early morning

Do you know the peace of the very early morning?  

Until just a few years ago I didn’t.  For a lot of years, I was busy. The busy-ness all involved very legitimate things-teaching, working on the mission, taking care of my mom, raising my kids and holding down a job, much of it all at the same time. If I woke up in the early morning my first concern was going back to sleep so I could have the energy to get all of those legitimate things accomplished.

It has only been since I retired that I’ve come to know how blest we can be in the early hours of the morning. I’ve not had anything of pressing importance to keep me from sitting and soaking up the peace. 

The world is sleeping. Our neighborhood is a very quiet one anyway and at three in the morning it is even absolutely hushed.  Our house is absolutely still, even the busy cats are asleep and, of course, the dogs are dead to the world. Even those little noises that come with every house-- the sound of the warm air flowing from the ducts, the gurgle of water in a pipe, the click of a clock-- are muted.  Nothing disturbs the stillness.

It’s then that God can be so very near and it is so very easy to hear His Voice. 

I’ve learned to simply sit and reflect on life and the things of God.  One of the greatest blessings that hascome with reading the Word of God for nearly sixty years is that it becomes engraved in your heart and mind. (For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people.   Yep, it’s true!)  And when you are still, the Holy Spirit brings those scriptures back to mind.  You don’t even need to pick up the Bible, He just scrolls them through one after another until His sermon is finished.

And after the Holy Spirit has led you through those scriptures He begins to bring to mind those people in your life who need your prayer.  To me that’s as amazing as how He lays the scriptures on your heart because sometimes those He brings to mind are people that you would have no reason to think of or pray for and yet there it is, the burden of prayer resting heavy on you. 

How does He do that? 

I don’t know but I know the blessings of it.  It happens most often in the dark silence of early morning.  It is at that time of day we can truly ‘be still and know that I am God.’ And it is at that time of day we can realize that we are a very, very small part of the Lord’s Plan.  It is humbling and uplifting at the same time.  When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.

Doesn’t that make you feel so special in the eyes of God?  And doesn’t it make you feel so insignificant in His overall Plan?  A less familiar scripture, one of Job’s questions, says What is man, that thou shouldest magnify him? and that thou shouldest set thine heart upon him? And that thou shouldest visit him every morning, and try him every moment?  Job 7:17-18 

I think it is only in the early hours that we can realize how much He has magnified us and set His heart on us.  I know for me those hours of realization have become a special part of my life because it is then that He is so close.

I’m not one of those people who say you have to get up at the crack of dawn and have devotions.  Nor do I feel that I must ‘discipline’ myself to spend time in the Word or with the Lord.  For me there is no ‘discipline’ involved in reading or meditation on the Word of God.  I do it because there is a part of me that draws me to it. It is like breathing. I do it because I am drawn to it like a magnet draws iron filings.

I used to read my Bible, ordinarily, at the end of the day and go to bed with the words in mind. I had a tiny bible that I kept in my drawer at work and sometimes during the day a scripture would come to mind and I would take a couple minutes to go and read the text. Or sometimes in the morning I would look for something that had been in my mind as I woke up. Now I read and study on and off all day long.  (How good to be ‘retired’.) And all of those times are sweet.  But I think my favorite time is at three or four in the morning when I just wake up for no apparent reason and spend the next three hours being quiet with the Lord.  For so many, many years I wasn’t able to do that, but now I can.

Makes me think of Ecclesiastes.  To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:  Old age is a season and the purpose of it is that we now have time to sit still and dwell in the presence of God in a way we never could when we were younger.

If you can, the next time you wake up three hours before you usually get out of bed, go ahead and get up.  Don’t turn on the radio, or put on a CD or even turn on the lights.  Just go out to your favorite chair and sit there quietly.  Think about the Lord and His blessings.  Allow the Holy Spirit to lead you and let the Lord sit right there in the room with you.  It will be a blessing.

river of peace

I love living for the Lord! It is so wonderful to wake up with a song on your mind and in your heart. What a blessing.

This morning, in that musing time between deep sleep and full waking, the hymn, River of Peace, came running through my mind. It had nothing to do with me because I hadn’t been thinking on peace the night before or even considering the subject, but there it was pouring it’s blessings through my whole being. “Oh, this river of peace Makes me perfect and whole; And its blessings increase, Flowing deep in my soul.:

The Lord spoke through Isaiah and said of His People, Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river (Isa. 66:12) That peace doesn’t come in the things of the world. There will always be wars and conflict, but within the heart of the child of God there is everlasting Peace.

Politicians and religious leaders and humanitarians go around talking of Peace and trying to legislate it or shame people into it. But world peace will never come through the auspices of mankind. Peace comes only through our fellowship with the Lord God. Natural men, men living in the flesh and for the flesh will never come to agreements and harmony. Every natural man strives only for himself, his own desire and benefit. Nothing except the love and grace of God within us can cause a man or woman to truly work for the benefit of others.

So the peace that was pouring through my soul this morning wasn’t that of  peace in the world or peace with among my fellow men. It was the Peace of God that passes all earthly comprehension. D.S. Warner wrote of that Peace more than a hundred years ago and it is just as true now as it was then. This kind of Peace endures.

The River of Peace

I’ll sing of a river divine,  Its waters from trouble release; More precious than “honey and wine,” That river, sweet river is peace.

It reaches from heaven to earth,  It issues from under the throne;  Great peace! oh, thy infinite worth! Sweet peace in my Jesus alone.

Oh, wonderful life-giving flood, Thy waters so crystal and pure  Make glad all the “City of God”; forever thy blessings endure.

Oh, Jesus, the tempest of sin  Is hushed into heavenly rest, Since tasting the pure, living streamThat flows from Thy crucified breast.

My moments as angels appear, All gliding so gently along  Each dropping a blessing so rare, Enraptures my soul with a song.

Refrain:

Oh, this river of peace Makes me perfect and whole;  And its blessings increase,  Flowing deep in my soul

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. John 14: 27

(If you don't know the melody here's a link for it.  http://library.timelesstruths.org/music/River_of_Peace/

me 'n' God 'n' early morning

There’s something about early, early morning that I like. I think it’s the peace of being awake before the world wakes up. I like to sit here quiet with very soft music playing. It’s a time to think about things—not worrisome things or plans or what the day holds, but just to think about the Lord, about how much I love my kids, about happy things that have happened to me.

I used to wonder about Pappy, who would be up in the early morning reading his Bible or just looking out at the day. And now I understand. It is a good time of day.

I’ve never before been able to enjoy this time of day. When I worked at day care, I often woke up in the middle of the night--about this time really 3:30, 4:00. But then it was the stress and pressure of the job that made sleeping short. I had a lot of things to worry about and plan and thing through. It was never this peaceful, quiet kind of wakefulness. I was always trying to go back to sleep.

Then after the day care finally got moved, wakefulness was a habit and when I woke up it was a bother, because I knew I would be tired in the morning and I wanted to go back to sleep. But now it is a joy.

We’ve been talking about having my knees fixed and the possibility of surgery. And that’s good. But I wonder if having my knees repaired will alter the tempo of my days. I don’t want to lose this time alone with me and God and my thoughts. When the Lord healed Rachael of lymphoma, I told Him I wouldn’t bug Him about healing my knees and that promise has paid of in great spiritual dividends. Not being able to walk has left me chair bound and I spend hours some days, reading the bible and following different topics along as the Spirit leads. That’s a very good thing and I don’t want to lose it. I’m afraid if I were able to bop around and do this and that without thinking about the number of steps or the pain involved that I might get so busy with life that I would lose this quiet flow of walking quietly with the Lord.

There’s a peace in this kind of walk. I’ve always loved the Lord and I’ve lived for Him for most of my life—not just drifted along ‘being good’ but consciously made choices to do and be what He would have me to be. And that has been a blessing. But I’ve never been able to just be quietly in the center of His will with no need to get up and going. I know I was pursuing legitimate tasks and I was doing them within His Will. Up until now though, I’ve always had something that needed doing. I’ve always had my times of contemplation cut short by necessities. Now, now I can wake up at 3:30 and sit quietly in the peace with no driving need to go back to sleep so I can wake up in three or four hours and do something important. These hours alone in the dark become my important thing to do.

I used to like sitting in Notah’s old house and looking down across the valley and watching the lights come on, then the color shift from darkness to the lighter and lighter grays of the coming day. “My” window in the Angelo house faced west. So the view was different from watching the sun come up. It was like a window on how that rising sun affected the world. Maybe it wasn’t the blazing beauty of a desert sunrise but it was beautiful and gave me a backwards view of the coming morning.

Then when they moved to Tierra Grande I had a direct view of the Manzanos and the gradual lightening of the sky, the rising sun casting the mountain into relief as the first blush of light shone above it. Sometimes when there were no clouds the brightness seeped up across the entire sky. Other times when there were blowing particles in the air there would be fingers of light blazing up from behind the mountain. And other times, the clouds would put on a spectacular display of reflected and refracted and changing colors as the sun rose from its resting place of the night.

Here in Westerville, I don’t have the pyrotechnics of the sunrise, I have the wall of the neighbor lady’s house. But I still have the peace of morning and the sleeping neighborhood around me. This time of morning it is just me and God. And THAT is a very good thing.

morning, again

I love early mornings. Even though I’m home alone most of the time, and there is no disturbance in the house, it seems that early mornings are more intensely quiet. I woke up at 300. And I’ve been enjoying the quiet.

I like it here, but sometimes I miss the view down across the valley from Notah’s old house on Angelo. And other times I miss looking out at the rising sun behind the Manzanos from his new house on Mallette. I never got to hear the coyotes teasing the dogs at the new house. I think next summer when I am there, I will go and sit out side in the early morning—if I can get out without three dogs thinking they need to go along and protect me.

And when I’m there with Notah’s family, I miss being here with Rachael and I miss my cozy room here with all my junk. I told Rachael yesterday that I know my room is the grubbiest room in the whole house and that the clutter drives her crazy, but I like it and I feel cozy there.

I look forward to the day when we will all be in NM and I can be Notah and his family when ever I want and be with Rachael and Michael whenever I want. Or when ever they will have me.

The woman at Rachael’s store who was slacking on her job performance and doubling the work for everyone else was transferred to another store effective Monday! That was a surprise! Rachael was given the deli-bakery, the department this woman had in such a mess. The new manager told her that if she could straighten it out she would get a promotion out of it. One step closer to NM