Echoes From the Campfire

Do you know the Western land? Do you know the far plains and the high, snow-crested ridges? Do you know the beaver streams, the water laughing in the bright sun? Do you know the sound of wind in pines? The cloud shadows on the desert’s face? Have you stood on a high ridge and looked fifty miles across the country, country known only to Indians, antelope, and buffalo?
     “Have you crawled out of your bedroll in the chill of a spring morning with the crisp air fresh in your lungs and the sound of running water in your ears? Have you started a fire and made coffee, and broiled your venison over an open fire? Have you smelled ironwood burning, or cedar?”
               –Louis L’Amour  (To Tame A Land)

     “Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice; let the sea and all that fills it resound.  Let the fields and everything in them exult.  Then all the trees of the forest will shout for joy before the LORD, for He is coming–for He is coming to judge the earth.  He will judge the world with righteousness and the peoples with His faithfulness.”
               –Psalm 96:11-13 (HCSB)
———————————–
I was out the other morning and as I was crossing over Wolf Creek on my way to Huntsville several thoughts sprinted through my mind.  The old song by Albert Brumley came to my mind, “I’ll meet you in the morning, by the bright river side…”  The morning was near perfect, for we will not see a perfect morning until we get to Heaven.  Wait, my mind told me to hold on and ponder for a moment.  Will there be mornings in Heaven?  If there is no night is there a need for a morning?  If there is no time, is there a need for a morning?  It made me also wonder, will we sleep at all in eternity?
     The morning that Brumley was speaking of was when we “sleep” (the term Paul uses in regard to the death of a believer) then wake up in glory.  That will indeed be a grand morning–a perfect morning.  I remember reading somewhere (and I looked for it) of a person who spent too much of his life sleeping when the sun was just rising.  How he wished he could go back and relive those morning moments.  I’ve tried to make it a habit never to miss a sunrise.  When I see the sun come up, or if it doesn’t show on a dreary day, I still think about those precious promises, “Because of the LORD’s faithful love we do not perish for His mercies never end.  They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.” (Lamentations, 3:22-23, HCSB).
     Many of David’s Psalms speak of meeting with the Lord early in the morning.  In the morning David recalls, often, the mercies of the Lord.  The psalmist of 119:147 writes, “I rise before the dawning of the morning, and cry for help; I hope in Your word.” (NKJV)  Jesus sought solace and solitariness in the morning; it was a special time for Him to be with His Father.  “Now in the morning having risen a long while before daylight, He went out and departed to a solitary place; and there He prayed.” (Mark 1:35, NKJV)