Awake, Awake

The first thing I heard from my morning porch perch was the neighbor's rooster.  He was crowing as if pulling the sun up from the edge of the horizon was all about him.  As the stillness of the morning took over, I heard a woodpecker drumming away on some distant tree.  And then, came the sound of a hundred small birds creating a fluttering kind of music in the air.  Hardly had they finished when a distant crow started up and then as that sound cleared the air, Canadian geese rising at a distant pond added their distinct sounds to the early morning chorus.    

No song leader ever led a such a chorus of praise!     For those who think of the rocks and trees as silent sentinels in creation, or who view the birds of the air as insignificant participants in the divine plan, it is impossible not to hear the morning music as creation offering a choral praise to the Creator.  Jesus often spoke of people who had ears not hearing and such is the case with so many of us.  Too many of us live in a creation regarded as silent and empty of any Word from God.      

When I was in my last few years of high school in Alamo, Georgia, there was a small group of guys with whom I hung out a lot.  One of the things we often did in that small town empty of things to do was to go to the church in the evening and sing.  One of the group was the church pianist and organist and the rest of us thought of ourselves as heirs to the legacy of the Blackwood Brother's Quartet.  One of the songs we loved to sing from the Cokesbury Hymnal was the "Awakening Chorus."  It was a rollicking tune we kept trying to sing.  One of its lines said, "The rocks and rills, the vales and hills resound with gladness.  All nature joins to sing the triumph song."  I am grateful I have lived long enough to finally hear.