"And there was evening, and there was morning..."

I've been reading and rereading the Creation Story in Genesis 1 a lot lately. I've found that it is this exceptionally beautiful poem. But one thing has always perplexed me - when it says, "...and there was evening, and there was morning - the first day."

I never understood why the order was that way. Isn't morning at the beginning of the day, and evening at the end... not the other way around? It never made sense to me. I never understood.

I recently heard someone give a reason why...
It's because that's how God works. That's God's nature. God is always moving from evening to morning.

From darkness to light.

From despair to hope.

From death to life.

This seems especially meaningful this time of year. I'm reading through N.T. Wright's For All God's Worth slowly; it's a small book, but filled with great wisdom. This morning he told me this:

"What was the message that was so urgent that he (John the Baptist) had to get it across even at the risk of his life? It was the news that all would be well at last; that the long night was nearly over, and that the day was about to break; that God who had apparently abandoned his people was coming back: coming to rule, coming to judge, coming to save, coming to forgive. It was the Advent message."

I'm still learning to see that things move from darkness to light. That the morning follows the evening - not the other way around.

Because that is God's way.