or be heedless as to its arrival. For the coming of the morning is the coming of Him whom we long to see. It is the coming of Him " who turneth the shadow of death into the morning." (Amos v. 8.) It is the return of Him whose absence has been night, and whose presence will be day. It is the return of Him who is the resurrec- tion and the life, and who brings resur- rection with Him ; the return of Him who is creation's Lord, and who brings with Him deliverance to creation ; the return of Him who is the church's Head, and who brings with Him triumph and glad- ness to his church.
All the joy, the calm, the revivifying freshness of the morning are wrapt up in Him. When He appears, day appears, life appears, fruitfulness appears. The curse departs. The " bondage of corruption " is no more. Clouds, storms, troubles, sorrows vanish. The face of nature reassumes the smile of unfallen times. It is earth's fes- h 3"
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tival, the world's jubilee. " The heavens re- joice, the earth is glad? the sea roars and the fulness thereof, the fields are joyful and all that is therein, the trees of the wood re- joice, the floods clap their hands, and the hills are joyful together before the Lord; for He has come, for He has come to judge the earth ; with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with his truth." (Psa. xevi. 11 ; xcviii. 7.)
This morning has been long anticipated, Age after age it has attracted the church's eye, and fixed her hope. On the promise of it her faith has been resting, and towards the hastening of it her prayers have gone forth. Though afar off, it has been de- scried, and rejoiced in as the sure consum- mation towards which all things are moving forward according to the Father's purpose. " There is a morning " has been the word of consolation brought home to the bur- dened heart of many a saint when ready to say, with David, " I am -desolate/' or with
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Jeremiah, " He hath set me in dark places as they that be dead of old."
Let us dwell for a little on some of these Old Testament allusions to the morning. Let us take first the 30th Psalm.
David had been in sorrow, and in com- ing out of it he makes known to the saints his consolations : — " Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness. For there is but a moment in his anger ; in his favour is life; weeping may endure for a night, but joy
COMETH IN THE MORNING." (Psa. XXX. 4,5.)
The earnest of that morning he had already tasted, but the morning itself he anticipates. Then joy has come. Then he can say, (verse 11,) " Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing : thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with glad- ness." But it is the voice of a greater than David that is heard in this Psalm. It is one of Christ's resurrection Psalms, like the 18th and the 116th. He was "lifted
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up," so that his foes were not made to re- joice over him. He cried, and was " healed." His " soul was brought up from the grave." There was anger against Him " for a mo- ment," when as the sinner's substitute he bore the sinner's curse. But in Jehovah's favour there was " life." He had a night of weeping, a night of " strong crying and tears," when his soul was " sorrowful even unto death," and when beneath the waves of that sorrow he sunk, commending his spirit into the Father's hands. But it was a night no more. Morning came, and with morning, joy. Coming forth from the tomb, he left all his sorrow behind : his sackcloth was put off, and he arose " girded with gladness." He found morning and joy ; and he is " the first-fruits of them that slept." His rising was the rising of his Baints. There was a morning for him, therefore there shall be one for us, — a morning bright with resurrection -glory. Let us next take Psalm forty-ninth.
THE MORNING. 8l
These are Christ's words, as is proved from the quotation of verse 4th in Matt. xiii. 85. He summons the whole world to listen. He " speaks of wisdom," for he is Wisdom. He points to the vanity of riches, and their insufficiency to redeem a soul; and who knew so well as he what a ransom was needed ? He sees men going on in their wickedness, self-confidence, and vain- glory. He proclaims their madness and guilt, — speaking of them as incurable from generation to generation. He contrasts the end of the wicked and the end of the righteous ; ■■' like sheep the former are laid in the grave," — buried out of sight, forgotten, unmourned. " Over them the righteous shall have dominion in the morning." The morning then brings do- minion to the righteous, — redemption from the power of the grave. In this Jesus re- joiced ; in this let us rejoice. This joy of the morning was set before him ; it is the same joy that is set before us. Dominion
82 THE MORNING.
in the morning is that to which we look forward, — a share in the first resurrection, of which they who are partakers live and reign with Christ.