From Darkness to Light: An Easter Morning Reflection from the Hills of Ellensburg
On Easter Sunday, April 20, 2025, I climbed to the top of our windswept Ellensburg hills just before sunrise—before the sky turned that soft wash of pink and gold—to celebrate the dawn of the Resurrection.
There, surrounded by the quiet strength of nature, I welcomed the morning light and the gentle presence of Christ with these ancient words: “In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” It felt sacred to be so high up, above the town, where wind meets hilltop and silence meets sky. The air was crisp, the light subtle, and the promise of a new beginning tangible.
This outdoor gathering wasn't a traditional church setting. It was something more raw and rooted. The kind of moment where your breath catches—not just from the chill, but from the weight of meaning. Inspired by the poetic voice of John O’Donohue, I shaped a reflection for the morning—words to guide us through the threshold of darkness into the tender light of Resurrection.
Opening Our Hearts to Easter Light
We began with a simple prayer, one that acknowledged our shared need for healing, hope, and new beginnings:
“Lord, you have given us the gift of this new dawn, the dawn on which Jesus rose from the dead and broke, finally and forever, the chains of darkness and blindness. We ask that streams of Easter light might flow into the intimacy and privacy of our hearts this morning…”
John O'Donohue once wrote that Easter light is not just symbolic—it’s transformational. It enters the deepest shadows of our lives: our fear, our wounds, our loneliness—and turns them gently toward peace, courage, and renewal. On this hilltop, I believed that light could reach every one of us.
READ HIS FULL SERMON IN HIS BOOK: WALKING IN WONDER
Sacred Scripture at Sunrise
As the light grew brighter, we read from Scripture—words that have crossed centuries and still speak powerfully in our present:
Acts 10:37–43 told of the risen Jesus, seen not by the whole world, but by those who loved Him—who ate and drank with Him after He rose. READ HERE
1 Corinthians 5:6–8 reminded us to leave behind the bitterness of our old selves, to become like freshly baked bread—holy and whole. READ HERE
John 20:1–9 brought us into the morning with Mary Magdalene, her shock and grief turning to awe at the empty tomb. READ HERE
Each passage was chosen to mirror the moment we were in. The stillness of dawn. The shift from darkness to light. The quiet realization that something holy had already begun.
A Reflection: Dawn as a Threshold
We are always crossing from one thing to another—from sleep into waking, from fear into faith, from pain into hope. And dawn, perhaps more than any other time, makes that movement visible. It reminds us that no darkness lasts forever.
Life begins in darkness—in the womb, in the soil, in the quiet spaces of our hearts. But the Resurrection teaches us that we are not meant to remain there. Jesus, a carpenter from Nazareth, embraced all the darkness humanity could hold—and turned it inside out on the cross. That is the miracle of Easter: not just that He rose, but that we can rise too.
“Each of us is here not out of curiosity, but out of need. We are strangers in this world, and yet deeply known. We carry hurt. We long for healing. And this new light—this Easter light—is for all of us.”
“It’s lovely to think that at the heart of our belief in God is a young man—a carpenter from a small town—who bravely embraced the darkness of the human journey. He took upon his tender shoulders, in the most brutal and harrowing way, all the darkness everywhere. He carried it to the summit of Calvary, where that darkness was transformed into a light that will never be quenched.”
No matter how broken or afraid we feel, no matter the wounds we carry or the regrets we hold, there is no corner of our hearts beyond the reach of Resurrection light.
A Call to Begin Again
As I looked out over Ellensburg bathed in morning light, I felt how brief life is—how important it is to start again. To choose love. To shed the old narratives that keep us stuck. To stop carrying what no longer serves us.
“We weren’t put here to build empires. We were placed here to love and be loved—to walk with God in the beauty of the earth.”
Let us not forget the sacredness of our purpose. Let us not miss the chance to be fully alive.
A Closing Blessing
We ended our time together with a prayer of gratitude and hope. A prayer for friends, for healing, for justice, for the broken-hearted, and for a world still aching to be made whole. We asked that the light of Christ would reach all places: hospitals, prisons, institutions, and the quiet aching places in our own hearts.
“Renew us, transform us, and lead us into the tender dawn light of the hope you have given us on Easter.”
And finally, we read a poem by John O’Donohue from his book TO BLESS THE SPACE BETWEEN US, a blessing over the day that had just begun:
I bless the night that nourished my heart
To set the ghosts of longing free
Into the flow and figure of dream
That went to harvest from the dark
Bread for the hunger no one sees.
All that is eternal in me
Welcomes the wonder of this day,
The field of brightness it creates
Offering time for each thing
To arise and illuminate.
I place on the altar of dawn:
The quiet loyalty of breath,
The tent of thought where I shelter
And all beauty drawn to the eye.
May my mind come alive today
To the invisible geography
That invites me to new frontiers,
To break the dead shell of yesterdays,
To risk being disturbed and changed.
May I have the courage today
To live the life that I would love,
To postpone my dream no longer,
But do at last what I came here for
And waste my heart on fear no more.
Why I’ll Keep Climbing Hills at Dawn
As an artist and as a believer, I often find God most clearly not in a cathedral, but in the wild. On a mountaintop. In birdsong. In wind. In paint. In people gathering with open hearts.
This Easter morning reminded me again why I keep doing this work—why I keep showing up. Because light always comes. And when it does, we get to witness it together.
May this day—and every day after—be filled with the kind of Resurrection light that calls you back to your purpose, softens your fear, and leads you gently forward.
He is risen. He is risen indeed.
