“I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.”

“…new life starts in the dark. Whether it is a seed in the ground, a baby in the womb, or Jesus in the tomb, it starts in the dark.”

Both quotes from Barbara Brown Taylor- “Learning to walk in the dark”

Advent offers us these themes over and over again, of light and darkness, darkness and light, as often seems to be the case my advent season is peppered with a mixture of celebration and sadness, I have funerals to lead, difficult conversations to have, Carol Services, The Big Sing ( an event I love), a mix of light meets that dark reality.

Light meets the dark reality, surely this is our reality, we live between the now and the not yet, what is and what is to come…

We live between the black and white, we are the grey, the questions, the doubts, the concerns. the ponderings…

Is this right, is that true

Is this just, is this really fair, the right way forward…

is it?

Could it be?

We walk a tangled path through these days, not just what we believe is true, but questions of how we should live, of how we should be, of what we should be letting go of…

New life begins in the dark…

today I have net light and dark….

hope and despair…

I can only pray…

O Come, O come….

light me, love me,

gift me, guide me..