God of the Dark

and He made darkness pavilions round about Him 2 Samuel 22:12

Darkness – “Little children, turn your lights on, for there are monsters under the bed” Santana’s Supernatural album featured “Put Your Lights On” on track three. We all knew the feeling. There really are monsters under the bed and only the light will send them away. There’s the unexpected shiver up the spine when we stand by the door at night; the feeling that there is something watching from the dark woods; the shudders when we past a darkened house. Something not quite right lurks there.

And then we come to the poetry of Samuel. And we understand. Darkness is the abode of the spiritual. God lives in the dark.

One of the paradoxes of the Bible is the use of the same words to describe things we would never imagine actually go together. Hoshech, the word for darkness, is used to describe evil, terrible places where the absence of God means the absence of life. But the same word is used here to describe the intentional cloaking that God uses to wrap around Himself when He appears in the world of men. We see it on Mount Sinai. We see it here. God pulls darkness around Him, shrouding His majesty. Exactly the same imagery is used in Psalm 18:8, Job 22:13 and Psalm 97:2. God rules the dark. It is at His beck and call.

There is relief and terror in this thought; relief because my God is the sovereign majesty over everything that is. He is at home in the high heavens and at home in the dark hell. He knows no bounds. I am comforted that there is no place where my God does not command all creation. I am comforted because there is no place where He cannot find me.

But there is terror because this is a God that I cannot even begin to understand. He rides the clouds under His feet. He wraps Himself in the thing that I fear. He speaks to me from my dreaded spaces. He is awesome, majestic and terrible.

And He loves me.

I can only drop, my face on the floor. Who is like you, O Lord, that you should even consider me? Who is like you, ruler of the light and the dark, that you should be mindful of such a sinner?