Two weeks ago, the season of darkness began. Every year, from the time we fall back on the clocks until the winter equinox, the darkness keeps encroaching earlier and earlier. I’ve mentioned it a number of times before, but adapting to the fact that it got dark so early was one of the biggest adjustments we had to make when moving here from Florida. I think it was the getting dark before 5pm that was just mind-bending for me. You could go to work and it still be dark and leave work and it would be dark. The darkness and gloom is overwhelming.

So it was for Isaiah’s contemporaries, except far worse. For their darkness and gloom was one of God’s judgment and of exile. For their failure to trust him, and their superstitious trust in idols and foreign kings, God had rendered certain a judgment of darkness, distress and anguish.

This held true all the way until the time of Jesus. The season of darkness didn’t just last for a few months. It lasted for over seven centuries. But it is against the darkest hours of history that the brightest promises of the Messiah are foretold. Like at the creation, when darkness, chaos and gloom were the thickest, God says, “Let there be light” into the darkest hours of Israel’s history.

This past Lord’s Day as we considered how Jesus fulfilled this familiar prophecy and reflected on the gift of a child who will sit on David’s throne forever.