“Candle Light”

Christmas Eve 

December 24, 2004

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 Rev. Dr. Carol L. Kerr

Blue Point Congregational Church

 

Candle light - a simple pillar of yellow flame with a heart of blue.   Its haloed radiance pulls us toward some ancient source and away from the surface of life.  At the same time the flame is fragile.  A door opening will make it flicker precariously.  And walking with a candle in your hand can blow it out entirely.  That is unless you protect it with your hand, and move in slow motion.  A candle flame however vulnerable will gather those near it and speak of peace, love, joy, and hope.

Likewise God did not enter our world with crushing impact of unbearable glory, but by the way of a haloed babe.  On a wintry night in an obscure cave, the infant Jesus was a humble naked helpless God who allowed us to get close to him.  Just as we can get close to the flame of a candle and feel its warmth.  It draws us in and we want to stay in its light. 

Many people particularly in the northern altitudes feel oppressed by the darkness at this time of year.  It is midnight black at 4:15 in the afternoon.  We get depressed.  We feel like they are barely getting through the day.  We just keep wanting to shut down.   “Seasonal Affective Disorder” – that’s the long cumbersome name psychology gives this condition.  I think I myself get a little of it.  There is a high tech. “solution.”  You can go on line and get a full spectrum lamp which imitates the sun.  Some I have seen look like a piece of  alien space craft with a large bank of tubular bulbs facing you.  You are to sit in front of these for about two hours.  Your seasonal affective disorder will be resolved – or so they claim.

I don’t know if these work.  I have never tried one myself.  Maybe they do.  Maybe you have one.  But, I think the technology and the big name misses something important which our ancestors understood.  For thousands and thousands of years people who live far north were not just depressed when the days grew shorter and shorter.  There was a primal sense of the waning of life itself with the disappearance of the sun.  As the days grew shorter and colder and the sun threatened to abandon the earth, these ancient people created ceremonies and rituals to haul back the sun and recover hope.  Hemmed in by darkness people need hope.  For me, the light that brings hope is not a wide spectrum lamp of so many hundreds of watts.  More effective is the flame of a single candle.

When we gaze at a candle the darkness is not denied by its light.  It golden globe burns  pointing out the darkness.  Just like at the birth of Christ those who live in darkness, the broken, fearful gaze on the light, Emmanuel, which burns for them.

We will each hold our candles in just a few minutes.  The fate of this hope giving light is in our hands.  We have the power to let it shine or put it out.  You know the trick, lick your fingers and quickly snuff out its bloom leaving a “dull blue dud.”  Likewise, we can snuff out our faith if we choose.  It is in our hands. 

We might be tempted to snuff it out.  After all life is limited even for those blessed few who lead charmed lives.   For many others life is not so charmed.  Some might even think their life is cursed.  Certainly many of us in between have problems. There are many things we don’t understand. We try our best but don’t succeed.  And there is always the suffering near us which we can do nothing about.  Candle lighting might seem like sentimental foolishness, so with a quick sizzle it is all over.   Yet if you choose not to snuff out the candle and hold it, you can think of the Christ child.  The point of the incarnation is that God’s actions speak louder than words.  God allowed himself to become utterly vulnerable to us.  Born in a Bethlehem slum, fragile, warm the child looks up at us and seems to say “I am so glad you came.  I am so glad you are holding me.”   Then God lest us hold him close, as he holds us close.  As it burns the candle welcomes “What Is, What Has Been, What Is To Come. 

Children often wonder if their Mom or Dad loves their brother or sister better than themselves.  They think love can get used up, like drinking from a bottle of soda.  If the parents spend too much time with a sibling, then the bottle will be almost empty and there won’t be much for them.  Love is more like a candle than a bottle of soda.  One flame lights another flame which lights another flame.   The more your give the greater it gets.  Unlike soda in a bottle – the light increases instead of decreases.  Brighter and brighter the room grows as one candle lights another and another.   

Candle lighting can do great things.  For instance, did you know candles ended the Cold War?  First a few hundred, then a thousand, then thirty thousand, fifty thousand, and finally five hundred thousand – nearly the entire population of the city – turned out in Leipzig for candlelight vigils.  After a prayer meeting at ST. Nikolai Church, the peaceful protestors would march through the dark streets, singing hymns.  Ultimately, on the night a similar march in Easter Berlin attracted one million protestors, the hated Berlin Wall came tumbling down without a shot being fired.  Millions of people holding candles which were as fragile as a newborn babe ended injustice that seemed impossible to end.  A huge banner appeared across Leipzig street:  Wir Danken Dir, Kirche (We thank you, Church).

We are a candle lighting, candle holding people.  After all, the scripture says:  What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.  (Jn 1)