Light in the Darkness  **For the LORD God is a sun and a shield; the LORD gives grace and glory; He withholds no good thing from those who walk with integrity. O LORD of Hosts, how blessed is the man who trusts in You!** (Ps 84:11-12) //In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  Now the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.  And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.// From the very foundation of the universe, God brings order from chaos and shines light into the darkness. He formed man of the dust of the earth that He created, and breathed His breath of life into him, so that man might bear His image, be fruitful, and multiply over the face of the earth. //In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.// (Joh 1:1-5) Jesus manifested that light in the flesh, so that we could behold the Glory of His Father. Jesus is the fulfillment of every promise God has ever made to man. In the 1901 American Standard Version, we find this translation of Hebrews 1:3: “who being the effulgence of his glory, and the very image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had made purification of sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high” Jesus is the effulgence of God‘s glory. Where most translations choose “radiance” or “brightness", which are perfectly fine translations, the ASV chose a word that packs a poetic punch, and pulls something a bit deeper from “radiance”. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary website has this to say about “effulgence": “It’s not a shiny ‘new’ word, having made its English language debut in the 17th century, but it does come from the Latin verb fulgēre, meaning ‘to shine.’ Effulgence isn’t used for bog-standard brightness, however; it’s reserved for shininess that dazzles, inspires, leaves you gobsmacked—in other words, ‘radiant splendor.’” Shininess that dazzles, inspires, and leaves you “gob-smacked"… If that isn‘t a good description of Jesus, I don‘t know what is. John goes on to tell us more about the nature of the light that Jesus manifested in the world: //The true Light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through Him, the world did not recognize Him.//(John 1:9-10) And a few verses down, John caps it off with this: //The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.//(John 1:14) Brothers, sisters, do you know that Jesus came to shine that same light that was shining at the foundation of the world into the darkness of each heart that will seek him? And, did you know that, by having that light shined into our hearts, it becomes our task to allow the effulgence of it to shine into the wider world? We are called, dear siblings, to “dazzle, inspire, and leave gob-smacked” with God‘s glory every single soul that we come into contact with. God is our shield and our Sun…go and proclaim it to the world. Father, I thank you for shining your light into my darkness, and I pray that I may take that light and turn it outward into the lives of others who so desperately need that illumination and warmth. I pray, Father, that you may grant me the strength, the wisdom, and the courage to take up my shield and shine that light into the face of the darkness. Please correct my feet when they falter, and keep me steadfast in your abiding love. In Jesus‘ name, Amen Pray for persecuted Christians in MYANMAR on the VOM App! https://www.persecution.com/app