Are you a morning person? Work schedules often dictate whether we are or not. Still, when an early riser’s routine is interrupted for vacations, retirement, or the like, he will usually continue waking at an early hour and eagerly prepare to jump into the day’s activities, whether that includes coffee with friends, a brisk morning walk, shopping, or whatever.
Some of us need an alarm clock to rouse us. Some can sleep through a typhoon; others sit bolt upright at the sound of a cat softly padding across the room. Regardless, we awaken from sleep to face a new day at some point. Depending on what the day holds, most of us, from time to time, have mornings of pulling the covers over our heads and ducking under them for a few more minutes of shut-eye.
Not God. Look what He does every morning…The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness (Lamentations 3:22-23 ESV). Merciful, loving God creates new mercies every morning to cover the predicaments and blunders we entangle ourselves in that would otherwise end in disaster and judgment if not for His divine mercy intervening. His mercy results in not only forgiving us but also withholding punishment for our wrongdoings and mistakes.
God is not the only one who appreciates the morning and starts even then to create mercies that will benefit us and bless our day. Jesus, too, recognized the value of the early morning hours to connect with the Father. Mark 1:35 says, and in the morning, rising up a great while before day, He [Jesus] went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed. There is something so serene about the morning hours before the hustle and bustle of the day crowd out the quietness of the night.
John Bunyan, the English writer of Pilgrims’ Progress, said, “He who runs from God in the morning will scarcely find Him the rest of the day.” Giving attention to the Lord at the beginning of the day by spending time in prayer, meditation, and Bible reading is a great way to wake up your spirit and mind to the reality of the Lord before you walk out the door to face another day of life in the fast lane. The psalmist says, in Psalm 119:148, My eyes are awake before the watches of the night, that I may meditate on Your promise.
What about the mornings that hold the heaviness of a day you’re dreading? Ugh. Tests in school, uncomfortable work situations, boring meetings or classes, unpleasant appointments—these are some things that whisper to us to pull the covers over our heads and forget about what lies ahead. If we start the day with the Lord, it can make all the difference in the world. THE MESSAGE translation describes what can happen in Isaiah 50:4-5: The Master, God, has given me a well-taught tongue, So I know how to encourage tired people. He wakes me up in the morning, wakes me up, opens my ears to listen as one ready to take orders. The Master, God, opened my ears, and I didn't go back to sleep, didn't pull the covers back over my head.
In another version, verse 4 reads, He wakens me morning by morning. The image is drawn from a master wakening his pupils early for instruction. In the stillness of the morning, time with the Lord can be just that. Why not try it? He’s already been making new mercies to cover you, but that’s just the beginning of what He has in store! What kind of new mercy will He show you today? It’s a great day to say, Good morning, Lord! Top ‘o the morning to You!
(The picture above is a stunning Alaskan sunrise my friend Sue Green captured on camera recently. Many thanks for sharing God's handiwork!)
© 2022, Chris Werre
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