Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.’”
NL Daily Devotion for Wednesday, February 23, 2022
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
We have to be careful about equating darkness with bad things. That kind of bias is so deeply ingrained in white majority culture that we automatically associate darker skin with negative personality traits and, conversely, immoral acts with darker skin. This can make many biblical passages deeply problematic, and there is much work to be done in addressing that.
As I read this particular verse (and I’m not offering a simple fix, because I have no idea how one could actually write this succinctly) I am thinking about the idea of darkness not as a literal color or lack of light, but as a complete unawareness of the truth—kind of like white people who don’t believe racism actually exists. In fact, Whiteness (with a capital “W”) is far more unaware of reality than any darkness.
So maybe I could just attempt to rewrite this Bible verse as: “I am the full awareness of truth and reality. Whoever follows me will never walk in ignorance, but will be fully alive to God’s truth.” You know? I kinda like that.
How can I be more intentional about using unbiased language in my faith?