3-12-15 - Cover of Darkness

Ah, think of it. Walking in the light. Transparency. Integrity. Truthfulness.
Good lord, we’d have nothing to watch on TV if this is how humanity operated! Most drama is driven by bad choices followed by cover-ups, which necessitate more lies and bad choices and behaving differently with different people – and before you know it, no one can trust anyone else.

Which, if you attend to the story of Adam and Eve and the serpent, is pretty much how we got into this mess in the first place. A bad choice, followed by a cover-up (even if those fig leaves didn’t cover much…), which necessitated more lies and bad choices. For some people this becomes a way of life, so entrenched that even when something wakes them up – say a light dawns – they are unable to change to a light-based operating system. They are too attached to the darkness.

These are the kind of people Jesus refers to when he talks about those who are condemned by their choosing to remain in darkness, even after the light has come: “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.”

We probably all know some people like this, lovers of darkness, so given over to self-will and exploitation of others they become evil themselves. There are plenty of those kind about, but they are a distinct minority, and I daresay none of the readers of Water Daily are to be found among their number. So what does this have to do with us? We are not lovers of darkness.

No, we are not. BUT… can we be a little too comfortable with the shadows? Are we oriented toward the negative, to the bad news, the worse outcome? Are we quicker to criticize than to compliment? Faster with the reasons something won’t work than why it might? Too ready to give voice to unhappy possibilities instead of speaking our desires into the air? This is how the world teachces us to think. God-Life invites us to change our way of thinking and speaking. We may not be people of darkness, but I think many of us can do some work on truly embracing the light. I sure can.

Today try to make a point of listening to yourself – both your internal monologue and external conversation. Hear what you’re saying – are your words life-giving or squashing? Notice when you make a negative assumption about yourself, another, or a situation. And if you do – and believe me, I do it a lot – don’t jump all over yourself. Just say, “Hmmm. Wow. I do that more than I realize. God, where is the life in this situation? Show me how you love this person. Show me how you love me.”

We are used to dramas based on bad choices, lies and conflict. We’re so used to that, we can’t imagine a story that’s all good having any dramatic tension at all.

But what if we’re wrong? Wouldn’t it be a kick to give it a try and find out?