Hezekiah's Tunnel
walking through the dark into the day
a long walk in the dark pitch dark too dark for pupils to dilate to adjust to and there is cold water flowing around my ankles and the rough stone walls are close beside and I decided to go barefoot so my soles are exposed to whatever is down here and it was a joyful adventure why? I was hemmed in before and behind by people I trusted by voices I knew I didn't know how long it would take but I knew we would come out of this tunnel into the light and in the meantime we were free to laugh free to communicate the dips ahead the turns when the walls were caving closer in we held one another there was nowhere else to go "it would be scary down here all alone it would be easy to panic and feel trapped" how do you get out of the dark too dark to see? you continue or you let yourself be carried you listen to the voice telling you the way to walk this tunnel like so many valleys has an end point an exit a release from the dark deep it ends near the pool of Siloam where Jesus sent a man born blind to participate in his own miraculous healing Siloam means sent now that this tunnel has ended now that you can see again what will you say about your journey through the dark? what will you say about the man who responded altogether differently to your blindness than anyone else ever had? the man who would not partner with your accusers, but offered you light instead? will you be a sent one proclaiming: "light has come into the world darkness has not overcome it"
31 “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat. 32 But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.” // Luke 22
As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. 4 As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. 5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”
6 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. 7 “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing. // John 9