© S. Ingraham and lightshedder.com
This exposition of the light within and without comes from my first attempt to introduce my two oldest daughters, age 6 and 9, to the practice/discipline of Christian meditation as outlined in Toward a Practical Christian Meditation. It is meant to be practical . If you don't know immediately just what I am talking about here, sit down, assume the posture for meditation, take your deep cleansing breaths, and see if you can experience something like I am describing here.
Now we need to talk about light. There is an inner light that we see when we close our eyes...I am not talking about the swirly, sparky, fireworks kind of flashes that you first see...those are just bits of left over light from the the outside bouncing around in your eyes and mind...little flashes of energy as the cones and rods and the nerves of your eyes relax. I am talking about the steady white light that you see just before sleep or right after waking. It is there all the time. Jesus said...
Luke 11:34-36 "Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are good, your whole body also is full of light. But when they are bad, your body also is full of darkness. See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness. Therefore, if your whole body is full of light, and no part of it dark, it will be completely lighted, as when the light of a lamp shines on you."
If you let all the sparks die away, all the fireworks fizzle out, you will be left, not with the darkness you might expect, but with that inner light. It is very white, very clean, and seems to fill you right up to the top of your head and press gently against the back of your eyelids. You have the feeling that the light has hollowed you out...you are like a balloon full of light. You will be quite happy about that, since you will also be filled with a joy that matches the light in quality. Practice until you get through the fuzz and fizzle to that steady light.
You can't be aware of the inner light without also being aware of a much greater light that is outside you. Seeing the light within calls up the awareness of that outer light. We are immediately impressed by two things.
First, it seems to be the same light that is inside us...it has the same quality exactly, white and clean, gentle but inescapable, filling the universe as our inner light fills our body. When we see the light that fills the universe we experience the same sense of joy and wellbeing as when we see our own inner light. There is a sense of rightness...the yes! which is our response to any truth of the spirit.
Second, we are aware that the outer light is much, much greater than our inner light. It is like the light within us is the light in a well lighted room, but the light outside is like the full sun of daylight. As long as we stay inside the light in our room seems bright, but if we go to the window and look out, then turn back, we see how dark it really is inside.
Our eyes, initially, are windows of our room. What you want to do is imagine
yourself moving right up to those windows. As you do, you will become ever more
aware of light outside. It will get brighter and brighter. Surprisingly, the
closer you get to the windows of your eyes, the brighter the light that is inside
you becomes...as though someone in there is turning up a dimmer switch to keep
pace with the brightness of the light outside. In your imagination you are now
pressed right up against the window, so that almost all of your awareness is
on the light outside. The brightness within has grown and you fell balanced
between two lights. Press harder against the glass. It dissolves, and you become
aware that the two lights are one...the same light within and without, and that
the window, the glass, whatever separated your light from the light outside
is completely gone. It feels now as though your whole body, not just your eyes,
has become transparent, dissolved in light. The separation between the inner
and the outer light is so far gone that you know it never really was...that
even if you turn back into the room and it appears the walls close in again
and the window returns and light dims until you can only see with your eyes...
it hasn't really happened...because you can always turn back to the reality
that you have experienced...you can experience it again. The one light fills
everything...right down to your core...at will, just by remembering to do it,
you can join the light within to the light outside and experience that oneness.
1 John 1:5 "This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all."
Remember, this is just an exercise...something to be aware of when practicing Christian meditation...a tool to get you closer to the direct communion with God that ought to be our daily experience of life in Christ.