Lutheran Seminary's God Pause "Moved by the Promise" Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States for Monday, 5 January 2015 - Scripture: Genesis 1:1-5[The Message]

Lutheran Seminary's God Pause "Moved by the Promise" Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States for Monday, 5 January 2015 - Scripture: Genesis 1: Heaven and Earth
1-2 First this: God created the Heavens and Earth—all you see, all you don’t see. Earth was a soup of nothingness, a bottomless emptiness, an inky blackness. God’s Spirit brooded like a bird above the watery abyss.
3-5 God spoke: “Light!”
        And light appeared.
    God saw that light was good
        and separated light from dark.
    God named the light Day,
        he named the dark Night.
    It was evening, it was morning—
    Day One.[The Message]
I believe it was no coincidence that the first thing God created was light. The dark can be a scary place. We modern folk rarely encounter true physical darkness. Recently I was at a church meeting when all the power in the neighborhood went out. All of a sudden we literally lived in utter darkness. Utter darkness—for about three seconds, that is. Then everyone pulled out their smart phones and the room was aglow with artificial light. It's difficult to imagine a time when physical darkness meant danger, fear and perhaps even death. 
We do, however, understand figurative darkness and the danger, fear and dark that can accompany that. God breaks in and creates light. Physical light to be sure, but also spiritual light. Light to guide our way. Light to give us hope. Light to calm our fears. May you know the light of Christ today and always.
God of light, shine in our darkness that we may not be afraid. Amen.
Julie M. Blum
Lead Pastor, Maple Leaf Lutheran Church
Seattle, Wash. 
Master of Divinity , 1998
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth,
2 the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.
3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
4 And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.
5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.[The Revised Standard Version]
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