A Theological Meditation on John 1:5

Pondering the light that shines in the darkness.

The light shines in the darkness,

and the darkness has not overcome it.

— Jn 1:5

I pushed and pulled my way up the janky staircase. The uneven and narrow treads required some familiarity. Turning your foot at a slight angle made it easier, but no less awkward. At the top, muscle memory took over. I slid my hand down the wall, caught the switch and sent the basement into darkness. As I bounded into the kitchen and closed the door behind me, I heard a cry. Unsteady and unsure at first, it grew into a full-sized wail.

I had turned out the lights on him. It was unintentional, of course. A matter of habit. But as darkness shrouded his three-year-old body, it didn’t matter if it was an accident or not. He was afraid.

There’s something deep inside the child and deep inside all of us that reminds us we were not made for darkness. Darkness is not our “natural habitat.” Deep inside, I think we’re all afraid of the dark — it puts us on edge — especially the ultimate darkness of death. 

Neither by darkness, nor for darkness

We were neither made by darkness, nor for darkness. This is clear in the creation account. 

In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth— and the earth was without form or shape, with darkness over the abyss and a mighty wind sweeping over the waters. Then God said: Let there be light, and there was light. (Gen 1:1-3)

God speaks and there is light. Light appears in Act 1, Scene 1 and every other act and scene depend on it.

Light is God’s first creature. God speaks and light comes to be. God speaks and light is. God speaks light. He does not make or fashion light, like he makes and fashions everything else. No. He speaks light. His word itself is light. 

The prologue of John’s Gospel offers further commentary on the Genesis account of creation.

In the beginning was the Word,
        and the Word was with God,
        and the Word was God.
    He was in the beginning with God. 
    All things came to be through him,
        and without him nothing came to be.
    What came to be through him was life,
        and this life was the light of the human race;
    the light shines in the darkness,
        and the darkness has not overcome it. (Jn 1:1-5)

“Word” in Greek is logos. Logos means word, but it also means reason, mind, and meaning. Logos is a wise word, a meaningful word. And the Word isn’t just an utterance of God, but the Word is God. Hence, the Word is the author of life. Through the Word, everything comes to be. Everything God creates bears God’s fingerprints. Better, everything bears his logos-prints. Everything is willed. Everything is purposeful. Everything is ordered. All of creation is meaningful. The universe is not a big cosmic accident.

God’s logos, his Word, his Light, is why all of creation is fundamentally good. 

God’s meaningful creation reaches its high-point in human beings, made in God’s image and likeness, containing within themselves the divine spark, logos, mind, reason — walking the face of the earth as the sign of God’s presence and carrying out God’s work. Human beings are the only creatures who, because they are logos-like, can recognize logos (literally re-think what has been-thought), can “see” the meaningfulness of all reality.

Human beings are made by light, for light. Made by God for God. We are not made by darkness for nothing. Children know all this instinctively.

Desiring Darkness

But something terrible happens.  

The Devil, disguised as a nāḥāš (serpent-dragon), confronts our first parents. This nāḥāš was Lucifer, the name attributed to the devil, a name that means light-bearer. Lucifer, created by God as a good angel, through his pride and selfishness, cuts himself off from God’s light and now bears only his own, dim light. Lucifer, the one who has become the prince of darkness and the father of lies, he confronts Adam and Eve and offers a counterfeit light. He offers them a different way of seeing and knowing everything — one not illuminated by God, but only by the self, by their own minds. 

Tragically, they take hold of this evil fruit that darkens their intellects and hardens their hearts. They embrace an alternate kind of light, a black light, and perceive all reality according to its strange shadows.

Now, rather than living in right relationship with God, rather than living in the light, they collapse into themselves. They cover themselves and hide from each other. They tuck away behind trees. They hide from God in the long, dark shadows.

Genesis 3 depicts the first “game” of hide and seek, that is not a game at all, but a broken reality — where God, the good Father, the Father of light, the God who is light, cannot find his son in the darkness, cannot find his daughter in the darkness — and he calls out, “where are you?” 

Darkness is not God. Darkness is not of God. Darkness results from sin. It is doubt, despair, and bondage. 

And throughout the ages, God works to overcome the darkness of sin — by manifesting his light in different ways through the created order. He does this to remind his children that they are children of light and they should live like it. 

He finds Noah, a shining, righteous light amid the corruption of humanity — and recreates the world and puts Noah and his family as the beacon of light within it. But they sin and this sin again floods the earth in the chaos and confusion of the Tower of Babel and its fallout. 

So God tries again with Abraham, who is illuminated by faith. Abraham is the one to whom God promises a  future filled with descendents as numerous as the stars. But Abraham’s descendants, after what appeared to be a bright future in Egypt, end up in the bondage of slavery. 

Again, God intervenes with light – a burning bush, a pillar of fire, lightning on Sinai, and Moses, the great prophet whose face shone with the glory of God. 

Still, the people sinned, preferring darkness to light. 

Eventually, when they reached the promised land, new bright lights emerged in David and Solomon. Solomon had the bright light of wisdom, but it flamed out due to lust and greed. 

So God sent prophets to speak the light of truth, but the people did not heed their words. So God’s chosen one’s are are banished into the darkness of captivity. Yes, into the darkness outside of Jerusalem.

This entire story of a people speaks to a deeper truth. Israel’s journey is a physical manifestation of the real darkness. That darkness resides inside the hardened hearts of the people — the darkness of their sinful hearts.

Throughout the Old Testament, God uses created means, means created by his light —bearing his light — to remind his children of himself and of their call to bear forth his light. And over and over again, we snuffed it out — taking ourselves to be smarter than God and wanting to be our own gods. 

All of this reminds me of my response to my son’s predicament. Recall that I had unintentionally turned out the lights on him. As soon as I heard his cry, I realized my mistake. I hurried to the top of the stair and flipped on the lights throughout the basement. His crying persisted.

“It’s okay, buddy. I turned the lights back on. I’m sorry,” I yelled down the stairs. He continued to cry. Flipping on the lights didn’t do the trick.

Light Shines in the Darkness

Let’s return to the story of salvation, because it’s in the fullness of time that God does something unimaginable (cf. Gal 4:4-7). Light itself (capital L), the second person of the Trinity, the Word, came into the world. The Word took flesh and dwelt among us. The Creator became creature, while remaining what he was — God. 

The Word has taken flesh in the person of Jesus Christ (cf. Jn 1:14). And the Word is Light. Jesus says this about himself: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (Jn 8:12; also Mt 5:14).

The world, created by light, yet which rebelled against the Light, the darkness that had seemingly won, that had seemingly had the final word, this darkness was nothing for the Word and his Light, he, himself, his presence overcame it. 

For us, in our fallen state, it seems created light is not enough. Amid the present darkness, we need the Light itself, the Word, to be present – really and truly, body and blood, soul and divinity. 

The littlest children can teach us such things. This was the case for me. Turning the lights back on didn’t dispel the darkness my son had experienced. The horror of his situation could only be resolved by another human being who loved him. So, I made my way downstairs and embraced him. He stopped crying. In that moment, I became a kind of light shining into his darkness. I let him know everything was alright and was going to be alright.

In a much greater way, in an infinitely greater way, God is present to us. God is not distant; God has a face. His Light, too infinitely great for the small human vessel, this Light now breaks through our darkness as a presence in the person of Jesus Christ.

We can encounter this Light right now because Jesus, the Son of God, took flesh in history, suffered, died, rose from the dead, and ascended to the Father, because the Holy Spirit descended upon the Church at Pentecost, and because these events still happen in the world. These events happen now because the Catholic Church exists in the world to make them present through the sacraments. They happen because Jesus is alive. He can be encountered today with exactly the same results experienced by Andrew, James, John, Peter, Mary Magdalene, the Samaritan woman, the man born blind, Zacchaeus, and the criminal at the cross next to His.

They happen today because Jesus still wants to encounter us and lead us to the Father. They happen now because the Light still shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.