Woke up this morning to Old Man Winter beating a boisterous “Good morning!” symphony on the wind chimes’ pipes. Been sleeping upstairs in the guest room for a few weeks and have enjoyed hearing the wind chime tintinnabulations on these windy mornings. The sky was winter blue, sparkling clean in the sunshine, cloud free. I watched the tall towering fir trees across the street wave hello to me with their branches. The neighborhood mockingbirds were squabbling in the tree’s spiky high branches but when I looked closer I saw the mockingbirds were harassing a large black crow. Those mockingbirds always bother the crows and hawks in my neighborhood. The two old hoot owls just sit on the power poles and blatantly ignore the mockingbirds’ harassment. I need to pop them with my pellet gun!

Late afternoon the sun stood on her tiptoes looking down over the top of the horizon. Shaking in the cold breezes, in her sleeveless sterling silver pageant gown, the sun beamed her blinding silver rays through the bamboo forest, the sunlight filtering through the canes’ myriads of yellows and greens, turning the forest into a living stained glass window. So pretty to sit and watch the changing lights of the sun’s shadows in the bamboo forest.

As the sun began walking down the horizon Mother Nature picked up her watercolor brushes and blazed an fiery orange wildfire across the landscape, blackly silhouetting the old oaks’ bare branches, warming the sun as the pageant began. Father Sky placed his navy sport coat around the sun’s shoulders and walked her down the horizon as the wildfire turned a golden honey bathing the sky in the glow of the cool grayish-blue twilight. Mr. Waning Crescent Moon, resting close to the sun, is asleep except for a bright right edge. Father Sky struggles to wake him. The beautiful stars take their places on the night sky and twinkle brightly to wake the moon. The night is now wide awake, cold and dark, beautiful and free.

The awakening night can be just as glorious as the breaking dawn. The colors in the night sky, deep purples and dark grays and navy blues, gather to a make a sky canopy of darkness. We can find hope and beauty in the darkness and be inspired by the vastness of the universe. The stars shine through the night’s darkness reminding us of God’s holy light guiding us through the darkness of our world. Og Mandino writes, “I will love the light for it shows me the way; yet I will love the darkness for it shows me the stars.” I never think about needing the darkness to see the stars. But we do.

Sometimes the darkness is a gift from God, the darkness a time for transforming and strengthening our faith. God leads us through the darkness and we walk into the light with a new appreciation of the blessings of this life. We experience life’s crushing blows learning to navigate down a new path, teaching us to give hope and sunshine to others who are walking down rocky paths of their own. Spiritual darkness teaches us that God’s presence can be found even in despair and adversity. John 1:4-5 reads, “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

I think our Christian faith is a star in life’s darkness. The stars represent God’s divine light that shines on the paths we walk. John 8:12 reads, “I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.” Sailors use the night sky for navigation and we use our faith to guide us and give us direction when our life gets dark with storms. We find hope in God’s light and our faith calls us to be lights to others. We all have dark nights we stumble and pray for the new day to send its healing light. Even our most difficult days will eventually end and God’s sunshine will again flood our lives with hope. As H.D. Hunter wrote, “No matter how long the night lasts, the sun will always rise.”

“A little bit of light dispels a lot of darkness.” — Rabbi Schneur Zalman