Morning & Evening Devotional Reading

 January 5– Evening

by C. H. Spurgeon, Revised and Edited by W. C. Neff

“And God saw the light.” 

—Genesis 1:4

Each morning we notice the goodness of light and the Lord’s dividing it from the darkness. But today we now want to think about the way in which the Lord looked at the light on that first morning. “God saw the light”: he looked at it with satisfaction, gazed upon it with pleasure, and saw that it “was good.”

If the Lord has given you light, dear reader, he looks on that light with peculiar interest. Not only is it dear to him because it is his own handiwork but because it is like himself, for “He is light.”

Pleasant it is to the believer to know that God’s eye is tenderly observant of His own work of grace in us. Sometimes we cannot see the light, but God always sees it—and that is much better than our seeing it. Better for the judge to see my innocence than for me to think I see it. It is comforting for me to know I am one of God’s people, but, if the Lord knows it, I am truly safe.

This is the foundation, “The Lord knows them that are his.” You may be sighing and groaning because of inbred sin and mourning over your darkness, yet the Lord sees “light” in your heart, for he has put it there. You may have sunk low in despondency, and even despair; but if your soul has any longing toward Christ, and if you are seeking to rest in his finished work, God sees the “light.”

He not only sees it, but he also preserves it in you. This is a precious thought to those who, after anxious watching and guarding of themselves, feel their own powerlessness to keep the light shining. But the light is preserved by His grace, and he will one day develop it into the splendor of noonday and the fullness of glory. The light now within is merely the dawn of the eternal day. [M&E]