The Small Group Guide is here. 
John 1:1-14 December 12, 2010 • Portage First UMC
And so, the journey continues. We are spending the season of Advent this year sailing along with the crew of the Dawn Treader, a ship in the magical land of Narnia that is on a mission to find seven lost Lords. The ship, the story and the land of Narnia are, of course, the creation of the great author C. S. Lewis, and it could be argued that this story, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, is his most symbolic piece of writing (Bruner & Ware, Finding God in the Land of Narnia, pg. 91). All throughout the story, there are rich images and deep symbols to be explored; we don’t have enough time here in worship to dig into them all. For instance, after they leave Dragon Island, which we talked about last week, they come a place called Deathwater Island, where everything, including one of the lost Lords, can be turned into gold. Then they come to a place where a magician lives along with some interesting folks named the Dufflepuds. Lucy faces her greatest temptation there, the temptation to be the most beautiful. From there, they set out to sea again and soon encounter an even more mysterious place, a place of absolute darkness. Lewis tells it this way: “It is rather hard to describe, but you will see what it was like if you imagine yourself looking into the mouth of a railway tunnel—a tunnel either so long or so twisty that you cannot see light at the far end…[It was] utter blackness as if they had come to the edge of moonless and starless night” (Lewis 177). That brings to my mind the image of being in a cave, at the deepest level when they turn off the lights and you can’t even see your hand in front of your face. This is Darkness.
There is some significant debate as to whether they should sail the ship into the darkness, but as the only other choice seems to be turning around without completing the mission, they move ahead, and quickly are surrounded by a deathly quiet, deep darkness—which makes the voice, when they heard it, much more jarring. It is “a cry, either of some inhuman voice or else a voice of one in such extremity of terror that he had almost lost his humanity” (Lewis 182). It is a man, one of the lost Lords, and when they bring him on board, he urges the ship to flee the area. “This is the Island where Dreams come true,” he says (Lewis 183). At first, many think that would be a nice place to visit; we might think that as well. A place where dreams come true—we would think at first, just like the crew of the Dawn Treader, that this is the place to have our wishes granted, our hopes and longings fulfilled. Remember that I said on the first week how much of this story is about pursuing and finding our heart’s desire, and maybe this dark place was to be where that happened. But just as the crew begins to imagine what they might wish for, the lost Lord interrupts them: “Do you hear what I say? This is where dreams—dreams, do you understand—come to life, come real. Not daydreams: dreams” (Lewis 183). And after about half a minute, the crew begins to row away as fast as they can. This is not the place where wishes come true; this is the place where fears become reality. This is the place of darkness.
The Bible describes the time before Jesus came as darkness. Isaiah, looking forward to that day, said the people were walking in darkness (9:2), and in the beginning of the gospel of John, which we read this morning, John describes Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, as “light” shining in the “darkness” (1:5). Both Isaiah and John are using words that describe a lack of light, an absolute darkness, but they’re not describing a physical condition of the world in either time. The “darkness” that both Isaiah and, much later, John, have in mind is a spiritual darkness, an “ignorance of divine things,” a lack of God’s presence in their lives, a condition that the Bible says leads to fear. For centuries, the people had chosen to do exactly what God had told them not to, and bit by bit, they had crossed over into a dark place, a place absent of God’s presence. A bit later in John’s Gospel, the narrator describes it this way: “People loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. All who do evil hate the light and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed” (3:19-20). Darkness brings fear.
But the story of Christmas, as John tells it, is all about light overcoming the darkness, God’s presence overcoming fear. John doesn’t have angels and shepherds and wise men and a manger. John doesn’t have a journey to Bethlehem and a crowded inn. John is the last follower of Jesus left alive writing the last of our Gospels, and he knows we have already read Matthew, Mark and Luke. We know the Christmas story. We know about the baby in the manger. John wants us to understand what it means, and to do that, he takes us all the way back to creation: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made” (1:1-3). Jesus, he says, is the Word—he is everything God the Father wants to say to us and he was with the Father in the beginning, from before time began. More than that, he goes on, this Word, this Jesus—he is the source of all life, and that life “is the light of all people” (1:4). The life Jesus brings is the light Isaiah promised that the people walking in darkness would see, the light that dispels darkness and fear. Jesus comes to show us the way to God, to show us the way out of the darkness. “The light shines in the darkness,” John says, “and the darkness has not overcome it” (1:5). The psalmist had promised that God’s presence would dispel our fear: “I will always look to you,” the psalmist writes, “as you stand beside me and protect me from fear” (Psalm 16:8, CEV). The story of Christmas is about being led out of the darkness by the one who is the light.
The crew of the Dawn Treader immediately began to row away from the island, afraid that their fears might catch up with them. They row and row and row, but the total darkness makes it impossible to know just how far they have come or even if they are headed in the right direction. When they’ve rowed longer trying to get out than they did getting in, the crew begins to despair and believe they will never be free of the darkness and of their fear. And it’s at that point that Lucy utters words that will change everything. Very quietly, this little girl says, “Aslan, Aslan, if ever you loved us at all, send us help now” (Lewis 186). Aslan, you may remember, is the lion of Narnia, the Jesus-figure in the stories. He appears at times when the children or the land most needs his help, and often works in the background at other times. Lucy sees him the most, and so it’s natural she would ask for his help. Just as she utters her wish, they suddenly see a tiny speck of light ahead, and just as quickly, the entire ship is surrounded by a beam of light. It does not change the darkness; it breaks through the darkness to find the Dawn Treader. Lucy looks along the beam of light and suddenly sees something in the midst of it. At first, it looks like a cross, then an airplane, then a kite and finally she realizes it is an albatross, a sea bird. It circles the ship three times, then lands and calls out in a “strong sweet voice what seemed to be words though no one understood them” (Lewis 187). Most hear only the bird’s call, but Lucy hears the words. It’s Aslan’s voice, and what she hears brings her hope: “Courage, dear heart.”
But didn’t I just say that Aslan is a lion? Yes, most of the time in Narnia he is a lion, but as the very first book noted, he is not a tame lion and there are occasions in the story where he is not a lion at all (Downing, Into the Wardrobe, pg. 72). Aslan shows up where and when he is most needed, and in this case he comes to bring reassurance to Lucy (only she recognizes that it is him), and light to the rest of the crew. So he comes in a common form, one they will understand, an albatross, which is the “traditional good-luck bird of the sea” (Hinten, The Keys to the Chronicles, pg. 43). In this appearance, he reminds us of the ways God shows up to various people in the Old Testament: sometimes as a pillar of fire, another time as a burning bush, sometimes as a voice out of a whirlwind, and another time as a gentle whisper (Brown, Inside the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, pg. 173). God shows up when he is needed and how he is needed to bring hope and healing to life’s situations and circumstances.
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (1:5). When in your life have you sailed to Dark Island? Where are the dark places, the times when it seemed that there would never be a ray of hope or a bit of brightness again, the times when your fears threatened to overwhelm you? It may have been when you lost a loved one or watched someone close to you fight a desperate battle against an illness. It may have been the loss of a job, the loss of your family, or a mistake that cost you something precious. The journey to Dark Island happens when we find that the things we most feared are coming true. Many scholars believe C. S. Lewis included this scene in the book because he also struggled, from an early age, with night terrors. Some of his earliest memories were of fear-inducing dreams. He knew the power nightmares can have on a person, and how we can go from dreams to terror to feeling as if we’ll never get out of the situation (Brown 170, 178). And we won’t if we simply rely on our own power and our own strength for rescue. Lewis’ point in the story is that the crew, left to their own devices, will never find their way out of the darkness. Neither can we. The Bible asserts over and over again that the spiritual darkness we may find ourselves in cannot be exited on our own strength. Isaiah said that the people walking in darkness would see a great light. John proclaims that the light, the way out, came in Jesus, the Word made flesh. Only by looking to him, by trusting in him, can we find our way out of the darkness.
That’s not to say it will be easy. This is not a “just look to Jesus and everything will be okay” message. In fact, it will take work. It may take a lot of work, depending on how dark a place we are in. We may need to seek out a trusted friend to walk with us, or a professional counselor, or a Stephen Minister who will listen to us, guide us and be a source of support. All of those are avenues through which Jesus shines his light into our lives. And it all begins, as it did with Lucy, when we breathe a prayer, asking for help in the midst of our darkest times. In fact, we can use pretty much the same prayer Lucy did when we are in the darkness. It’s a short, simple prayer and even though there’s no magic to it, it’s one we can pray over and over again. It’s printed on your sermon study guide this morning, and it’ll be on the screen, so let’s try this by saying it together just a time or two: “Jesus, Jesus, if ever you loved us at all, send us help now.” Now, as I said, there’s nothing magical about this prayer, but calling on the name of Jesus, the one who brings light to our darkness, begins to point us in the right direction, toward his light rather than our own, just as Lucy’s prayer was the beginning of the end of the darkness for the Dawn Treader.
Once the light begins to shine, it isn’t long before the ship breaks out of the darkness and is under blue sky again. And, as Lewis puts it then, “all at once everybody realized that there was nothing to be afraid of and never had been” (187). And when they look back, they are amazed to see that the darkness is completely gone, as if it had never existed. Once the prayer was said and the light broke through, Dark Island vanished forever and so did their fears. Christmas is all about light—the light of the world breaking in and dispelling our darkness. Jesus himself said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12). Jesus is the light, and I think that’s one reason light is so important this time of year. We use light to break through this dark time of year in so many ways. I also think that’s why, when God wanted to announce the birth of this one who came to dispel our darkness, one who came to break through the most painful places in our lives, he did it with a star, a beautiful star. Jesus is the light of the world, a light that the darkness cannot and will not ever overcome and he will bring light to our lives and hope to our fears if we let him—thanks be to God!