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In our first post in this series, I explained how we live in a pervasive darkness with no ability to see and perceive spiritual reality. Since we don’t ultimately value or “treasure” Ultimate Reality, our state is darker than we can possibly imagine. This is what Jesus meant when he said: “If the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” His statement is not a question, it is written in the ‘nominative‘ mood, pointing out a very certain reality. He was not hypothesizing. The darkness of humanity means that we all live a delusion and in our pride, we insist that we “see,” which only proves just how deluded we are about ourselves and God.

In last weeks post I went a few steps further. I proved how we have conflated darkness with evil in an oversimplification of our darkened state. From this confusion we have erected theologies and religious rituals to expunge the darkness from our lives as we try and live out Hollywood’s version of the battle between good and evil. Star Wars did not invent the dark side. The biblical narrative reveals a theology of a God who is completely sovereign over darkness and light, and who manifests himself in love via both objective (light) and subjective (darkness) means. Darkness then is experientially understood by God’s will to love in proximity to the beloved. This is how God can be “perfect light in whom there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5), while still being a God who is “pleased to dwell in thick darkness” (1 Kings 8:12), and who creates all darkness (Isaiah 45:7).

If we are tracking with these summaries, then the ageless questions bubble immediately to the surface as we struggle (in our darkness) to make sense of our world, namely: “If God is so loving and so sovereign over all things, then what is the purpose for our darkness and the evil which blossoms from it?” As we survey the world, we appraise it as being full of meaningless suffering, evil oppresses the innocent, and corruption is in the seat of power. If God is good, and has the power to do something, why doesn’t He? These questions and the milk toast answers given by religion are the greatest causes for Atheism our world has known.

The purpose of darkness is perspective. Darkness is the subjective precondition, where the objective light of truth exists in entirety. “Darkness was over the face of the deep.” Consider how darkness and light coexist perfectly in space, both undetectable, until the smallest object enters the dark space and then immediately refracts the light which exists. In this way, light can pass perfectly through complete darkness and even completely fill the darkness, but it is undetectable (subjective) until the light contacts an object.

Now imagine we were placed into a pitch black room with no concept of what is there. In this state of delusion, our imagination may dream up that we are in a peaceful or beautiful place, but it is only when the light is switched on that our dream becomes the nightmarish reality that we are standing among hostile creatures and numerous corpses. When the light goes out, the darkness feels very different. Most people live in the state prior to the light coming on, so darkness has no perspective.

The perspective gained comes from the light and is what reveals the darkness about ourselves. Perceiving the darkness is the first real gauge of self-awareness. With the experience of light, we learn not to minimize the darkness, or assume the horrors of the world belong to “others.”

“Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” (Romans 7:7)

Darkness is the necessary precondition for light to illuminate the beauty of God’s loving creation by revealing those aspects of our being which require transformation in order for that beauty to be fully realized. What God sees is the complete perfection of His artistry as every particle glorifies Him in his goodness and love. What we see, in this moment or phase in the restoration process, is the interplay between shadow and light. At first we love our darkness, then as our eyes adjust to the light, we despise the shadows and our inability to remove them.

We actually have no ability to call anything evil, or point to something and call it useless suffering, if it were not for the graced amount of light which allows us to see how things can be otherwise. When the light comes on in our pride, we survey the room, we see the violence and corpses and then we blame God for His impotence, not realizing that we are the violence and the corpse in our yet to be resuscitated state. The proud who live in darkness can only see evil in others and feels superior by comparison. “How great is the darkness!”

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked…” (Ephesians 2:1)

Darkness provides the perspective which ensures none of us will pass through life and miss God. Darkness is our default perspective. Since we can all imagine life slightly better than it is, this means we have been graced with enough light to perceive not just good and evil, but good from better and better from best. We decry the atrocities of evil, the victims, the suffering, the inequity, the injustice…but in pride refuse to see the seeds of each horror within our own self. Evil doesn’t exist in the world except by each of our own darkness.

“For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.” (Romans 6:20)

The darkness means we are not only complicit, but we are each culpable. When we judge one act as worse than another, we show our tolerance for an endless number of evils stemming from our darkness or inability to perceive the truth. The purpose of this pervasive darkness is to create the necessary friction and pain which moves us closer toward our own liberation and healing, and then toward that of the rest of the world. When the light comes on for us, it shines through to the rest of the world.

The purpose of darkness, as we struggle against it, is to be humbled by our failures and weakness, and illuminate our utter dependence upon God for light if we are to ever find freedom. The world of so-called “meaningless suffering” exists not because God is somehow powerless or unwilling to act, it exists because, in our darkness and pride, we see the light of God and hate it, preferring our darkness and certainty and pride. The suffering world can only exist in proportion to our prideful rejection of God.

“…the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.” (John 3:19)

Throughout human history, we have strived to create societies of peace, prosperity and justice. In every case, these societies have been corrupted by the darkness within us which only sees justice as retribution and punishment. There has only been one solution which has subverted retributive justice and replaced it with restorative justice in its place, and that is the Gospel, the Good News. This restoration project for all humanity is not the making of a society, but the building of God’s kingdom here on earth where we become the temple, the dwelling place of God. This IS light within us is…it’s not us. This kingdom is the end of religion, the end of appeasement, the end of power-over dynamics, the liberation of the captive, the binding up of the broken heart, the good news to the poor, all exist within the central figure of Christ, the promised anointed one from Hebrew scripture.

“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.” (Isaiah 9:2)

This is not an appeal on my part to get you to convert to a religion. The redemption of the world does not come through religion. History has proven that Jesus was correct when he called the religious: “Blind guides.” (Matthew 15:14, 23:16, 23:24) Christ following is not the same as alignment with the institutional Christian religion. Christ following is the discovery of the “Light of the World” and the faith to see into the darkness, transform it, restore it, and free our world from its captivity. The purpose of darkness is to prove the Gospel can be believed. Its purpose for remaining with us, is to draw us again and again to the light of God, for the sake of others. Consider how each of these passages reveal the hope of the Gospel.

“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

“The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple.” (Psalm 119:30)

“For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6)

Yes, all of humanity lives in darkness, but there is also the light of God shining through us all, existing through us all, and that light is not us, but the work of Christ in us, no matter what we call it. Though we possess such darkness, the light of God is not far off.

The great revelation of the scripture is that God is pleased to dwell in thick darkness…

…and what is darker than you and me?