Christmas Lights

I love the run-up to Christmas (not the run-up that starts in September, but the one that starts at the proper time, at the beginning of December).  I love the frosty, icy mornings, mulled wine, mince pies, starting to hear Christmas Carols and songs on the radio or when you're out shopping.

 

And I love seeing the Christmas lights that people put up, both in their homes and in towns and cities.

 

Turning on the lights has become a big event in recent years: often, a local celebrity will be invited to turn them on, and people will queue - sometimes for hours beforehand - to see the lights going on.

 

I find this quite amusing - at no other point in life is turning lights on a big deal.  I'm sure we all turn lights on at regular intervals throughout the day without ever noticing or caring.  We certainly manage the task by ourselves and without a crowd cheering us on.

 

Of course, most of the lights that we are turning on during the day are nothing like the light displays that we see around Christmas time.  And in recent years, there seems to have been an increase in the creativity and competition of Christmas lights - like the fantastic display at this local house which gets up to 300 visitors a day over the festive period.

 

 

But why do we like the light so much? 

 

There seems to be something within us which prefers light to dark, which celebrates lightness championing over darkness.

 

This is a story that is played out throughout the Bible and which peaks at Christmas (and, again, at Easter.)

 

John describes Jesus' birth like this:

"What came into existence was Life,
and the Life was Light to live by.
The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness;
the darkness couldn’t put it out."

 

[John 1: 4-5 MSG]

 

That's the thing about light, isn't it?  It always conquers darkness.  No matter how dark it is, light always wins.  A tiny flame from a tiny match will still be visible in the dark.  Lights from a city on a hill are visible for miles around, no matter how dark the night is.

 

Light always wins.

 

And whilst we take our Christmas lights down after Christmas and put them away until next year, Jesus is an ever-lasting, eternal light, who will always guide us and give us life.  In the words of one of my favourite carols,

 

"Yet in the dark streets shineth the ever-lasting light."

 

 

 

 

Ombre

Ombre. 

 

It's French for 'shade' or 'shades' and is a much nicer-sounding word for the current trend in dip-dyeing hair [where the ends of the hair are dyed, usually much lighter, than the rest of the hair].

 

Done properly, the aim is to for the different shades to be indistinguishable and for the lines between them to be blurred.

 

I have had a go at it this weekend.

 

The ends are not as blonde as I would have liked, but are definitely much lighter than the roots.  And I am very pleased with how well I have managed to blend the shades: it is almost impossible to see where the lighter shade begins.* 

 

The light and darkness blend together.

 

Symbolically, darkness and light are important in the Bible: darkness signifies our attempts to live independently - apart from God - and to sort out our own issues, and light represents a life lived in the loving presence of God, made possible through Jesus Christ.

 

Isaiah, prophesying Jesus' birth writes,

"That time of darkness and despair will not go on forever [...] The people who walk in darkness will see a great light. For those who live in a land of deep darkness, a light will shine."

[Isaiah 9:1-2 NLT]

 

It is through Jesus that we can leave our lives of directionless, disorientating darkness and walk in the light:

“I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

 

[John 8:12 NIV, emphasis mine] 

 

And it is in this "light of life" - the light of God's glory and love and forgiveness and grace and mercy - that we begin to find healing for our souls and direction for our lives.

 

This is the chorus of one of my favourite songs - 'Healing Begins' by Tenth Avenue North:

 

"This is where the healing begins, oh
This is where the healing starts
When you come to where you're broken within
The light meets the dark
The light meets the dark."

 

 

It is when the light meets the dark that healing begins.

 

 

 

 

* The trick, I have discovered, is to use an old toothbrush to apply the dye.