Deep in the Middle of a Night made Light

Have you ever seen the way the winter snow casts a spell on the night? Not merely the glimmer and sparkle as it plays with traffic signals and Christmas lights, but when what little daylight there was earlier seems like a distant memory. Long after everyone’s snug in their beds and an already quiet day falls even quieter, there is something out there deep in the middle of the night…

Light.

When the days have gotten shorter, snow can come along with its biting chill and add a mysterious depth to what should be a persistent darkness. When our eyes should not be distracted by a soft glow coming through our windows, snow teases our curiosity and calls us from our blanket and couch to take in the view and linger. When our heart is intent on calling it a day, snow calls to our imagination and says, “Look what I can do with the night…”
And whether through a window, dimly, or worked up into a bundle of shirts and scarves and coats and hats plodding forth against the snarl and icy stare of the cold, we defy the call of a warm bed for something unusual, perhaps rare for most of us deep in the middle of the night…

Light.

As with any other night, including those cool summer evenings that sigh with relief from the unrelenting heat of the day or that sweet and gentle autumn breeze stirring leaves long after dusk, this kind of night swallows us whole. And that cold, almost as if it senses our curiosity, indulges our midnight trek and lets us explore with little complaint. Just to stand in the middle of the darkness… in the darkest night made light.

We stare. Everything is still there, right where it was earlier. And though the colors are strained out by the dimness of the night, the snow captures the available light and tells another story.

By day, it accents the sun. But it cannot accentuate the darkness of night. It opposes it. Exposes it. Questions it. And subtly steals its power. All by standing still, being what it is, reflecting light.

While some of that light seeps through clouds from a broken moon, the snow invites whatever light comes along – from distant city lights to the glow of slumbering subdivision street lamps and porches. Effortlessly, it imposes it back into the night. And we see the world in deep of the middle of the night… a night made light. A world, not deprived of its colors but, rather, relieved of inevitable and deep darkness. The colors are still there to be awakened by an impending sun intent on keeping its date with morning, romancing her again with a bouquet of unspeakable color of his own.

And with this, our thoughts can be either warmed or chilled. We can consider lessons to learn or metaphors to meditate from this simple experience of standing in the middle of a snow-covered night. I offer this simple thought…
It’s beautiful. Mysteriously, divinely beautiful.

It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s strange, it’s lonely.But oh, it’s really quite beautiful.

For all the meanings I could derive or ideas the moment inspires, God has intended my heart and mind to be touched by this beauty, to receive it for what it is… deep in the middle of the night made light…

…the quiet, frosty air beneath a canopy of drifting, glacial clouds…

…the meticulous detail of deciduous branches resigned to their wait…

…the patient landscape and structures quilted in the courtly snow cover…

…the stillness of deep grey silhouettes pressed against the backdrop of my childhood… And memories swirling within, tying this moment to a couple thousand that came before at a place I still call home.

Snow can cast a spell on the darkest, coldest night, invite you into the middle of it, and haunt you with the innocence of its beauty and the complexity of its questions. It captures a little light and intensifies it, not overpowering the darkness but illuminating your world so you can see it in a needed way. It unveils details you wouldn’t see even in the brightest sun, reveals textures and perspectives unclear in the day, and stirs feelings that need your reflection.

Whatever 2017 was for you, or whatever you hope 2018 to be, don’t ascribe hope or resignation to a grid on the wall or numbers on a clock. Though the sun will rise every day without apology, the night will likewise fall with darkness, but as a veil that can be lifted, a curtain that can be parted, a darkness that can be lightened…

Maybe in our seasons of darkness there is beauty and light to be experienced, to be absorbed as we stand still despite unwelcomed quiet and the bitter chills life brings. It’s not for me to tell you what you can learn from those moments or what direction you’ll find.

But perhaps you could turn off the lights inside your mind and press your nose against the windows for a while and stare… or work yourself up into a bundle of faith and hope and heart and soul plodding forth against the snarl and icy stare of cold realities. Maybe sometimes we need to defy the call of a warm distraction for something unusual, perhaps rare for most of us deep in the middle of a dark season…

It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s strange, it’s lonely. It hurts. It angers. It alienates. It discourages.

And yet… there is light.
It’s beautiful…
Mysteriously, divinely beautiful…
Just to stand in the middle of the darkness…

…deep in the middle of the night made light.