Tuesday, December 9, 2003

Yet I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining.
(1 John 2.8 NRSV)

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"The poinsettias that adorn the season of Christmas are something special. Perhaps you are aware of the requirements necessary to make poinsettias bloom. It is a very precise balance between temperature and light. It must be a cold and dark place to force them to bloom. It is easy for me to imagine nurseries all over the country with important sealed rooms, and "Do Not Enter" signs posted on locked doors for most of the day. Inside, thousands of green plants sit in the darkness. During those required hours of darkness, no one would be allowed to enter. Even a flashlight, or a lighted "Exit" sign over the door would spoil the beauty being prepared.

"And at that point we find the marvelous parallel. There are those dark times in our lives. Those times when we struggle with illness and grief, loneliness and despair. Those are the times when God seems so far removed from us. Yet it is those very times when 'Immanuel'--God with us--is the most significant truth in our lives. In those times God is giving us the most precise care. He is the professional in our lives, the Master Gardener, who knows exactly how much hardship and darkness is necessary to produce the most beautiful blooms in our lives."

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God of hope, in those dark moments of my life help me to see the hope in Jesus our savior. Amen.

Ron Newhouse

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