4/8/51

Scripture: Exodus 16: 1-10.

Text: Exodus 16: 7; “And in the morning, then ye shall see the glory of the Lord.”

Morning is a time of hope. It was in the morning when somebody discovered that Jesus’ tomb in the garden was empty. With the dawn of the day, there dawned also the consciousness that there is a living Christ who still influences mightily his disciples of every generation and land.

Those who watch through the night in desperation by the bedside of some loved one who is seriously ill usually feel better in the morning -- more hopeful, more confident, more competent. Do you remember the story of Paul’s shipwreck, when the crew realized they were approaching some land? Fearful that the ship might be driven on rocks “they cast four anchors out of the stern and wished for the day.” [Acts 27: 29]. When the day did come, it was still wild and stormy, but they found the way to save themselves alive from the wreckage of their ship.

So many mornings are full of hope and lovely freshness. The sunshine on fresh snow in the winter, or on newly opened blossoms in the spring. And there is a glory about living that comes after the rest of the night. There is the assurance of such a morning in a line or two of the Scriptural story we read this morning. It is set in a background of discontent. The children of Israel were complaining. It was not open rebellion, it was just “murmuring,” in the words of the ancient story. That is a good description of discontent. The faith of those people was not very strong. Indeed, it required the insecurity of some years of wandering in a wilderness to develop the trust in God and reliance on self necessary to real freedom.

On this particular occasion, there was not enough food, or of anything in the desert that they could find to eat. With unsatisfied stomachs, they quickly forgot the remarkable deliverance they had had at the Red Sea no more than a month earlier. The whip bruises on their backs were scarcely healed. Their hands were marked with slave-toil. --- But they forgot, in their discontent, the hardships they had suffered and hated in Egypt, and they were remembering only that there had been some meat and bread of a sort for them there. Their murmurings were that it had been better to subsist on slave rations than to hunger and starve in the wilderness.

I wonder; would we be any different from them, still, centuries later? While they were in Egypt, they cried out against oppression and were willing to give up anything for liberty. Now that they had it, they were ready to go back into bondage for a stomach full of food. It is against the background of this story of complaint and bitterness that the words of their leaders shine: “In the morning, then shall ye see the glory of the Lord.” Light, hope, food, enough.

The daybreak experiences that come to men and women from time to time, in every time, reveal the glories of God. How many a child, fretful, tired, and discouraged, suffering from some pain or discouragement, is put to bed by a mother who says, “Now go to sleep; it will be better in the morning.”

A. Even grownups know a wonderful therapy in sleep. Tumbling wearily to bed, tired and discouraged after a day when all went wrong, you fall asleep. Your time had been wasted in some profitless way; people were difficult for you; problems arose wherever you looked; there was just too much to do; the outlook was discouraging and things were a mess! But the next morning came fresh and new; sleep had knit together again the raveled ends of care; and life seemed again possible. “He giveth unto his beloved sleep.” [Psalm 127: 2]. Particularly did it seem possible, if in the fresh morning, you laid hold on the power of God, offered to assist you. I have heard a busy man say that the way he gets through his worst, and most crowded, days is to begin the day with a prayer that God will take hold of his life, keep open his mind, quicken his understanding, and direct his decisions.

I once knew, rather well, a man who all his life, had made a practice of daily devotions, each morning before breakfast. He and his wife read together, thoughtfully, a short portion of the Bible, prayer (they always knelt) and then felt ready for what the day was to do for them, or they were to do in the day. Their children were included, so long as they would get up and come. When they got old enough to be lazy about getting there, the parents still stuck invariably to their devotional rule. So significant was it for their daily living that I once heard the man say that he had recently forgotten, in the press of some unusual morning activity, the devotional moments of that morning. He got to his office hot and bothered and soon found his mind snarled up with indecision and frustration. He grinned, uneasily and sheepishly, when he admitted that he had gone down the back stairs, driven back to his house, deliberately sat down with his Bible for those few moments of reading and meditation when he earnestly sought divine guiding -- and then returned to his customary duties for the rest of the day!

God seems to breathe on us, with each new morning, “Here is a fresh opportunity; a clean page; a new beginning. Here is a new song to be heard, a different country to be explored, another chance to do better.” And all you need, to see that glory in the morning, is to give over that day to God.

B. That glory is further heightened by a devotional use of the Lord’s Day. It is necessary, to the kind of living the Creator intended for his creatures, that we have a periodic day of rest. The best rest day is not one of sheer laziness; nor is it just a press of activity different from that of the other six days. It is most gloriously refreshing if it is marked as the Lord’s Day with time and attention set aside and marked for our worship. The church bells call us to see the glory of the Lord. This is what you are looking for -- hoping for -- some communion with God. You want to feel the divine presence near -- and real -- and caring for you. You want to pray, to feel clean inside, to be assured of forgiveness, to find a resurgence of strength to do better. Here your aspirations are revived, and your longings for better are fed and nourished.

It is a wonderful thing that Christ is able to use church services, with all their human weaknesses and deficiencies, for the fulfilling of his promise that: “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” [Matthew 18: 20]. Many people who go to church could not tell you precisely why they go. Maybe we do not always know. Perhaps we’ve never thought it out exactly -- or do not know how to express it in words. But our hearts would probably say something like this:

I came here hoping, longing to find God;

I need more faith. I want more faith.

I want to believe; I don’t want to be cynical.

I need strength to carry on.

I am concerned about some loved ones -- far away,

or beyond my power to help.

The only thing I can do now is to pray; and that

I do want to do.

I need some help for living effectively and carefully

through the week --

Maybe I don’t know what it is -- but I need it.

And I’m hoping to find it here.

Should we marvel that it happens, again and again?

God is in his churches:

Singing --- has a radiance.

Anthems --- glorious.

Scripture -- enlightening, and rereading of truth.

Organ lifts us.

Faces expectant of blessing.

Prayers of the people - far more than the voice of the minister.

There is good --- there is God! That’s it! It happens over and over in church after church, among hosts of people.

C. The morning of life is good -- childhood -- teachable, believing. Jesus -- “To go into the kingdom of Heaven -- become as a little child.” Not childish, but child-like, with some sense of wonder and appreciation.

We get

so blasé

so sophisticated

so worldly wise.

And so often “burnt” in our certainty that we know so much.

We get so carried away with what we know -- or somebody knows -- with advancing science, that we forget to wonder over what we do not know except by faith and trust.

The wonder of the day is sometimes terrified, dulled and confiscated by wrong-doing.

A Washington, DC, minister sees young people who come from sheltered, happy homes, arrive in the capital city of our nation:

-- thrown into the independence of life there;

-- thrown into social pressures, some of which are not wholesome;

-- meeting among many folk, some whose moral standards are far more base than their own.

They begin with questionings about the principles their parents and teachers at home held to. They discover -- sometimes with great shock -- a great deal of various kinds of immorality in the city. People tell them that being “narrow-minded” and “old-fashioned” is a greater evil than moral sin. Some “rationalize” the concept of sin out of their lives. So --- compromise here --- give up ideal there. It is hard to be different unless one is powerful to lead in difference. No one likes to be thought “queer.” So they start doing what others do. But that isn’t a real cure for the homesickness, and loneliness, and desperation. They discover that you can’t do wrong and feel right.

Conscience troubled -- Feel ashamed, unclean, miserable.

Can the glory be recaptured?

Great danger here: “You’ve done it now. You can never go back. You may as well be like the others and try to have a good time of it!” And maybe your dad and mother were wrong anyway. But there is still that small voice of conscience within you.

There can be another glorious song. If your heart is penitent; if you look fairly and squarely at the cross.

Listen: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Jesus: “I am come to seek and to save that which was lost.” [Luke 19: 10].

Christ: “Whosoever cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.” [John 6: 37]. And that “whosoever” includes every one of us.

D. Glory for one who attaches his efforts to a great cause.

Missionaries of the generation before mine -- “The evalgelization of the world in their generation.”

An “invasion” of every land where Christ is not yet known.

Failed of the entire purpose --- but missions still go on; an invitation to the lands where those new churches are living.

(Japan still in the Christian family).

“Revolutionary zeal” for America.

We’ve got so much of what we wanted that we must not forget to help for a fitter moral and material world for everybody.

If we’re up, let’s help.

(Judge Case -- like to see her get ahead).

(end it).

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, April 8, 1951 (editor’s decision on the year.)