This article is by Benjamin Long:
Alaskans discuss years in winters, summers, and occasionally earthquakes. Autumn bursts in yellows and oranges but quickly fades from the collective consciousness in a matter of weeks. Spring too is haunted by mounds of melting snow persisting in the shadows even until May. Punctuating the dichotomy of short summers and long winters is Alaska’s daylight. On April 17th each year, Anchorage residents step into the land of the midnight sun where “night” is transformed into varying levels of twilight (civil, nautical, and astronomical twilight to be precise). Summer brings with it bonfires that easily linger into the early hours of the morning, grass that can grow knee high within a few weeks, and run-ins with moose, bears, and other wildlife (yes, “there’s a moose in my driveway,” is a legitimate excuse for being late to work here).
But every year as the midnight sun sets, Alaskans have no choice but to turn toward the approaching darkness of winter. For the northernmost residents of Alaska in Utqiaġvik (formerly known as Barrow), “day” turns into twilight on November 18th and residents live without true daylight for two months. Pragmatic intentions to beat impending inches of snow lead some Alaskans to put up Christmas lights by November 1st. But it is a defiance toward the gloominess of winter that compels many to keep those lights up long past Christmas. Additionally, light boxes (popularly called “Happy Lights”) are a staple in many Alaskan homes to mitigate the effect of darkness on a person’s body. This bipolar annual rhythm can be daunting even for the most experienced of Alaskans. But for the Christian, it is a unique opportunity to embody the “time in between” as Fleming Rutledge puts it. Simply put, if creation sings of God’s glory, then Alaskan winters sing of Advent.
Advent is wrapped in weekly candle lightings, singing songs, and rare space to pause and reflect. The popular modern Christian practice of Advent centers around themes of hope, love, joy, and peace. Participants place themselves in a season of expectation to imagine the historic time in between the prophets and the coming King of Israel. However in Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ, Rutledge reminds readers that the focus of Advent is not primarily the historic coming of Christ but rather observing the time in between His first and second coming. “Advent begins in the dark,” Rutledge continues, to which Alaskans bear witness every year.
Anchorage has one of the highest rates of homelessness in the country with 2018 data showing 274 homeless people per 100,000 residents, and it is suspected that they overrepresent the number of “outdoor deaths” that occur every year. From 2017 to 2021, 74 people have died outside in Anchorage. “The bodies turn up in snowbanks,” the Anchorage Daily News reports, “Behind utility boxes. Face-down in creeks. In the woods and under bushes.” The “most wonderful time of the year” and yet people die from being cold and outside. Considering such loss, Rutledge reminds us that, “the Advent season is designed to lead us into an ever-deeper awareness of the solidarity of all human beings in pain and darkness. No one can count himself exempt from the distress of others.”
However, the popularized American Advent does not remind observants of their solidarity with mankind. Instead, it teaches distraction and escapism. Rather than taking an inventory of the darkness, an American Advent helps us escape to, “the most wonderful time of year.” Commercialized and reductive, Advent becomes a countdown to Christmas via Disney stories, Ted Lasso Socks, or a 4-foot custom calendar from Tiffany & Co. Twenty four daily brief moments of distraction and individual consumption. Unfortunately, even modern Christian celebrations of Advent have been influenced by the larger culture. December church attendants don’t want to contemplate the evil and injustice in the world. Rather we quickly look to the manger for a comforting message of love, joy, hope, and peace. We want to sing “Joy to the World,” “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing,” and “Go! Tell it on the Mountain,” without first sitting in the depth of, “O Come, O Come Emmanuel,” like the verse below:
O come, Thou Dayspring, from on high,
And cheer us by Thy drawing nigh;
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Advent in Alaska groans for Christ. The gloomy clouds of night bring a unique form of depression known as Seasonal Affective Disorder (aptly abbreviated as SAD) which may impact around 9% of residents in Fairbanks. Alaskans typically have higher rates of binge drinking than the national average. And in 2020, 57.7% of Alaskan women reported experiencing physical or sexual violence. This impact of mood disturbances, alcoholism, and domestic violence disproportionately hurts women. More frequently in Alaska than any other state, women are killed by a man that they know. Advent in Alaska “bids us take a fearless inventory of the darkness: the darkness without and the darkness within.” But this inventory is uncomfortable. It is much easier to distract ourselves with an American Advent of treats, Christmas lights, and holiday cheer, or the typical Christian Advent with its comfort of hope, joy, love, and peace. However, Advent as it was originally observed by the Medieval church marched to quite a different drum.
“The Medieval church designed the four Sundays of Advent around the themes of the four last things: death, judgment, heaven, and hell — in that order, so that the subject of hell was preached on the Sunday just before Christmas Eve.” Can you imagine a sermon on hell for your Christmas Eve Service? But it was precisely this fearless march into the darkness that displayed the glory of Christ. Rutledge asserts that these themes better displayed, “how the light of the birth of Christ appeared against a backdrop of darkness, depravity, and despair.” The culmination of which is displayed in the crucifixion. Jesus — the Light of the world – bears humanity’s sin on the cross. Creation in response is overwhelmed by literal darkness on the day of his death, “Now from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour.” (Mt 27:45) This imagery has parallels to the “Day of the Lord” in Amos 5:18-20:
Alas, you who are longing for the day of the Lord,
For what purpose will the day of the Lord be to you?
It will be darkness and not light;
As when a man flees from a lion And a bear meets him,
Or goes home, leans his hand against the wall
And a snake bites him.
Will not the day of the Lord be darkness instead of light,
Even gloom with no brightness in it? (Amos 5:18-20)
Perhaps much of our modern problem is like Israel in Amos’ day. Under the reign of Jeroboam II, Israel had prospered but Amos reveals the cost of their prosperity. Rather than remembering their history as slaves in Egypt, Israel benefited from treating people as things and contributed to the suffering of the poor. Likewise, the presence of poverty, evil, and death — as well as our benefit from these things — are unavoidable in our society. We should not make the same mistake as Israel who turned “aside the poor in the gate.” (Amos 5:12) As Rutledge reminds us that in Advent we live in the tension between the expectation of dawn and acknowledging the depth of darkness in which we find ourselves. There is no quick fix for homelessness, domestic violence, or the multitude of evils in our society. And yet, “To be a Christian is to live every day of our lives in solidarity with those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, but to live in the unshakable hope of those who expect the dawn.”
Advent in Alaska reminds us of the hopeful expectation of the dawn. Winter here is like a long rest musicians observe on the score of a great musical work. Part of the joy amidst the contrasting silence is the anticipation of the melody’s return. Likewise, Christians already know the melody waiting for us on the other side of Advent’s long rest. Our joy comes from knowing and sharing that “God will come, and his justice will prevail, and he will destroy evil and pain in all its forms, once and forever,” Rutledge reminds us. Just as we cannot stop the darkness of winter from coming, so we cannot prevent the dawn. Darkness reigns the Alaskan winter, but come December 21st, it must acquiesce to the light. Daylight starts to break through as we celebrate that The Light of the world has come. And Alaskans wait in the darkness knowing The Land of the midnight sun will come again.
