Let there be Light
Monday (December 1)
Let there be Light
Psalm 43:3a
Send out your light and your truth; let them lead me.
Every word of this Scripture is worthy of a devotional all its own, like chapters in an epic story that each stand alone, but the very first words strike me as the most important upon reflection, because they reveal the divine Source of light and truth. Just think: if God hadn’t sent out His word to prophets and scribes, and if He hadn’t sent out Himself as the Word to reconcile our souls back to Him, what hope would we have? The very notion of God being the giver of all truth distinguishes our Christian faith from most religions in the world today. Because we understand our fallen nature correctly, we don’t lean on the limited help of a God-given conscience that whispers moral instruction through our affections and ambitions, nor do we put all our faith in the dim light of God-given reason that instructs us toward a golden rule for living. Oh no—we build our lives on the bedrock of what God has sent out to us. We believe and herald to a lost world that all light and truth and beauty emanate from God’s character and that any fragment we receive is a gift of His good pleasure. We don’t manufacture light and truth on our own. We can’t ascend by our own merit and virtue. And unless He sends us His wisdom, unless He imparts to us His grace to understand and interpret and repent, and unless He condescends to meet us in the crevices of our common lives, teaching us how to live and love, walking in our flesh and blood, and demonstrating for us what pure, undefiled humanity looks like, then we aren’t any better off than those blind men in the old fable who grope at an elephant and make whatever they will of it.
I recently saw an advertising campaign that simply read, “Let there be change!”, but oh how much greater is that divine word at the very beginning of all things, “Let there be light!” Friend, remember the words of the apostle who wrote in 1 John 1:5, “God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all,” and thank Him for granting to you a Word of truth and a Light to carry out into the darkness.