i happened upon Mary Baker Eddy’s definition of the word “valley” this morning. couched in between the words depression and darkness lies the word meekness. i hadn’t noticed that before. it was one of those “oh”…moments.

valleys…pits…holes too big to climb out of, moments fraught with darkness, drunk with depression, and yet there in the midst is meekness, a silent ember, homing signal, a window, doorway, a waymark heading: “enter here, transport home.”

“Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.” Isaiah

there’s a wonderful version of Handel’s Messiah called A Soulful Celebration. their version of the song “Every Valley Shall Be Exalted” always delights me. (you can hear at least a part of it through this highlighted link.) it speaks to the imminent promise, the immediacy…how quickly things can turn from darkness to light, vantage points change, an emergence of knowing takes hold, dawn arrives.

here’s the rest of Eddy’s definition:

“‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.’ (Psalm xxiii. 4.)

Though the way is dark in mortal sense, divine Life
and Love illumine it, destroy the unrest of mortal thought,
the fear of death, and the supposed reality of error. Chris‐
tian Science, contradicting sense, maketh the valley to bud
and blossom as the rose.”

right where darkness, doubt, depression, despondency loom largest–inviting surrender, entanglement, fixation; right there meekness beckons: here slither unseen through the morass; here walk weightless through the mire; here find the valley mountainlike, the whole world flooded with light.