IN THE MORNING

Those nights!  Have you ever had one of those nights? You know what I’m talking about don’t you?  One of those nights when you wake up in a cold sweat. The sheets are wet. Your heart is racing. You can actually feel the steady, incessant beat in your head. And your head! A thousand things are going through your head. As one unreasonable worry is dismissed, another takes its place. Try as you might, sleep won’t come. Your mind is just too busy to rest. One anxious minute passes only to be followed by the next anxious minute. The what-ifs and the if-only’s pile, one on top of another. 

You know those nights. You’ve had those nights.

I don’t much care for those kind of nights. The darkness just seems to add to the angst and magnify the worry. I can’t wait for the morning to come. 

There’s something about the morning. The sunrise. The dawning of the morning light. As the sun rises, the anxiety seems to melt away. The cares of night slink into the shadow. The weight of the worry and the cumbrance of the cares are lifted.  Hope rises with the sun.

There’s nothing like a beautiful sunrise! Brilliant pinks and oranges and yellows give way to the endless blues and purples. The dark shadows of early morning grow smaller as the sun makes its way higher into the sky. The crushing cares of the night are doused in the newborn light. No wonder the birds welcome the sun with song!

The psalmist, too, sings of the morning!

It is good to give thanks to the Lord,
    to sing praises to your name, O Most High;
to declare your steadfast love in the morning,
    and your faithfulness by night,

 to the music of the lute and the harp,
    to the melody of the lyre.
For you, O Lord, have made me glad by your work;
    at the works of your hands I sing for joy. 

                                                             Psalm 92:1-4

I wonder, sometimes, about one sunrise in particular. I wonder what it must have felt like to experience that very first Easter. The preceding darkness had to have been more than frightening! Overwhelming! Crushing! 

But then the Son rose and the Light shone and the shadows shrunk . . .! I can only imagine!

And I wonder too, sometimes, when that Day will dawn and those shadows flee . . . forever and for us! 

What joy will be ours! In the morning!

He is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!!

Pastor Tim

“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes.
This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

                                                                                                                 –  Psalm 118:22-24