The tradition of having Christmas lights in towns and villages has grown over the past few years.  Epping High Street has been decorated by lighted Christmas trees above the shops for many years – and, for a few days, this Church too, will be alight with Christmas tree lights.  Such lights have always been attractive and they weave their own kind of magic.

The first lighted tree was thanks to Martin Luther, the famous Reformation theologian who is remembered not only for the 95 theses he nailed to a church door calling on the Church to reform itself but also for being the first person to place lighted candles on a Christmas fir tree.  The rest, as they say, is history.

The placing of lights on fir trees has a special appeal and I suspect that it has something to do with the time of year when we do this. Winter is the darkest time of the year when darkness comes early in the evening and seems to last right into the morning.  Lights on trees seem to do something towards dispelling that darkness – as light always does.  When I am driving back home late at night and I reach the end of the High Street, the coloured lights in the trees (just over the way from here) are a welcoming sight and give a sense of arriving home.

Darkness is something we experience in more than a physical way and never more so than when we have lost loved ones through death.  We often say that in a death a light has gone out – our personal world becomes a darker, less welcoming place. Loss is often accompanied by spiritual and mental darkness. Our lives are diminished.

Those with a Christian faith can take comfort in some words of Jesus who spoke of himself as the Light of the World – and in using this image, Jesus is saying that, despite the darkness all around us – His life and the love he brings to humankind is a light which dispels the darkness.  At Christmas, we in St. John’s together with our fellow Christians throughout the world – will hear again some words from the beginning of St. John’s Gospel.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.

These words refer to Jesus, whom John calls the Word – and this short passage contains a clue to what we are doing here tonight.

Each of the lights on this tree are in memory of loved ones who have died and whose death brought darkness to the lives of those who loved them and for whom they were special.  In lighting the lights, we are Lighting Up a Life and the symbolism of these lights are that we refuse to believe that death has destroyed those lives which mean so much to us.  We are here making more than a deliberate act of memory – we are going way beyond that.  We are reminding ourselves that, as we who are Christians believe, life is changed by death but not taken away.  Everything we valued about our loved ones who have died – the qualities which made those lives so special remain in our hearts but also, because I believe in the infinite love of God, they remain alive in God’s nearer presence. Life is not taken away – it is changed by God’s love and it is changed for the better and for all eternity.

If we can hold on to even a glimmer of that faith – or if we can’t, to at least have the hope that it may be so – then these lights which we shall shortly light in this tree become a powerful symbol of that hope: the light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it.  That is a truth I believe and that is a truth I ask you to consider.  As long as we believe that these lives we think about – and hopefully celebrate – have meaning for us then they will remain lights which lighten our darkness.

I used to live in the heart of the country before I came to Epping. There were no street lights in my village and each night the sky was carpeted by stars - myriad stars too numerous to count.  This taught me that even in the blackest landscape there was always perpetual light.  And sometimes when I drove home through dark lanes I would see the welcome lights of a familiar house. This was a great comfort because I knew that despite being seemingly alone, I was not.   And neither are we. We are surrounded by pinpricks of perpetual light and there is, in these lives we celebrate tonight, a welcoming light that tells us that they are still with us – a welcome light in our darkness calling us home.