Writings: The Dark Night of the Soul

By: Dr. Gregory S. Neal

Back in the 1500s a Roman Catholic Priest, Carmelite monk, and mystic author who has become known as John of the Cross, wrote an amazing poem which is usually called: The Dark Night of the Soul. This poem describes the journey that we all make from the spiritual wilderness of sin, from being lost in the darkness of despair and separation, not knowing one’s way and having to depend entirely upon God, into the amazing love, presence, and comforting embrace of the Good Shepherd. Over time the phrase “The Dark Night of the Soul” has come to refer to any time of wondering, any time of struggle with one’s path, any time of difficulty in knowing what one should do.

In my opinion, the best way to comprehend the experience of the “Dark Night of the Soul” is to liken it to those long, fitful, sleepless nights that we’ve all had: lying in bed for hours, gazing at the ceiling above our heads, watching as spooky shadows are projected on it through the partly draped windows of our bedrooms; listening to the steady drip-drip-drip of the faucet in the bathroom, the rhythmic snoring of the dog in her kennel next to the bed, the annoying creaking of a house at night. It can be so quiet and so still that you can even hear your own heartbeat; the bed can be comfortable, the temperature perfect, and you may even be incredibly weary, but you still can’t sleep. You try to sleep, but you can’t; there’s too much swirling in your mind, too many fears afoot in your soul, too much to consider, too many things to do, too many contingencies you’ve got to deal with ... there’s so much going on that you just can’t sleep. And, yet, you know you need to sleep. You check your phone or your clock – if you still have one of those – to see that it’s 2 am ... then 3 am ... then 4 am ... and rather than counting the number of hours you have left to sleep that night, you begin counting the number of hours you’ve been lying in bed, unable to sleep.

An experience of “The Dark Night of the Soul” is like that: a troubling, agonizing time when you don’t know the twists and turns in the path before you; you know that your destination is God, but that’s pretty much all you know. You wish you had a map-app to show you each step of the way, each turn, each stop, each detour ... but you don’t have that. All you know to do, all you can do, is wait until you can take a step. And when it’s time to take that step, it’s taken mostly in the dark. Oh, if you’re lucky, you can see where that first step will take you, but sometimes you can’t even see that; you simply have to put out your leg and take that first step, totally in the dark, not knowing where your foot will land. It’s the journey of faith ... and it’s not easy.

Oh, sure, faith can often be an easy path and an easy journey when you can see your course, or at least the few dozen steps ahead of you. But, often times, faith is not that easy, where even your next step is shrouded in mystery, and where you don’t know where your foot will land and what the consequences will be when you take that step. You know you have to take it, and you know that it will take you someplace, and that someplace will eventually lead you to God, but the route is unknown, the length of the journey is unknown, and how long you’ll be in the Dark Night is unknown. It can be, quite frankly, terrifying.

That’s where I’ve been for about 3 months. Each day, each night, wondering what’s next with my mother’s health, wondering how I’m going to care for her as the weeks and months drag on, and wondering where I’m going to be serving God in my next appointment. You had a peek at it on Sunday April 18 when it was announced that my good friend, the Reverend Brian Dierolf, had been appointed to serve as your pastor beginning July 1. Usually, in the UMC a new pastor isn’t announced until the currently serving pastor is either appointed someplace else or has stated that they’re retiring. I have 18 years to go until I retire, but I’m still waiting for an appointment.

Waiting for an appointment can be short, or it can be long, and the details of how appointments occur are often shrouded in mystery. Sometimes clergy will joke about how the process of appointment-making can feel quite a lot like a game of “pin-the-tail on the donkey.” Only, in this case, it’s the cabinet that blindfolds the bishop, spins the bishop around, hands the bishop a bunch of pins with the names of the clergy on them, and then directs the bishop toward a map of the Conference with all of the appointments listed on it. Wherever each name is pinned determines who goes where. No ... it’s not that bad. The truth is that the Bishop and the District Superintendents work hard and long in order to make pastoral appointments; it only seems like it can be weird or random.

It’s in those times of cloudy unknowing, it’s in the midst of the Dark Night of the Soul, that Jesus’ identity as our Good Shepherd has its greatest impact and its most amazing meaning.

"I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep." (John 10:14-15)

That’s incredible and amazing. In the ancient world shepherds were often hired hands, brought in to tend the sheep; they really couldn’t be trusted to protect the sheep in a dire emergency. Jesus, however, is our Good Shepherd. Jesus isn’t a hired hand, doing the job for a paycheck: Jesus comes among us and lays down his very life for us. In his life, ministry, death, and resurrection Jesus stands between us and the big bad wolves, fending them off. That’s the Good Shepherd; that’s who we have on our side.

That’s what I’ve kept reminding myself, night after night as I’ve tried to sleep, even when not knowing what is next with my mother, even when not knowing where I’m going; I’ve reminded myself that the Good Shepherd, who laid down his life for me, is guarding and guiding my steps ... if only I will take those steps. And yes, my sisters and brothers, the Good Shepherd is guarding and guiding you, too. I have been blessed to serve among you these past three years as an Under Shepherd to our Great Good Shepherd. It has been an honor and privilege to serve here among you, and I know that Jesus will care for you through whatever is to come, just as I know that Jesus will care for me. No ... I still can’t say where I’m going, but I know that, no matter where it is, the Good Shepherd will be with me, guiding and guarding me every step of the way ... even through the Dark Nights of the soul.

© 2021 Dr. Gregory S. Neal
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