The Day Grows Brighter

a bonus post to celebrate the light

Good morning from the Blue Room!

I said I was closing up shop for the year, but I had some requests to share some elements of the Longest Night Service we held at the church on Wednesday evening.

Longest Night is one of my very favorite parts of Advent. It typically falls on December 21, the shortest day of the year, and provides a respite from the jingle and jangle that is often overwhelming for people dealing with loss or grief, or who just need a break from it all. In my previous congregation we often had a service on the Sunday before Christmas, and since it wasn’t technically the longest night we’d call it Blue Christmas. It’s always a small service, but I find the people who come deeply need it. There is no “should” with the Longest Night service. 

I must admit, I also love the Celtic/pagan elements of Longest Night: the huddling together in the darkness, the burning of candles, the hymns to the Light. (Yes, I acknowledge the problematic history of imperial Christianity, coming in and gobbling up so much indigenous religion and practice for its own triumphalistic purposes. Still, the persistence of the Longest Night service may be a sign that those creation-based spiritualities have a lot of life in them yet.)

Anyway, I want to share three things with you from Wednesday night. Granted, the longest night is past; tomorrow is Christmas Eve; even now, the light is returning to the Northern Hemisphere. So perhaps enjoy these today in the spirit of a friend’s congregation, which held a “The Day Grows Brighter” service last night, the day after the solstice. 

Thing One

…a Spotify playlist with some longest-night-flavored music that we played before and after Wednesday night’s gathering. 

Thing Two

…an adaptation of the song “Joy to You Baby” by Josh Ritter. I’m so thrilled to have a colleague who sings and plays guitar! With everything else going on in December, he whipped this up for the service. Italics are my additions. I hope Josh would be OK with a friendly amendment.

I go to the parties
Throw my hands in the air
I drink what they pour me
The cups of “who cares?”
Go up in the night sky
Up in the clouds
Fly over the houses
I'm looking down

Joy to the city
Joy to the streets
And joy to you baby, wherever you sleep
Tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight, tonight, tonight

There's no ghosts in the graveyard
That's not where they live
They float in between us
'What is' and 'what if'
And cast our own shadows
Before our own eyes
You don't get them up here though
They don't come up high

Joy to the city
The lost and the weak
The hospital hallway
The tears on the cheeks
Joy for the grieving
Joy behind bars
Joy to you baby, wherever you are
Tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight, tonight, tonight

There’s pain in the world now
There always has been 
But the star went on shining
O’er Bethlehem then
In the quiet of evening
A child came to us all
To bring joy to you baby
In spite of it all

Joy to the city
The heatwave and all
To the lion of evening
With the storm in its paw
And joy to the many
And joy to the few
And joy to you baby
Joy to me too
Tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight, tonight, tonight
Tonight, tonight, tonight

Thing Three is the short reflection I offered at the service, based on Psalm 80. (Mainly I want you to know about the interview I referenced between Stephen Colbert and comedian Rob Delaney. Achingly beautiful.) It’s the longest Thing, so I’ve tucked it at the very bottom of this post.

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it. Season’s Greetings to all. 

~

Link Love

President Zelensky’s speech to Congress was marvelous, especially this line:

“...In two days we will celebrate Christmas. Maybe candlelit. Not because it’s more romantic, no, but because there will be no electricity. …But we’ll celebrate Christmas. Celebrate Christmas and, even if there is no electricity, the light of our faith in ourselves will not be put out.” 

~

Reminder: The weekly Blue Room newsletter will always be free, but I’ll be sharing additional musings with paid subscribers in the new year. To welcome folks into this experiment, a yearly subscription is 10% off through the end of 2022. (Members and friends of Trinity are eligible for gift subscriptions upon request. No paywall between a pastor and her people. Email me.)

~

Longest Night Reflection

This week my brother sent me a video that was a clip from the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, an interview with the comedian Rob Delaney. Rob has written a book called A Heart That Works, which is about his experience losing his young son to a brain tumor when the boy was just a toddler.

This is one of those times when a screen in worship would be helpful, because honestly, this short clip has all the sermon we might need on this longest night of the year. Rob described the loss of his son and said, “We immediately felt plucked out of the human race.” And I know many of us can relate to that feeling, especially during this time of year, when there is such a flurry, a holly jolly that can sometimes sweep us up into joy in spite of ourselves, but other times can feel very isolating. It can feel like everyone else’s holiday is right out of Currier and Ives and we are simply out on the sidewalk, shivering, looking in at the warm and perfect scene.

I know many of us who are here are here on behalf of others—people whose stories and griefs you carry in your own hearts. One of the things that struck me is how Stephen Colbert conducted the interview. Despite being a talk-show host, charged with the task of creating good television, or moving the interview along so the commercial breaks come right on time, the conversation turned out to be real moment of authentic holiness right on network TV. Stephen did two things that can be instructive to the rest of us who walk with folks during hard times.

The first thing he did was ask Rob to talk about his loved one. “Tell me about Henry.” It’s important to allow those in grief to talk about their loss, to say the name of the loved one, to share stories and memories. We’ll create that space in a moment when people will be invited to light and candle and, if they wish, lift up the names of the concerns on their hearts. Rob said his son Henry, though only a couple years old, was the hardest worker he’d ever seen, throughout his battle with cancer, through surgery which left him disabled and needing to relearn basic things or even learn them for the first time since he was so young. Sharing stories also gives us the chance to share sweet moments and even laugh. Stephen showed the audience a picture of Rob cuddling with Henry as a baby, and the first thing Rob did when seeing the picture was smile and say, “I miss having his ears in my mouth… Very important as a parent, to have your kids’ ears in your mouth as much as possible.” So sweet.

The second thing Stephen Colbert did is to give Rob Delaney a chance to make his own meaning of the experience. Notably Stephen did not provide any explanations or platitudes, even in an attempt to comfort him. But when Rob talked about how much more comfortable he now is with mystery, and questions, than he was before, Stephen simply said, “What’s the mystery for you?” And Rob said, “You see the shapes and outlines of things that are much bigger and more powerful than what’s happening in this day-to-day corporeal form… You get to put your hand on the pulse of something much more majestic and terrifying and beautiful, something beyond the veil of this world. Maybe that’s love, or faith.” And perhaps those of us here who’ve had that experience might name that presence beyond the veil as God, who is with us and promises never to leave us, who in fact wanted no veil between us and Godself, to the point of becoming a human being, a baby like Henry, to participate in all the majestic and terrifying and beautiful things that we do.

In the psalm I just read, we get a glimpse into a psalmist’s own pain and hurt. Unlike Stephen Colbert, we can’t say “tell me about it,” so we don’t know the situation being described, but we can hear the anger, the isolation, the desperation for God to save. “Stir up your might,” the psalmist prays, and we can almost see the clenched fists and desperation. “Stir up your might and come to save us!” And it’s understandable to want God to come in like a superhero and save the day. But a God that was born in human frailty and placed in a bed of straw doesn’t work that way.

We don’t know how God answered this prayer. Whether the situation resolved to the psalmist’s satisfaction. Or whether the psalmist simply received just enough strength to endure it for one more day, and then the day after that.

But we do get a little insight in the psalm as to how God works. Three times in these short verses, the psalmist prays, “let your face shine, that we may be saved.” How could the shining face of God be what saves us?

And yet we know it does. We know how much we need the light. How even the light of a candle can repel the gloom. How a kind word or a casserole or a shared cup of tea can provide just enough light for one moment more.

I think back to what Rob Delaney said at the beginning of that interview, that in his loss he “left the human race.” And there’s such a tragic irony to his statement. I appreciate the feelings of loss and isolation. But we know that nobody escapes this life without some kind of suffering. And I would say that in that brokenness, and in that struggle to remain tethered to love despite everything, that’s when we are most fully human, when we are most connected to the human race.

As Elisabeth Kübler Ross has said, “The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

Whatever has brought you here tonight… I don’t want to suggest that the suffering we experience in this life is somehow worth it because of the life lessons it imparts. I do want to say that we are beautiful even in the midst of it. Our perseverance. Our kindness. Our authenticity. And we are deeply, deeply loved by God. Thanks be to God for the light of Christ, coming back into the world in this season. May we feel its warmth and see its glow. Amen.