"And there was light": cosmic conflict in the season of darkness

I love a good light vs. darkness story. The human imagination has produced some beautiful envisionings of this cosmic conflict both in literature and on film. History likewise is filled with true tales of the brave and the bad warring for justice or the perversion of it - personally, politically, and militarily. Even the calendar of the northern latitudes tells the story: at the end of October the light seems to be pushed back and the days grow dark and cold, while every now and then the sun shatters the gloom in noon-day brilliance and clear blue sky.

Though diverse and distinct, these accounts – fantasy and fact – are not disconnected. They form part of a story that goes back to the beginning of time and continues to the end of the world as we know it. Look at the message played out across that universal tapestry, at the legends and the real lives, and you will see its at times temporal and one day ultimate outcome: light wins.

The criminals and corrupt of Gotham learn that the city doesn’t belong to them – that it’s "full of people ready to believe in good." The evil Galactic Empire is defeated and the Sith Lord falls at the hands of Darth Vader, his greatest apprentice. The Ring of Power is destroyed, the tower of Sauron crumbles, and peace returns to the Shire. Voldemort dies, victory is snatched from the jaws of the Death Eaters, and "all was well." The old Narnia is frozen in time, and Peter, Edmund, Lucy, and their friends are led into Aslan’s country, the real Narnia, where the true story begins "which goes on forever and in which every chapter is better than the one before."

Slaves are set free, the oppressed given liberty, and those who once cried for freedom are filled with song and made to dance. Wicked rulers wade in the blood of the downtrodden but therein one day they drown, felled either by the frailties of old age, the murderous act of a covetous assassin or vigilante, or the just actions of world leaders who act to bring them down. Terrorists find themselves terrorized, and people, cities, and nations rise from the ashes of death and decay not only to survive but thrive. Many diseases, those more mysterious manifestations of darkness, have been eradicated entirely from nations and in some cases the whole world, due to courageous, self-denying care and containment and pioneering medical research. False teaching is exposed and people who lived in intellectual and spiritual confusion are set on the right path. As the motto of the Protestant Reformation goes, Post tenebras lux: after darkness, light. 

But still the seasons come, when darkness seems to push back the light. This is not final.

Near the beginning of the story of light vs. darkness there is a promise from God to the evil serpent of Eden: the offspring of woman “shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel.”

The great centre-piece of the story tells how just that happened: the light came into the world and the darkness did not overcome it. Though one day the clouds rolled in and afternoon sun was shrouded by the dark at the death of Jesus Messiah, three days later in resurrection triumph he announced his victory over death, sin, and the grave. Satan and the demonic forces were disarmed and made into a spectacle of silly creatures with scary looking masks but no real power over Christ and the people he came to deliver. The Man’s heel was bruised, but so too was the serpent’s head.

The story is not over. Traverse the years since the serpent was trampled by Jesus’ feet . He roams the earth wounded lashing out with the venomous ferocity of desperation and survival. He knows the death blow has been struck, but even as he is a liar to others, he is to himself. So he hisses, spits, and bites. But there comes a day when the bruised dragon of darkness is bound for a time and rendered utterly inactive, unable to deceive. In the mysterious counsel of the will of God, he is set free briefly – only to be humiliated and made a spectacle once and for all, consumed by fire for ever.

The night will pass and the darkness flee.

The icy death grip of demons broken will be.

Gloom shattered

Fear aflight 

All made right

when once for all the Light of the World burns bright.

Turns out, the fantasies of fiction were true. The events of history were imperfect micro-stories in a perfect grand narrative.  The conclusion of this narrative is already written:

And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever…The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen. (Revelation 22:5,21)