Elohim...Mighty Creator

This week I started a study on the names of God. The first name that we are digging into is “Elohim,” the Mighty Creator.  The author instantly sent us to Genesis 1 where we first see Elohim.  Every time I open the pages of Scripture to this familiar passage, God never ceases to amaze me. “He said, let there be….” and “there was….” God spoke the creation into existence. Who does that?  No one but God. That is why he is called the Mighty Creator.  This truth always stirs me to praise him and honor him for who he is and what he has done.

The author continues with this challenge: “God speaking (1:3,6,9, etc.) brought order and beauty from darkness and chaos (1:2). In what areas of your life do you need God to bring order and beauty from that which is dark and chaotic? Can you trust him to do this? What, in the creation story, encourages you that he will?” Oh, that question brought the Mighty Creator right into the center of my life. Of course there is darkness and chaos in life starting with a sister with cancer, grandkids with learning disabilities that break my heart, a friend in the hospital, another friend struggling with an auto immune disease, and the list goes on and on.  Darkness and chaos surround us daily. Our habitat is in a fallen world. But the author goes further and asks, Can you trust God to bring order and beauty into cancer and learning disabilities and sickness and loss?  At this moment, I paused and pondered. Can I trust the Mighty Creator to bring order and beauty from these things?

Upon further study, I glanced at Genesis 1:3-4, “And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.” As I meditated on these passages, I thought about cancer. It is dark and ugly and hard, yet, in the middle of the awfulness of cancer, God shows up and brings light into the darkness.  Sometimes He heals; sometimes He takes the person home to be with Jesus.  But all of his actions are light. Then my mind wandered to why the young grandkids are struggling with learning disabilities. He created them just as they are, yet, in the mist of the struggle, he brings light into their lives and they see Jesus in ways that I never could.

As I continue to ponder on creation and the Mighty Creator in my life, my heart trusts him to bring order and beauty into the darkness and chaos of life. However, I continue to ask him to help me when I don’t fully trust. How about you? Do you trust the Mighty Creator to bring order and beauty where darkness and chaos reign?   Or are you trusting yet asking for more trust in the weakest moments?

Learning to trust,

Bev Bartlett