Advent: Hope in the darkness
Imagine you walk outside on a winter night that is so dark it is disorienting. There are no stars, no moon in sight, and no lights that you can see. The only thing present is the stillness in the air that swallows the horizon. You can hear your footsteps but can’t see where they land, and for just a moment you wonder, “will morning ever come?”
That kind of darkness. The kind that is thick, disorienting, and engulfs every part of you. That is the world the prophet Isaiah was speaking into. And it’s the world many Christians find ourselves living in today.
“The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shone.”
Before Advent becomes a season of candles, wreaths, and carols, it begins in the shadows. It starts in the stillness and the darkness. Before the people saw this “great light,” they were walking in darkness. They were dwelling in a land of deep darkness. But as we reflect on this, we see one decisive truth. Silence does not mean absence.
Israel’s Long Night: A Darkness That Lasted Centuries
When Isaiah first spoke about “a great light,” Israel wasn’t simply discouraged or had their feelings hurt. They were living under the crushing realities of invasion, exile, national instability, and spiritual confusion. The northern tribes had already fallen to Assyria. Judah was on a similar path. Even the temple, once the center of God’s presence, felt hollow. This was truly a dark time.
But the deepest darkness came later.
After the prophet Malachi closed the Old Testament, Israel didn’t hear another prophetic word for four centuries.
Not four days.
Not four years.
Four hundred years.
This period is often called “the 400 years of silence.” This time of silence wasn’t merely an absence of prophetic activity. It was a profound spiritual ache. Generations lived and died without hearing a fresh word from God. It was utter silence. Silence that made it seem as though God disappeared from the scene.
As scholars like F.F. Bruce and D.A. Carson point out, the world into which Jesus was born was a world shaped by both longing and exhaustion. Some likely wondered whether God had forgotten His people altogether.
But silence is not the same as absence.
Silence is often preparation
When we look back on the history, we see something Israel didn’t - something fascinating and undeniable:
God’s silence wasn’t neglect.
It wasn’t abandonment.
It wasn’t forgetfulness.
It wasn’t deafness.
It was construction.
It was preparation.
Behind the quiet, God was arranging the world to be prepared for the Light to come. He was preparing the way for the light to come into the world at the right time. There were many different aspects and events that took place over these 400 years, and all of them were being orchestrated to help the Light shine even brighter. Some of these things include:
A common language (Koine Greek) - Through Alexander’s empire, this contributed to making the gospel easily transmissible.
A unified road system (“Roman roads”) - Allowed missionaries like Paul to travel with unprecedented speed.
The Pax Romana (Peace of Rome) - Provided relative stability that created space for the church to grow, missionairies to travel, and for the Greek language to spread.
Synagogues scattered across the Mediterranean gave people like Paul ready-made preaching platforms.
A renewed hunger for the Messiah was forged through hardship, shaping the hearts of people like Simeon and Anna.
In Isaiah’s day, God promised that a child would come. In the long silence afterward, God was preparing the very stage on which that child would step.
This is why Advent matters:
It reminds us that God’s “quiet” seasons are often His most strategic.
Theologians like Herman Bavinck, Sinclair Ferguson, and Michael Horton highlight the reality that God fulfills His promises slowly, often imperceptibly, but always perfectly. The Spirit was not inactive. He was hovering over history the same way He hovered over the waters in Genesis 1.
The light that breaks the night
When the room is darker, a small light can be so bright that it’s blinding. Christ is that light - blinding, captivating, and completely in contrast to the darkness He entered. Isaiah’s words build toward this promise, almost too gentle and too good for such a dark world:
“For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
A child.
Not a conqueror.
Not an emperor.
Not a politician.
A child.
Israel expected God to act loudly, dramatically, and even decisively. Instead, He came quietly and vulnerably, in a Bethlehem manger. The first cry of the Messiah broke four centuries of silence - not with thunder, or lightning, or an earthquake that shook the world, but with an infant’s cry.
This is the way of God, breaking the silence of 400 years with the incarnation.
He shines light not in the way we expect, but in the way we need. What was the answer to the darkness? The silence? The desperateness and the longing? The incarnation.
As Michael Horton says, God’s glory is most clearly seen in “the slow, steady unfolding of His covenant promises.”
What This Means for Us in Our Darkness
We all know something of silence, of darkness, and even stillness. Sometimes our prayers feel like they’re hitting a ceiling. Sometimes we go through seasons where God seems far, where His nearness feels like a memory that we can’t help but long for again. Advent gives us language for this. It gives us something to look past the immediate feelings and situations in our lives, and focus our eyes elsewhere, not on ourselves, but on Christ.
It tells us:
Darkness doesn’t mean God has departed.
Silence doesn’t mean God is inactive.
Waiting doesn’t mean God has forgotten.
Sometimes, as John Frame notes, God hides Himself not to punish us, but to reshape our desires so that we seek Him more deeply.
And like Israel, we rarely understand the preparation happening behind the curtain. Only later, sometimes much later, do we see how God was putting the pieces in place for redemption, restoration, renewal. In other words, it leads to formation.
A Holy Longing: What Advent Forms in Us
Advent doesn’t ask us to pretend everything is bright, cheerful, and merry.
It asks us to bring our darkness into the presence of a God who works in silence.
This is why the Christian life is shaped not just by fulfillment but by longing (Spirit-formed, God-centered longing). Longing is not a sign of weak faith but deeper faith. The Spirit Himself stirs it (Rom. 8:23).
The same Spirit who was shaping Israel during the silent centuries is shaping you in your waiting.
Spiritual Practice for the Week: Sitting in the Holy Quiet
So how do we practice this? Try this, for five mornings this week, sit in two minutes of quiet before praying.
Let the silence feel uncomfortable.
Let yourself listen for the gentle whisper before overshadowing it with your voice.
Let yourself feel the longing.
Then pray something like this:
“Lord, teach me to trust You in the quiet.
Let Your light break into my darkness.
Prepare me to recognize Your work when it finally appears.
Come quickly, Lord Jesus.
Amen.”
Reflection Questions
Where do you feel God’s silence most acutely right now?
What might God be preparing in you—or around you—that you cannot yet see?
How might Advent reshape your understanding of waiting?
waiting with hope in the quiet
Advent invites us to trust what Israel had to learn: God is faithful even when He is quiet, present even when He seems hidden, purposeful even when we cannot perceive His work. The same sovereign grace that orchestrated the arrival of Christ is shaping your story now.
So as you wait, wait with hope.
As you long, long with confidence.
The Light has come, and He will come again.
