Tuesday, January 29, 2013

IN THE BEGINNING...

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light." Gen 1:1-3 Have you ever felt like things were formless, empty and dark? In some ways, we live in a formless, empty and dark time. Many are experiencing darkness, despair, discouragement, disillusionment, fear... Throughout history, many have described walking through a "dark night of the soul" or "desert" season - a transitional time of lack as God prepares to take one deeper into His ways, presence and purpose. "To use another word, things were obscure." an on-line article explains. "This is the root meaning of the Spanish word oscura, translated as "dark," as in noche oscura, "dark night." As in the dark of a real night...The whole point of a dark night of the soul is not knowing. If we were aware of what was going on, we would disrupt or sabotage the process. We need to not know to get through it while allowing it to run its course and achieve God's goals... all people are created with God's presence inside them, but also with a deep desire for God that can't be satisfied by anything or anyone but God...The ego can only be put aside if our desire for God is satisfied by God Himself.... " (NeoMysticism.com) Allow me some liberties here as I try to parallel Gen 1 and "Dark Night of the Soul"... "In the Beginning..." Before God created the earth, man, and all that is in it, everything was dark, empty, formless. There was nothing! "Things were obscure." There was no "knowing". Things were void, non existent, empty. Out of nothing God speaks. He speaks right into the empty, dark, formless void: "LET THERE BE LIGHT! And there was LIGHT!" WOW!!! If we could but grasp this. WOW! There was nothing! Blank! Zero! Absolutely nothing! God, the creative one, simply uttered the words: "Let there be Light." BAM! There it was. LIGHT! Life, existence, purpose, people, animals, water, land..... Out of nothing came everything! He creates a Garden. He creates Man. He puts man in the Garden and gives man everything! Then, Genesis 2:9 tells us: "The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." Two simple trees: Tree of Life and Tree of Knowledge... We know the story. We have been living with the consequences ever since. Man disobeyed God, enticed into a life of separation from God. We have been living there since! Daily we deal with the battle of these two trees within our own soul. Will we abide in the Tree of Life (JN 15), trusting God with our lives? Or, will we eat of the Tree of Knowledge, making ourselves god over our own lives, having to understand everything before we can trust? The Tree of Life is simply a life abandoned unto God, trusting Him with our whole heart, soul and mind; living a life in total surrender to our creator - as He intended us to live. This is the only way to life! The Tree of Knowledge is completely opposite. Unfortunately mankind has mass produced this second tree and it's what most people buy and eat from, even most "Christians". The "Dark Night of the Soul", in simplistic terms, is the stripping process to get us back to God's original intent of abiding in Him. Much is dark, empty and void in this hour. Can you feel it? Be encouraged, God has a history of doing amazing things in the midst of such darkness. "LET THERE BE LIGHT!
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