William H. Willimon - "Why We Light the Candles" Christmas Eve Service (December 24, 1994)
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| - | Be seated. | 0:03 |
| (congregation being seated) | 0:09 | |
| The gospel reading from Luke Chapter Two. | 0:17 | |
| In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus | 0:22 | |
| that all the world should be registered. | 0:26 | |
| This was the first registration, | 0:29 | |
| and it was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. | 0:31 | |
| All went to their own towns to be registered. | 0:35 | |
| Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth into Galilee | 0:39 | |
| to Judea to the City of David called Bethlehem, | 0:42 | |
| because he was descended from the house and family of David. | 0:46 | |
| He went to be registered with Mary, | 0:51 | |
| to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. | 0:53 | |
| While they were there the time came | 0:58 | |
| for her to deliver her child, | 1:00 | |
| and she gave birth to her first born son and wrapped him in | 1:03 | |
| bands of cloth and laid him in a manger | 1:06 | |
| because there was no place for them in the inn. | 1:09 | |
| In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, | 1:13 | |
| keeping watch over their flock by night. | 1:17 | |
| Then an angel of The Lord stood before them, | 1:21 | |
| and the glory of The Lord showed | 1:23 | |
| around them and they were terrified. | 1:25 | |
| But the angel said to them, | 1:29 | |
| "Do not be afraid, for see I am bringing you good news of | 1:31 | |
| "great joy for all the people. | 1:35 | |
| "To you is born this day in the City of David a savior, | 1:38 | |
| "who is the Messiah, the Lord. | 1:42 | |
| "This will be a sign for you. | 1:45 | |
| "You will find the child wrapped | 1:47 | |
| "in bands of cloth lying in a manger." | 1:49 | |
| And suddenly there was with the angel | 1:52 | |
| a multitude of the Heavenly, | 1:54 | |
| praising God and saying Glory to God in the highest | 1:56 | |
| and on Earth peace among those whom he favored. | 2:00 | |
| When the angels had left them and gone into Heaven, | 2:05 | |
| the shepherds said to one another, | 2:07 | |
| "Let us now go to Bethlehem and see this that has taken | 2:10 | |
| "place, which The Lord has made known to us." | 2:13 | |
| So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph | 2:18 | |
| and the child lying in a manger. | 2:20 | |
| When they saw this they made known in what they had been | 2:24 | |
| told them about this child and all who heard it | 2:27 | |
| were amazed at what the shepherds told them. | 2:30 | |
| But Mary treasured all these words | 2:33 | |
| and pondered them in her heart. | 2:36 | |
| The shepherds returned, | 2:38 | |
| glorifying and praising God | 2:40 | |
| for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them. | 2:41 | |
| This is the word of The Lord. | 2:46 | |
| Thanks be to God. | 2:47 | |
| - | The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. | 3:00 |
| Thus says the Gospel of John. | 3:06 | |
| And never does this chapel look more glorious, | 3:11 | |
| more beautiful than tonight on this night of nights. | 3:17 | |
| Few of us worship in the evening anymore, | 3:23 | |
| and so the chapel, aglow with candlelight, | 3:27 | |
| is a strange and a wonderful thing. | 3:31 | |
| We worship in the evening every night here | 3:36 | |
| during Holy Week but we do not light candles. | 3:38 | |
| Why is it that on this night | 3:42 | |
| does it seem so fitting to fill this great room with light? | 3:46 | |
| In a Christmas sermon many years ago | 3:54 | |
| the great German theologian Rudolph Bultmann asked, | 3:57 | |
| "Why is it that we light candles at Christmas, | 4:01 | |
| "and take joy in their splendor. | 4:05 | |
| "The lights that we kindle are a symbol of The Light." | 4:09 | |
| Imagine a world before electric light, | 4:17 | |
| when candles were the only | 4:20 | |
| source of illumination after dark, | 4:22 | |
| rarely in our modern world | 4:25 | |
| do we ever experience such darkness, | 4:27 | |
| and yet deep within us, even within us moderns there is | 4:29 | |
| something which yearns for the joy of candlelight dinners | 4:34 | |
| and candle lit weddings and yes, candles at Christmas. | 4:41 | |
| Something of this light wants to shine into our dark world. | 4:49 | |
| Why do we light candles? | 4:57 | |
| Because it is a dark world, yes friends it is dark. | 5:00 | |
| Tonight this service is blessed with many children, | 5:08 | |
| children whose faces seem | 5:14 | |
| to glow in the light of our candles. | 5:16 | |
| But tonight there are children in Durham | 5:21 | |
| who will go to bed hungry, | 5:24 | |
| there are children who know from Christmases past | 5:27 | |
| that they will not wake in the morning to new toys, | 5:31 | |
| tonight somewhere in our town a little child will cry itself | 5:36 | |
| to sleep when Christmas Eve becomes an occasion | 5:40 | |
| for Daddy to drink too much | 5:44 | |
| and Mama to pay the price for his abuse. | 5:47 | |
| There will be no candles in the vast Durham Jail tonight. | 5:52 | |
| It will be dark. | 5:59 | |
| And when last week on the radio, | 6:02 | |
| there was a program about Christmas in Bosnia, | 6:05 | |
| I turned off the radio rather than listen. | 6:10 | |
| But is the world so dark, | 6:17 | |
| and why must we | 6:21 | |
| dwell on such depressing gloom tonight of all nights? | 6:22 | |
| Because our candles, | 6:29 | |
| for all their beauty don't give a lot of light. | 6:32 | |
| When the power goes off at night in your home during a storm | 6:37 | |
| in the winter light a candle, you'll see what I mean. | 6:43 | |
| Light six or seven candles, there is only a faint glow. | 6:46 | |
| Candles make no impression in a fully illuminated room. | 6:52 | |
| It's like there's got to be some darkness, | 6:56 | |
| before the delicate glow | 7:00 | |
| of the candlelight can be appreciated. | 7:02 | |
| Why do we light candles? | 7:06 | |
| Because we want, we need light in our darkness. | 7:08 | |
| Better to light one candle than to curse the darkness | 7:17 | |
| is sometimes the motto about this time of year | 7:22 | |
| for those who do good in a darkened world, | 7:25 | |
| is that what we're doing here tonight? | 7:27 | |
| Sure, it is a deep dark world so let's gather in church | 7:30 | |
| one night a year and brighten things up a bit. | 7:35 | |
| Light a hopeful Yuletide candle, | 7:38 | |
| sing a cheerful carol, | 7:41 | |
| give a can of corn to the hungry, | 7:44 | |
| a dollar for the poor, | 7:47 | |
| and tie some tinsel around the year long ugliness, | 7:49 | |
| is that why we're gathered? | 7:53 | |
| If that is why we are gathered than we shall fail. | 7:56 | |
| Better to light one candle than to curse the darkness, | 8:01 | |
| sure there is some truth in that. | 8:05 | |
| But the darkness is so great and your candle is so frail, | 8:09 | |
| even a thousand candles all glowing together, | 8:14 | |
| even Gorge Bush's thousand points of light, | 8:18 | |
| are not enough to dispel the darkness, our darkness. | 8:20 | |
| I remember Christmas Eve candlelight services we used to | 8:27 | |
| give everybody in the congregation a candle and as we all | 8:30 | |
| sang Silent Night we would process out into the darkness, | 8:33 | |
| and in the December dark just beyond the front door of the | 8:38 | |
| church there would be a winter wind | 8:42 | |
| and our candle would flicker and it would die. | 8:44 | |
| If the world in its present darkness is dependent | 8:51 | |
| upon my candle, | 8:55 | |
| our candles combined, | 8:58 | |
| then this world is doomed to eternal dark. | 9:01 | |
| The clock is ticking. | 9:07 | |
| At the end of the twentieth century, | 9:09 | |
| perhaps centuries this century is history's bloodiest epic. | 9:12 | |
| I have been acquainted with the night, | 9:20 | |
| I have walked out past the light, says the poet. | 9:22 | |
| We know the dark. | 9:27 | |
| You pick up the morning newspaper, | 9:29 | |
| and it really does seem from the headlines there, | 9:34 | |
| if St. John is right, | 9:37 | |
| and that we loved darkness rather than the light. | 9:39 | |
| Why do we light the candles? | 9:47 | |
| Because despite the dark, we yearn for light. | 9:52 | |
| Power goes out in your home during a winter ice storm and | 10:00 | |
| you grope, you stumble about and then someone | 10:04 | |
| finally finds a match and then snap, lights a candle | 10:06 | |
| and there is light and you can see the glow | 10:11 | |
| on the faces of those in the room. | 10:14 | |
| Every year at Good Friday in this chapel | 10:18 | |
| we celebrate the Tenebrae Service. | 10:20 | |
| Darkness, seven candles upon the altar | 10:23 | |
| are gradually extinguished and then | 10:28 | |
| the lights go out and I'll tell you in this | 10:30 | |
| building when the lights are switched off it is dark. | 10:33 | |
| And then one little candle is lit upon the altar, | 10:36 | |
| and it's amazing the entire chapel seems to glow. | 10:42 | |
| A fragile light yes, | 10:47 | |
| but when it is dark, very dark, | 10:50 | |
| even a fragile light is impressive. | 10:53 | |
| Is that why we light the candles? | 10:58 | |
| No, | 11:03 | |
| we are not here tonight | 11:06 | |
| to celebrate human accomplishment. | 11:07 | |
| We are not here to celebrate the good work of the UN, | 11:11 | |
| the good efforts of all the volunteers | 11:14 | |
| and their thousand points of light, | 11:17 | |
| the elucidation of one or of | 11:20 | |
| a million hopeful human achievements, because our darkness, | 11:23 | |
| the present darkness, dark Durham | 11:30 | |
| is greater than our human efforts to enlighten it. | 11:33 | |
| You have not come to this chapel tonight as phototactic bugs | 11:38 | |
| swarming about some street light, | 11:43 | |
| poor darkened souls who long for a little artificial | 11:45 | |
| yuletide fantasy and escape from the dark realities of life. | 11:49 | |
| You haven't come to light, you have come to The Light. | 11:57 | |
| The light which lightens the whole world. | 12:03 | |
| We come because there is something deep within us, | 12:07 | |
| in even the most hardened of modern hearts, | 12:11 | |
| in even the most flattened modern world views | 12:14 | |
| there is something in us which rises, | 12:17 | |
| warms to the glow of Christmas candles. | 12:21 | |
| And when we see the light of the candles, | 12:24 | |
| when you hear the message of these carols, | 12:29 | |
| you rise. | 12:34 | |
| But this is not light of our creation, | 12:37 | |
| this is not the bright burning | 12:41 | |
| glow of merely human good will, | 12:43 | |
| human hope, human accomplishment. | 12:46 | |
| We light the candles in recognition that light | 12:49 | |
| has come to us from outside our darkness as a gift. | 12:54 | |
| As an unexpected baby at Bethlehem, | 13:00 | |
| The light of the world. | 13:04 | |
| Because in Him we have seen light. | 13:08 | |
| We light the candles. | 13:12 | |
| We come, drawn to his radiance like a magnet, | 13:14 | |
| our lives illumined by his dawn, his dayspring among us. | 13:18 | |
| Why do we light the candles? | 13:25 | |
| Because the light shines in the darkness, | 13:30 | |
| and the darkness two thousand years later | 13:34 | |
| thank God, | 13:38 | |
| has not overcome it. | 13:41 | |
| Amen. | 13:45 |
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