GOD’S STORY Part 18 GOD is Divisive
“… and GOD divided the light from the darkness. GOD called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.” (Genesis 1:4b-5)
So: I’m crawling through Genesis at the moment, to discover what is GOD’s point of view. I discover today that GOD is divisive!
Larus Press with the blog stream Preparing the Bride is all about enabling us to be ready for Jesus’ return, preparing also for all He has in store for us in the meantime.
How do we prepare as the Bride of Christ? One aspect is to learn GOD’s STORY. Piece by piece, and peace by peace, we learn to walk as He has walked. And we learn His perspective.
Here at Preparing the Bride, I’m telling GOD’S STORY. Presumptuous?! Not when simply looking at scripture, because scripture is the unfolding of God’s story to those who read it.
Let there be Light
“GOD is light and in Him is no darkness at all….” (1John 1:5b)
And yet,
Job 34:21-23 states,
“For His eyes are on the ways of man,
And He sees all his steps.
There is no darkness nor shadow of death
Where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves.
For He need not further consider a man,
That he should go before God in judgment.”
GOD is light. He sees into the darkness, into the secrets of mankind. And as He created Day and Night, He surely did not sleep or abandon the darkness. He made Day and He made Night, and nothing is hidden from Him at any time. And so He is in both the darkness and in the light. What does this imply?
GOD separates: He begins Time by separating Day from Night. He will create a bright source of light for Day and a lesser light for Night. And although even in darkness there is light… He has separated light from darkness, day from night.
He divides
He divides Time into days. He divides day by night. He divides good from evil, right from wrong, life from death, truth from lies… and so on. And through this division we can begin to learn His perspective: to discover who GOD is, and what He is not.
Why does division matter?
GOD will know what is to come… The battle for mankind between GOD and satan will take mankind millennia to navigate. They will need to know a clear difference between GOD and notGOD. They will need a clear distinction. And so GOD makes the difference clear, mirrored in the contrast between light and not light.
Division marks out choice
Mankind — each individual will have a choice between GOD and notGOD. We need to see through the darkness clearly, to find our choice.
Isn’t division bad?
Society has trained us to see division as a negative. But it is simply a distinction, neither negative or positive…
Even today we see division being eroded. Men and woman are equal but to some that means they are the same. Black and White have suddenly become politicised and making a distinction is racist. We are experiencing an unprecedented attack on differences.
But GOD is here, there, everywhere…. then and now
GOD created differences; He created variety and in that variety He created individual uniqueness.
First He created Day and Night; Light is His first distinction.
GOD is there -> GOD is light -> GOD is marking out Time. This will be for a purpose, a form of distinction. Yes, GOD is divisive (and we distinguish this even in our debates about the very existence of GOD)… We may not like division, we may have been programmed to not like it but it is true, real, a necessary part of Creation.
GOD created evening, morning = the first day
He must have marvelled at His Creation. And He didn’t stop there. First day implies more is coming. And yes, He created MORE.
Dividing
Dividing Time, He would go on to create even more diversity. Dividing is creative; diversity is exciting. A new day will come — a second after a first. And difference, division, darkness and light are not to be shunned or feared. They are part of GOD’s Creation.
As usual, our walk with GOD shakes up our thinking. Let’s have more of GOD’s divisions…