Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (Rock Springs UMC)

Our scripture reading today is Genesis 15 verses one through 6.

After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision.

Do not be afraid Abram, I am your shield, your very great

reward. But Abram said, Sovereign Lord,

what can you give me, since I remain childless, and the one

who will inherit my estate is Eleazar of Damascus.

And Abram said, You have given me no children, so a servant in

my household will be my heir. Then the word of the Lord came

to him, This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your

own flesh and blood will be your heir.

He took him outside and said, look up at the sky and count the

stars, if indeed you can count them.

Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be.

Abraham believed the Lord and he credited to him as

righteousness. May the Lord add His blessing to

the reading and the hearing of His word.

Before I get into the sermon itself, I just want to let you

know I'm preaching a little bit differently today than I

normally do. And if you're interested, if you

care, you may not care about what I'm about to say next.

You know, think about the Browns and the Bengals game coming up.

Ponder whatever you need to there.

But when I am preparing sermons, I, I usually just sort of as I'm

praying and studying, get, get words, phrases to ideas, topics

that I then put in an outline and, and I usually try to keep

it a, a reasonably simple outline and, and parts of that

outline I put on the slides. And every once in a while, maybe

you know, once in every, I don't know.

I don't very, very rarely that the way I just described is how

I prepare for my sermons 99.99% of the time every once in a

while. And it happened this week.

I sat down to work on my outline and when I started typing the

outline, everything just sort of woop came out and and I thought,

well, I'll just pick parts out of that and use it as the

outline. And I can't do it.

So I'm doing something today which I don't normally do, which

is I'm going to actually be be sticking very close to a

manuscript for for much of the sermon today.

Part of it, not so much, but for most of it I will.

And because I don't normally do that, I wanted to let you know

what was going on and why I'm standing here behind the pulpit

and looking at my notes for so much.

So that said, I want to talk about don't be afraid of the

dark. I have very personal connection

with that statement. Don't be afraid of the dark.

Because when I was a little kid, maybe four or five years old, I

saw my very first horror movie or the part of my very first

horror movie and, and I was not supposed to be watching it.

My parents were staying up to watch it was.

And I, this memory has been part of me for such a long time and I

never really looked it up, but I remember the name of the movie

was Don't Be Afraid of the Dark. And then I thought, you know

what? I wonder if that's really the

name of a movie or did my brain just invent this and it's the

movie. I looked it up on IMDb.

That's the movie. The description is just what I

remember of the movie I was not supposed to be watching.

I wanted to stay up and watch. My parents said you are this is

you're not old enough for this, this is too scary for you.

Go to bed. It was bedtime anyway, but the

sofa my parents were sitting on had its back to the door.

I snuck out and my bedroom and down and looked around the sofa

without them knowing that I was there and watched Don't Be

Afraid of the Dark. At least I watched part of Don't

Be Afraid of the Dark. At the point that the little

furry creatures crawled out from under the cupboard below the

steps and started attacking the family, I decided my parents

were smarter than I was after all.

This was too scary for me and I went back to bed where I did not

sleep much that night. Don't be afraid of the dark.

It's something that we as parents tell children and

grandchildren, and at times even ourselves.

In the darkness, there's nothing to be afraid of.

Don't be afraid of the dark. That's a statement that is much

easier to say when the light is shining.

It's much easier to believe at noon and when the lights are on,

then in the darkness of night when we cannot see.

Living in darkness and the fear and anxiety and worries that

come with it are a very human problem that we have.

We see in Abram today a very common problem, a very human

predicament, the dreadful challenge of trusting God when

we can't see him. Now, up to this point, Abram has

done some amazing trusting in God.

Abram lived in a region. That's what what is you know,

you know, the region of Haran kind of.

And God came to him, not visibly as far as we know, but somehow

Abram heard this voice from God saying, leave everything you

know behind all this area where you've done all of your growing

up and lived your whole life. And Abraham was pretty well

along in years already at this point.

And I want you to follow me. I'm going to show you a new land

and a new place. And I'm not even going to tell

you where you're going. I'll just let you know when you

get there. And Abraham left, and he

followed God into this, not even knowing where he was going,

followed the voice of God, taking his wife, taking his

nephew, taking his household with him, leaving everything

else that he had ever known behind because of the promise of

God. And Abram literally became a

stranger in a strange land. And when he got there, God said,

this is it. And Abram said, all right, this

is it. This is where God said he would

give him descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky above,

as the dust on the ground, the sand on the seashore, and make

him a blessing to all peoples on earth and all nations on earth.

There were challenges that came up that Abram met once again

with great faith. His nephew Lot became very

prosperous just as Abram was becoming very prosperous.

There wasn't enough land for them to grave all of their

flocks together. Their workers were fighting with

each other over the land and over the grazing patch, excuse

me, grazing spots. I still got a little bit of that

bug over those grazing spots. And so Abram again, with a

tremendous act of faith and humility and courage and trust

in God, he said to Lot, the younger you choose, you pick the

land you want, I'll take whatever's leftover.

And Lot took the better land. And immediately God reassured

Abram, don't worry, it's all going to be yours and your

descendants forever and ever and ever.

Now at this point, Abram still had no descendants.

This relative of his, Eliezer, a person in his household, was the

closest thing he had to an heir. He had no children.

But then, then other crises arose, partly due to Lot's

decision to live in the Jordan Valley, pitched his tents near

Sodom, inherited some of Sodom's problems, many of Sodom's

problems, ultimately all of Sodom's problems, and this

particular problem was political enemies.

And Sodom's political enemies came and conquered Sodom and

carried Lot and his family off as political prisoners,

prisoners of war. An aberman, A tremendous act of

faith, an old man, not a soldier, not a general, not even

a king. He was a sheep herder.

He was a shepherd by profession and trade, but he raised his own

private army, he secured alliances with neighboring

kings, and he went to war. And he rescued his son-in-law,

and he not only got lot in his family back, he got all the

booty, all of the loot back from that king that had originally

conquered Sodom. He was carried aback.

He was a rich man, a very rich man.

And the king of Sodom even said, hey, I am so grateful that you

brought the people back. You can keep all the stuff.

And in another tremendous act of faith, Abram said, no, no, no,

no, no. You're not my provider.

God is my provider. No one will ever say that you

made me rich. Everything I have, people will

say was given to me, my God. And so we gave it all away,

every penny on it. A tremendous act of faith.

But he still had no child. And now a great adventure of

faith that began in the light of the noonday sun was creeping

toward the darkness, and Abram was starting to worry.

And Abram was getting afraid as the darkness closed in because

he could not see how he and his wife, who were well past

childbearing years, were ever going to have a child.

And it had been years since since he thought he heard God

make that promise, but it still wasn't fulfilled.

Was it going to happen or wasn't it going to happen?

Would he have an heir? Would he not have an heir?

And God, said Abram, don't be afraid.

I've made you a promise. I am willing and able to keep

that promise. You simply have to live by

faith. Live by faith.

But it is a dreadful challenge to trust God when we can't see.

But it's the very nature of living by faith, following and

obeying one we cannot see, to a place where we have never been

in the company, sometimes of friends, sometimes of strangers,

and sometimes utterly alone. Abe entered what millennia later

Saint John of the Cross would call a dark night of the soul.

Dark night of the soul, a time and experience of kind of an

internal wilderness, an internal darkness in which God strips

away everything that used to provide meaning and comfort and

hope and a sense of connection with God.

John talked about two types of dark nights.

One was a dark night of the senses in which all of those

things that make us feel God's closeness and God's presence and

God's joy and God's approval are gone.

You used to love your morning devotional time with God.

It made you feel so close to God.

Now it makes you feel nothing. You used to love gathering and

worship with the people of the church.

You used to feel such joy as you sang God's hymns, listen to

God's words, preached, shared, and worshiped together with your

family and friends. And now it just feels like Rote

used to feel tremendous satisfaction and works of

service in the church and in the community, and now they just

feel like duty and responsibility and everything

that used to make God feel good and close and present and loving

feels empty. And you begin to wonder whether

you would just imagine it all to begin with the dark night of the

senses, when all of those things that helped us feel the presence

of God become barren and dry. And as hard and difficult as

that is, it's not as hard and difficult as the other dark

night that John taught about. And that was the dark night of

the Spirit in which the presence of God seems to be withdrawn

entirely. And there is a creeping feeling

that maybe I never really experienced God at all.

Maybe it was all just my imagination.

Maybe it was never real because I feel utterly alone and in the

dark now. That's what Abram is entering

into. I believe he began acting out of

fear as much or more than out of faith.

He made decisions. He and Sarai, his wife together

made decisions that harmed them and harmed others around them

very, very deeply. Fear and anxiety and insecurity

and the darkness of doubt and the doubt that comes in the

darkness. And God said as Abram was going

into this, as the darkness was closing, God said to him, those

words, do not be afraid. I have made you a promise.

I am willing and I am able and I am faithful and I will keep that

promise. And on a grand scale, this is

what God says to all of us, through Abram and Sarai, and

through our fathers and mothers of the faith, throughout

Scripture and throughout church history.

God promises that he is willing and able, and He will keep his

promises. And that promise was most

grandly, eloquently, and potently fulfilled in Jesus and

his life, death, and resurrection.

Jesus, after all, is the light of the world, the light that

shines in the darkness and which the darkness has not overcome.

And yet, even as we truly profess and genuinely believe in

Jesus, we often do do not comprehend His light and

struggle to live this life of faith.

As we walk through the darkness of this world now.

Not always, but sometimes the way of faith seems as bright and

clear as a well worn path through a sunlit woods.

But at other times that path disappears in the weeds and the

fog and the night, and we find ourselves in the darkness

wondering which way to turn, where to go, which light in the

distance is the light of God, and which is the deceptive

flickering of false hope and deception.

Now I have encountered over the years some in churches who have

never experienced a dark night of the soul.

Who who always seem to live in the noonday sun, who never seem

to have been given a reason to doubt, and who are completely

firm and their confidence, direction and faith.

If you are such a one, thank God for the blessing you have been

given, but please do not chide, sneer at, or judge as faithless

those who seek to follow Jesus while walking in the darkness.

Friend of mine used to say, just because you've graduated, don't

burn the school down. Those who walk in darkness are

prone to fears, anxieties, worries and doubts.

Doubts at first whether we're still following God and God's

way, and then whether there really is a God and a way and a

true light. They feel like a result of sin.

They feel as if sin is what bras brought in them into this

darkness, and it feels like a repudiation of faith.

They feel like they've been abandoned by a faithless God, or

perhaps that there was never really God there to abandon

them. Many people live in this kind of

darkness. Some live in this kind of

darkness, having come from a place of faith and light.

Some live in this kind of darkness, never having seen the

light. I think the shooter in

Minneapolis just a few days back may be an example of such a one

who perhaps never saw the light. I think one of the most

disturbing facts about that shooting.

Shooting anyone is an awful thing.

The shooting of children is an abominable thing.

But sometimes we can, whether we agree with it or not.

When we know the reason, an ideology, a mental illness, when

we can put a why on it, it can makes the horror at least

manage. But when there is no ideology,

when a killing like that is done by someone who seems to have

just wanted to see the world burn, who had no ideological

motivation, no agenda, just was firmly convinced that the world

has no meaning and no purpose, so why not kill a bunch of

children before I kill myself? That kind of darkness, that kind

of philosophy has a name. Maybe you've heard it before.

It's spelled the same by everyone.

Some pronounce it nihilism, some pronounce it nihilism.

I don't know why there's two different pronunciations, but

there you go. A philosophy that says there is

no meaning, there is no purpose, there is no light.

We are not going anywhere. We exist by chance.

We will end in oblivion. And while our eyes are open and

our lungs are breathing and our hearts are pumping blood, the

only thing that really matters is power.

The power to crush others or the power of others to crush us.

Whether you know that word nihilism or not, that philosophy

is growing at an alarming rate in our world.

It is a philosophy that is embraces darkness and says there

really isn't any light at all anyway.

But dark nights need not be mindless, need not end and

mindless, meaningless death and destruction.

Because some dark nights, such dark nights as Abram was

entering, such dark nights as people of faith have entered for

millennia, such dark nights are God's good gift.

They are a slow and painful stripping away of our reliance

on all that is not God when we walk in this dark night of the

soul the best that we can do. The best that we can do is to

remember the light that we used to see, to remember, and to

choose to believe that it was real and not imagined.

Amy and I had years ago a friend and a mentor named Kimberly

Butler, older than us, wiser than us, further down and spent

more time on the road in life of faith in US.

And she guided us in some areas, in our marriage relationship, in

our spiritual life and was a tremendous blessing.

We had a particular time with Kimberly.

That was what I have heard I have referred to and I've heard

other people refer to as a mountaintop experience.

You ever talk about or hear about mountaintop experiences,

whether I whether it's a camp, whether it's at a a revival

meeting, a worship service, a time with your family, but it's

like Jesus transfigured on the mountaintop.

When God is so present and so real and the light is so bright

and you say, how can we ever doubt you know and feel and

experience the presence of God? It's so real and it's so

wonderful and it's so beautiful and it's so good.

And Kimberly said to us in that she said there will come a day

when you will be tempted to believe that you just imagined

what you're experiencing right now.

And then it was never really real.

I nodded and said absolutely. Kimberly said at those times

when that happens, you need to choose now that when that

happens, you're going to believe that what you remember from

today was real and is real and did happen, that you didn't just

imagine it. Sure thing, Kimberly.

It's what I said on the outside. Inside is like, no way, no way.

This is too real. This is too real.

And then the darkness comes and I imagine, did it happen?

Did I just imagine it? I mean, I know the circumstances

were there, but that feeling just a figment of my

imagination. And I thank God that Kimberly

had the wisdom to share that with me before the darkness

came. As we walk in the darkness, we

will stumble and we will fall. As Abram and Sarai stumbled and

fell. We will make bad decisions in

the name of faith and hope, as Abram and Sarai made bad

decisions in the name of faith and hope.

And we will hurt others in the name of God, as Abram and Sarai

hurt others in the name of God, making decisions out of fear,

wondering whether the promise was real and the voice was real

or they'd imagined it all and what's really going to happen

and can this really work? And maybe we should try this

instead, and maybe we should do that instead.

And they left behind them a trail of hurting and broken and

bleeding people in the name of God.

And by the grace of God, as we make our bad decisions and

believe our wrong things and do things that hurt others, by the

grace of God, we become aware of how much and how far we have

fallen and how how our bad decisions have, how bad our

decisions have been and the hurt we have caused others.

And we will sink deeper into the darkness.

Shame will wrap its cloak and its blinders around us until all

that seems to exist is darkness and despair.

And we will wonder even if there is a God, and how could there

be? If there is a God, and the God

is good, how could a good God ever love a Wretch such as me?

But it is in the deepest darkness that God will whisper

into our darkness. This is why I died.

This is why the cross was necessary, because you need it

too. You needed my blood.

You need my cross. You need my grace.

You have no hope without it, no hope without me.

All of your goodness, all of your deeds, all of your works,

all of your plans, all of your intentions, all of your efforts.

We're only paving the road to your hell.

But for God, a light like that is so faint and so ethereal that

it's easily missed. A light like that is easily

drowned out and out, shown by the dazzling lights of self

help, church work, praise, glory and admiration of the church in

the community. So many dazzling lights in this

world that the real hope and light of God and Jesus often

cannot be seen except in the darkness.

So if you are in such a darkness, or are approaching

such a darkness, or are aware that one might even exist, I

will give you the same comfort that God gave to Abram.

The wisdom, the truth and advice that God gave to Abram as the

darkness was closing in around him.

The wisdom, truth, and advice that are absolutely true,

absolutely right, absolutely necessary, and almost absolutely

futile. Don't be afraid.

Don't be afraid of the dark words that are so much easier to

utter and believe in the noonday than they are in the night.

But our God is Lord over the darkness as well as the light.

Our God is Lord over the chaos as well as the order.

God is the Lord over confusion as well as clarity.

God is the Lord over fear and anxiety as well as peace.

And though we are unfaithful, especially in the darkness, God

is faithful. And though we, like Peter and

Judas, are unable to keep our promises, God always keeps his

promises. So let us not despair like

Judas. Let us repent like Peter,

turning and returning to the light, acknowledging our

weakness and our failures, acknowledging the harm that we

have done ourselves and to others, whether individually or

collectively. And let us dispense with our

pride and acknowledge that the best that we can ever really

hope to do is love Jesus. Let us humble ourselves and hear

from him what he told to Peter. If you love me, then feed, tend,

and care for my lambs that are all around you in this world.

If we take up that task as our mission of faith and love, we

can know this, that the work that we have been given to do in

faith has not been given to us because we've earned the job.

Not because our resume is spotless.

Not because we performed so well in the last job.

It's work we have been given to. We have been given to do because

God and His wisdom and mercy knows that we need the work,

that if we are not working in His Kingdom by His grace, we

will find ourselves rotting in hell by our own efforts,

decisions and righteousness. Sometimes we'll be working in

the light, at other times we'll be working in the dark.

But when the darkness falls, May God help us to remember the

light in Jesus name, Amen. Amen.