St George's Cathedral, Cape Town

A Sermon preached by the Reverend Bruce W. B. Jenneker in the Cathedral Church of St George the Martyr, Cape Town, on the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord in the Temple – Candlemas, Sunday 1 February 2009

For us Christians, the meaning of reality is not to be found in some cataclysmic big bang in which, through violent explosion the clashing of nothingness upon itself births a universe. No. However the universe came about, for Christians the meaning of reality is to be found in the convergence of God's impulse to create and God's yearning for love. It is when the divine urge to invent a world becomes one with the divine hunger for intimacy that reality results, and that reality is light. What is born of God's desire to create and God's craving for love is light. Let there be light, God says. God's creating words rise up from the divine intention to make a universe of wonder and beauty, teeming with life in all its potential, and God's creating words are heavy with desire, God's longing to love and be loved. Let there be light God says, and there was light. And God saw that the light was good.

For us Christians, the meaning of reality is to be found in God's creating word, born of God's love, bursting into life-giving light. Light, which we see in the bright whiteness of this Cathedral, or in the dancing of the sun's rays through a window, or in the rainbow that arches over Table Mountain as the rain subsides, light in all its beauty is energy. Light is electrical and magnetic energy swirling through nature in a spectrum of colours to light up our lives and reveal reality to us.

Light penetrates the darkness and dispels it. Light illuminates the pathway and guides our footsteps. Light calls us from out of the gloom that frightens and obscures to the brightness that spells destination, arrival and safety. Light shines into chaos revealing its conflicting elements and confusing dynamics, allowing us to pick our way through its twists and turns, discovering meaning, uncovering truth. Let there be light God says, and there was light. And God saw that the light was good.

Light is the herald of truth. Deceit and falsehood are children of darkness. It is in the murky shadows that we invent the lies that oppress, exploit and imprison. It is in the gloom that hides and darkness that veils that crime and corruption breed. It is in the thick shadows of selfishness and greed that injustice and prejudice are born. Light penetrates and flashes through the darkness that imprisons us, to enlighten and radiate, revealing what was obscured, uncovering what was shrouded, exposing what lay hidden. Light lets the truth of life shine. Light uncovers and illuminates the truth of possibility and hope. Light lets the truth of freedom ring.

Light is the sign that life continues no matter how threatened it is by the darkness of disease and cruelty, despair and decay. Light is the sign that life bubbles with energy and vigour even when the weight of evil around us threatens to encroach and snuff it out. Light is the sign that the divine force, the sacred vitality at the heart of all things, is unconquerable, unquenchable and unstoppable. Light shines in the darkness, writes St John in the first chapter of the Fourth Gospel, light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. It was the light of Christ coming into the world, and the darkness of the world is powerless in the face of the light.

Today we enlist two small children in Christ's march of light against darkness. As they commit themselves to the work of being Christ's light in the world, we reaffirm our ongoing commitment to that ministry. God's light animates and reveals the universe. Christ's light lays open before us the way of self-discovery and self-offering. God's light calls us, enlightens and empowers us to carry the light of Christ into the world. Pray that the grace of God keeps us faithful servants of the light of Christ.

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