Darkness

When Ernest Shackleton and his crew on the ship Endurance set out on December 5, 1914, they were bound for Antarctica. On January 15 their ship got hopelessly stuck in an ice pack east of Antarctica in the Weddell Sea. From then on, their goal was simply to survive. The freezing temperatures and the near starvation were horrible, but when winter approached in late April, the crew of the ship grew more nervous. The sun disappeared in early May and was not seen again until late July. Shackleton’s biographer wrote, “In all the world there is no desolation more complete than the polar night. It is a return to the Ice Age— no warmth, no life, no movement. Only those who have experienced it can fully appreciate what it means to be without the sun day after day and week after week. Few men unaccustomed to it can fight off its effects altogether, and it has driven some men mad.” (adapted from Philip Ryken’s book, Exodus: Saved for God’s Glory)

Darkness was the ninth plague God brought to Egypt. It was the last of the three sets of three and as has been His custom with plagues 3 and 6, God gave Pharaoh no warning for number nine.  He simply told Moses to stretch out his hand toward heaven and there would be darkness over the land of Egypt. Let me remind you of the creation of all things, how God spoke on the first day, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And it was good. And in or around 1450 B.C., God spoke again and with a word turned out the light in the land of Egypt. And as God said, this was “a darkness to be felt.” The boils brought physical pain and the hailstones and locusts brought death and destruction to animals, people, and the land. But darkness brought a different kind of pain, a suffering that was felt in hearts and souls. It must have been terrifying for the Egyptians who worshiped the sun and praised Ra the sun god every morning when they saw the sun and because of the sun were able to see everything else. But they were worshiping the wrong god, so God took it away for three days! One of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes is this one: “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” The Egyptians, most of them, were living in utter spiritual darkness all the time, and God made it plain to any who had eyes to see and understand that He alone is our light and our life. 

Three days of darkness. There is no mistaking the foreshadowing here, is there? This may have been the darkest three days in Egypt’s history, but the darkest three hours in the world’s history started on a Friday at noon, about 1480 years later, as Jesus hung on a bloody cross: Matthew wrote, “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour.” And though the sun may have shone after that, there was three days of darkness as the Savior lay dead in a borrowed tomb. The disciples mourned and the world rejoiced that Jesus of Nazareth was dead and gone. They thought. Then the glorious Resurrected Savior, the light of the world, burst forth from death and grave and conquered hell for all who believe! Isaiah wrote, “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.”  For those of us who know Jesus, our joy is just beginning.

The darkness continues for all who do not believe.