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Karen Hollis | October 5, 2025 Pentecost 17 | Creation 1
Sun/Fire/Light:
As I said earlier, I invite us during this season of Creation to “read” from 2 books of scripture. First from creation and secondly from the Bible. What does it mean to read from the book of creation? It’s a little different from reading from a book in that there isn’t really a starting place, there’s no beginning of a sentence, or defined sequence. Another word for “reading” in this context could be “observation”.
We begin today with the sun and fire. For thousands of years humans have been observing the sun, watching as it traverses the sky each day. We’ve noticed the differences between its path from summer to winter and where it rises and sets on the horizon. We’ve noticed the quality and intensity of the sun’s light day to day and through different seasons. The quality of the sun’s appearance tells us something about the atmosphere and what is present in the air.
Have you ever made a sundial? I was a lucky kid, because my dad was a grade 7 science teacher. He was and still is great at observation. I remember one day we made a sundial together and he helped my sister and me discover how it worked by having us mark the shadow on the paper each hour. The changing shadow told us how the sun was moving and how the day was unfolding. I remember feeling more connected to the sun, after that exercise. I still use the concept of the sundial sometimes - when I want a general idea of what time it is at home, I will look out at my balcony to see how much of it is in shadow – connecting in a small way to my ancestors.
Many of our ancient ancestors were so connected with the sun that they built structures like Stonehenge that highlight and celebrate the solstices and equinoxes of the year. They were intimately connected to the sun as the source of light and heat, supporting food production, and predictable days and seasons.
Like the sun, we are also drawn to fire. Since time immemorial, we have been gathering in a circle around the warmth and light of fires. I heard on a podcast recently that scientifically, photons from the sun are absorbed by the leaves of trees and that energy is stored in the wood of the tree. Those same photons from the sun are emitted as the wood burns. It all comes from the sun.
Here, in indoor spaces, we light candles to remind ourselves of the light of life, the divine presence, here among us. From sunny days to campfire nights, and shared indoor spaces, we are sustained by the gift of light from our creator.
Matthew 5:14-16 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.
“In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be reflections of your word to us today, in Christ’s name we pray. Amen
Sermon:
Astronomer and science communicator, Carl Sagan said, “The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.” I love this quote – it says so much with so few words. Notice the references to both physical matter and non-physical consciousness and knowing. It seems we are at intersection points of the two, as expressions of life on our planet home, in this glorious cosmos. If we are to shine before ourselves and others, we need the support of both the physical light and inner light . . . because we are physical and spiritual beings.
Let’s begin with the physical: like the trees I talked about earlier, we also receive our energy from the sun. Think for a minute about your food. We can trace every carrot, apple, steak, measure of flour back to where it received energy from the sun . . . growing in the ground, on trees, grazing a sun-soaked field. Our food receives energy from the sun and gifts that energy to us when we consume it.
We also need direct sunlight to survive and to live well. Biologically it gives us vitamin D and surely other mysterious gifts that scientists have yet to discover. The sun lifts our mood – I feel fine and normal on a cloudy day – I’m from this climate; the days have been like this my whole life. I notice that on sunny days, like today, I get a little lift from the sunlight. When is the last time you closed your eyes and turned your face toward the sun? There is a holy presence in rays of sunlight. It’s medicine, it's comfort, joy, inspiration, and insight. After all, light is one of our names for God . . . which includes, while is certainly not limited to our sun.
Our inner light brings us to this morning’s scripture reading. Jesus says: you are the light of the world. Sorry, I thought God was the light of the world, Jesus too – Jesus is the light of the world. I am the light of the world? (hear the divine name there?) We are (gesture to whole congregation) the light of the world? This news could be inspiring or intimidating. We might look around us, have a peek inside us and seek the source of our light. In the Aramaic language, the language Jesus spoke, the word for light is nuhra, which means the illumination of what is unknown . . . which – when you think about it – is both an external and internal phenomenon. When we shine a light, we can see what was previously in the dark – this morning the light was just right on my drive in and I saw spider webs woven between power lines . . . all along the old highway. I had never seen them before, but the light made them known. Another kind of light comes on for us when we receive insight in thought, from conversation or reading is a similar kind of thing.
Many of you won’t be surprised to hear that to help us explore these non-physical aspects of light, I have another translation of this text – this one is by Neil Douglas Klotz, who works with the Aramaic language. Here is “Let your light shine before others” from the Aramaic:
Let the light of your being,
the consciousness of knowing your real Self,
radiate and illuminate the human beings
you find before you, as well as the
community of voices you find within.
So, this translation tells us there’s an aspect of our own beings that has its own light, it is the light of what is conscious and awake within us. For Klotz, Jesus’ words are not a call or a mandate, but permission. Permission to shine.1 Just breathe that in for a moment. You have permission to shine . . . whatever that means to you today. “Hearing this permission to shine with Aramaic ears,” Klotz writes, “we find Yeshua (Jesus) showing what happens when the light of our being – a tangible sense of our personal ‘I am’ connects with the sacred ‘I Am’ and allows itself to shine.”2 So it’s not just our uniqueness that shines forth, what is known and holy in us, but our source that shines through us. In the Aramaic sense, when our source shines through us, it is medicine for us and those around us.
Within our Christian tradition are practices for accessing and connecting with our source, this inner light of God. It isn’t easy for everyone to find, and so we practice. Many people practice centering prayer or other forms of meditation that draw us closer to the sacred light. Another pathway of connection is our relationship with creation and strengthening our sense of our own createdness. God knows our culture and many cultures of the world don’t make it easy. In the words of theologian Dorothee Soelle, (read slowly) some of us are raised in cultures that threaten “the capacities of human beings to take in creation in wonder and in awe, in self-renewal and in appreciation of beauty, in joy and in expressions of gratefulness and praise.”3 We are so fortunate in this part of the world to have waterways, forests, mountains, and sometimes even our sun, so present to remind us of who we are . . . to remind us of the spark of life that lives within us and move toward it with curiosity about what would feel supportive to that spark in you.
Here we are, at intersection points of physical matter and non-physical consciousness, with permission from our teacher to shine. If we are to shine before ourselves and others, we need the support of both the physical light and inner light . . . because we are physical and spiritual beings. In fact, these supports are built into the world in which we live. All of the physical and biological processes work together with the energetic and spiritual realities of the world . . . offering all of us, all of creation support and permission to shine forth . . . to show up for one another, shine for one another.
We are part of the creative process of the universe and God’s grand story of life. We are here, participating in the cosmos that dwells inside us and all around us, and the light of God, the light of life is here, supporting us to shine.
1 Blessings of the Cosmos p. 1
2 Blessings of the Cosmos p. 4
3 Dorothee Soelle Essential Writings, edited by Oliver. p. 86-7