This Good Word Episode 13 - Light (ShowNotes)

In this episode, I talk about the generative, expansive light of Day One of creation, how it swirled and danced and illuminated every dark corner of the universe.I talk about the nature of that light (it isn't the sun, the sun wasn't created until day four), what it fills and where it goes, and how it's still filling and going and illuminating, even today.I told some stories of some heroes who are being light in some very dark places, people I admire, respect, and who bring me great hope. I talk about Paris and the refugee crisis, and about how we can navigate the dark places of our world with light and hope.Enjoy!Check out Lynne Hybels' great work here. Follow her on Instagram to see her pics and read her stories from Iraq.Excerpt from Beginnings (NavPress, 2016, pages 15-17):

Have you ever found yourself in need of a new beginning, but you didn’t know where to start, or how to get past whatever darkness stands in the way?Let there be light, God smiles to the single mother, buried under piles of laundry and also piles of hopelessness.Let there be light, God announces to the doctor who has cheated on her husband, and also on herself.Let there be light, God thunders to the pastor, lost in depression, who cannot imagine climbing those steps and giving one more sermon.Let there be light, God calls out to the bored restaurant server, mired in a dead-end job with more bills than bank.Let there be light, God beckons to the suburban alcoholic mother, as she wakes up under the cover of regret and shame which threatens to unmake her.Let there be a new Day One in your life. A new beginning.On Day One, God brings light, and makes a way for you to be separated from the darkness in which you are lost and alone. On Day One, God whispers, “There you are! It’s time to go.”If you are going to learn to embrace all the beginnings in your actual life, one of the biggest lies you have to unlearn is the one that insists the hovering God will only descend after you’ve gotten your chaotic life back on track. “God helps those who help themselves,” you are told, and so you are convinced you need some forward progress before God grudgingly intervenes.This kind of thinking only keeps desperate people lonely, and hard-working people tired. This kind of thinking keeps us in the dark.Day One is about being rescued. Day One is about creation bursting forth right in the middle of the inky blackness. God speaks, and God’s Spirit moves, and a new beginning is conceived.It’s on Day One that we recognize our inability to escape the darkness. It’s on Day One that we are rescued out of our own powerlessness. This unexpected light comes just as we realize our impotence, and it is dazzling when we finally see it.

What's Blowing My Mind: Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me: A Memoir... Of Sorts, by Ian Morgan Cron

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And If you'd like to read the first two chapters of my new book, Beginnings, please click here. I'd love to hear what you think!If you'd like to pre-order Beginnings (released on January 1st), click here.

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