Morning Comes

January 12, 2018

The nights have been getting shorter for a couple weeks now. It still gets dark around suppertime, and isn’t light in the morning till nearly 7:00, but bit by bit, the sun is gaining. It’s dark now, and soon the kids will all be in bed, oblivious to the ticking of the clock that counts down the hours and minutes till morning. 

Night has always come with a certain amount of foreboding. Nefarious deeds are committed in the dark; as the Scriptures say, “men loved darkness because their deeds were evil.” Rioting, looting, burglary, assault, and rape all occur more in hours of darkness than in the light. We lock our doors and turn on security lights to discourage those who would do us harm. 

In today’s reading, there is a longing for morning when the dangers that lurk in the darkness recede once more as the dawn breaks. This longing looks beyond day and night to the dawning of righteousness and peace that will bring an end to the dark forces of evil that haunt this old world. I can almost hear the plaintive call...

“Watchman, what of the night?”

And then, that faint glimmer of hope as the watchman said, “The morning comes.” (Isaiah 21:11-12) Finally, the night is almost over, and the dangers of the darkness fade in the joy of the new day. This foreshadows the hope that we have in Christ who will one day come and shine like the sun. The Revelation says that in that day, there will be no need for the sun, because God himself is the Light. And so in this present darkness, we look forward to that day.

“Yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not delay. — He shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds.” 

“Let all your enemies perish, O Lord; but let them that love him be as the sun when he goes forth in his might. — You are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.

“There shall be no night there.” 

(Hebrews 10:37, 2 Samuel 23:4, Judges 5:31, 1 Thessalonians 5:5, Revelation 21:25)

It is dark now; the storm is raging. But the morning will come, and with it, another reminder that the Day is coming when night shall be no more. Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus!