Solstice

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.

~Isaiah 9:2

Light and life to all he brings, ris'n with healing in his wings!

~"Hark, the Herald Angels Sing"

The past several days of Christmas Traditions, my friend Mikko the Scandinavian Elf has been shouting, with barely-contained excitement, "It's almost Winter Solstice, it's almost Winter Solstice!!" Very few people actually know what she means, leading to many rambling explanations about Scandinavian midwinter, also known as Yule, in which, "We in the frozen north celebrate the shortest day of the year. Why do you think we would celebrate the shortest day of the year?" (The kids look confused, perhaps venture an answer about being able to sleep in.) "It's because the sun has been going away for a long time, and now there are only like two hours of sunlight every day. But starting on the solstice, the sun is finally coming back. We've been walking in the darkness, and we begin to see a great light."

Explaining the Solstice to wide-eyed children is particularly effective in the blackness of night, when the streets are pierced by twinkling Christmas lights strung in the trees, and I can ramble while holding up my flickering lantern and talking about bonfires and candles and the ways that Northern Europeans for millennia have celebrated the returning of the light. 

On Wednesday, right in the middle of an explanation, I began to choke up. For the first time, I really felt it— how terrifying it would be to stare down a dark winter, with two hours of sunlight a day in some areas, and only the root vegetables in your pantry and maybe one dairy animal to make it through until the spring. I imagined the anxiety of the days growing wan and short, the darkness creeping in the edges, the frost diving deeper into the ground, the animals growing lean, the pile of potatoes dwindling. And summer— full of green grass and lingonberries and flowers bursting with light and sunshine— feels more and more like a myth that the darkness blots out.

You huddle in your huts and light candles against the darkness, and wait for the light to return.

In the Christian liturgical calendar, the weeks leading up to Christmas are not a time of joy, but of solemnity, repentance, and longing. You wait. You linger and grieve and watch the sun rise later and later each day and set earlier and earlier. You light one more candle each week in defiance of the darkness. You are aching and empty, dreaming of midsummer— but you are stuck here in this broken world, frozen, icy, dark, and shivering.

You huddle in your houses and light candles in the darkness, and wait for the light to return.

And just when you think the darkness will swallow you whole, the Solstice arrives.

The sun is coming back.

It's not here yet. In fact, the hungriest months of the whole year are ahead, and you will be aching and shivering and freezing for months upon months. But the Solstice is here. So you light up the night with candles, and slaughter the animals so you don't have to feed them through the winter, and you create a massive bonfire to remind you what sunlight feels like and you celebrate, feasting and shouting and singing like it's already midsummer. The darkness cannot win. The light will always come back.

The light rises with healing in his wings, and we bask in the glow of his glory.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Amen.

~~~