics are able to see what most of us can't see, particularly in our scientific age, this is hard to accept.

What we see depends our how we look and light is a great example of this.

Though we see the world as made up of mountains and chairs and people, we have learned through science that there is more to the world than our senses can perceive. A simple example is the way bees that see ultraviolet light apparently see flowers. I find the fact that light exists both as a wave and a particle something to ponder.

In our Christian tradition, explosions of light often accompany encounters with God: Saul's conversion on the road to Damascus and Jesus'transfiguration are examples.

Aside from biblical examples, how do we recognize the spark of God's light? This has been a persistent problem ---people in the time of ancient Israel didn't know how, though the prophets tried to tell them. People alive at Jesus' time didn't know, though Jesus and his disciples tried to tell them. We don't know how to recognize how God shows up among us very well either.

Our passage from Matthew shows us a way. It starts out with the concrete physical reality, very specifically naming events and places: Jesus heard of the arrest of John the Baptist and then he went from Nazareth to Galilee. Then Matthew repeating Isaiah's prophecy gives us a description of the spiritual reality hidden behind the specific concrete events. The people who sat in darkness, have seen a great light, of course he didn't mean there was a long total eclipse. He is saying poetically the light of God will come into spiritual darkness bringing a new day.

We know about darkness perhaps better than the light, many people dwell in it. Joyce Rupp, a favorite author of mine, writes about darkness in her profound little book Little Pieces of Light. She says, "Darkness comes in many forms and is not an easy visitor. Our life experiences when 'dimness and disorder hold sway' are as many and as varied as we are." There are concrete dark times like war, exile, poverty or addiction and times when our inner hidden reality is dark and bleak, times of grief, loss, depression, or helplessness or hopelessness. In such times, God seems far away from us. Even though misery does love company, Martin Luther King wrote, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that." In such times, we need to find God's light to drive away the darkness. So how can we do that?

Matthew tells us. After first telling us there is a spiritual reality hidden beneath our concrete lives, he gives us the specific example of light breaking forth. He tells us about how Jesus walks along the lakeshore, meeting some fishermen, ordinary working folk mending their nets, and calls them to be his first disciples. Simon Peter and Andrew, then James and John immediately followed him.

I've always wondered what they saw in Jesus to make them drop everything in their lives? Looking deeper, Jesus must have inspired some awareness in them, brought certainty to theier hope, something deep in their souls must have clicked and they knew and saw in Jesus the light of God. A little piece light in them must have been rekindled and they knew they wanted what it was that Jesus had. They followed Jesus and together began to do God's work. You might think well that doesn't have anything to do with me, here and now. This could only have happened a long time ago, but I beg to differ.

I want to tell you a story from the very beginning of my spiritual journey. It began in a most ordinary way, at a school conference. It was in June 1992, only a couple of weeks after our youngest son's graduation from high school. I wasn't a seeker then, in fact I was even attending a church, having left six years before. One evening we were listening to a panel of Alateen speakers and I had a strange experience noticing something in one of speakers. In fact, I couldn't keep from looking at him. There was brightness about him. Whatever is was, it is very difficult to articulate but I can still clearly see it. This was so strange, nothing like this had ever happened to me before. I remember sneaking a look at the others in the room to see if they noticed it and was looking at him too. Nobody was. I couldn't believe that because he looked so different to me. I blinked, shook my head and kept checking the others' reaction; no one else seemed to take any notice. How could this be? I'd never seen anything like this.

This young sailor wasn't particularly articulate. He was very ordinary, very quiet, He wasn't what we would call a charismatic speaker; he wasn't especially handsome, but there was something very special about him.

While I couldn't name what it was about him, but I knew that whatever it was, I didn't have it and I wanted it. So I went up to speak with him. I had no idea how to put the question into words. After small talk, I finally just blurted out "So what is it you have?"

He answered, that whatever it was I saw, it wasn't him, it was from God. This was strange talk for me and I didn't know what to make of it. I never knew this young man's name. He certainly has no idea how much my life has changed because of my very brief encounter with him. Was this a mystical moment? I don't know. All I know for sure was that it was a moment of great grace in my life. I saw light, some spark of God in this person and I was forever changed. From this point, I set out on a new path, which has led to this place.

A piece of God's light from this young man touched me and changed me. I believe that we all do this for each other. And we don't generally have any idea of those we have touched with our light. I believe that there is a spark of God in each of us. How brightly it shines through us depends on our thoughts, our intentions and our choices among other things.

God's light is shining bright here. I am experiencing great light and joy in this church. Each worship service has been filled with light and love. Can you feel it? Each board meeting is filled with joy. I hope we all can acknowledge, accept and be grateful for God's light and spirit here.

One of the great gifts of our ministry is to seek this spark in each person and experience, in each community. So often we are all so busy with the mundane parts of our lives that we forget to look beneath the surface. Maybe the light is in the eye of the beholder, I don't know. I do know that I often see it when people are doing what it is they love to do or with people they love. The light shines out. When we say a kind word or reach out to someone in a new way, and it can be a moment-in-time when the other is transfigured by the presence and power of love. For that moment, there is a connection made which changes everything and is remembered for all time. It is through us; in the very grit and sweat of our lives that God's love is made real.

God, powerful and mysterious beyond our understanding, reaches out to us. God calls to us and wants to us in relationship with us. When we connect and find those little hidden sparks of God, those grace filled moments can peel away the limits our understanding and allow light to break into our awareness and transform us. Then we can see in a new way and we are changed forever. Believe me, it happens!