December 20

In her book Learning to Walk in the Dark, Barbara Brown Taylor shares about going out at twilight, shortly after the winter solstice, to watch the full moon rise. Poetically she recounts the anticipation and stillness, as she awaits “on tiptoe for a glimpse of her” in the space between sunset and moonrise. Speaking of how the moon illuminates everything around her, Taylor remarks, “When she comes through the door, everyone in her presence becomes as rich in God’s love as she is.” And then, she reminds us that the moon is “the mirror, not the light.” 

This verse in Ephesians comes in the midst of Paul’s encouragement for the early Christ followers in Ephesus to “walk in love” and as “children of light”. The call is not to remove one’s self from the darkness, but rather to merely allow the light to shine upon us, to expose ourselves, to come out of hiding, to wake from our sleep so that we too might become a mirror, like the moon, illuminating everything around us. The text tells us that everything that becomes visible, or illuminated, is light. 

To be exposed to the light is to become light. Where are you being led to become visible this Advent? What in you is being invited to come out of hiding, to be exposed? How might you open your posture to the light and become a mirror of God’s boundless love and light to all that surrounds you? 

photo credit: unsplash.com/@guzmanbarquin