Morning has broken... like the first morning

Morning light is changing. The first flush of dawn is softer, pastel rather than bright and sharp, often wreathed in fog, the hills below wrapped in clouds with only the tops peeking through. As I sit and look out at the front pasture, there is a misty impressionistic edge to the trees and fields. The cool stillness of the early morning is a gentle blessing for all the hurry of the day to come. The horses and the donkeys run and kick up their heels when I let them out of the stalls, rejoicing in the beginning of the day.
Each season of the year has its own special flavor in the morning... spring crab apple sweet, summer marigold sharp, fall tangy apple sweet and sour, winter dry wine. The mornings of each of these seasons is different and like my children, there is no favorite, just differences. Fall mornings with their softer edges are preparing me for my time of remembrance. The sour pain of loss is sweetened by the joy of memories.
I love early morning time. As a mother responsible for getting the kids up, fed and off to their days, I lost my mornings to the business of living and family. Now that children are grown and gone, I wallow in the pure pleasure of watching and feeling another day come to be. Perhaps it has something to do with my allotment of days growing shorter as well as time for appreciation... whatever the reason, I am grateful for fall early mornings.
Not only does the quality of light change in autumn, but the days shorten as well. Even though the change has been coming gradually, there is always one day when I wake up and feel the difference. It is dark when I wake up and dark when I come home from eating supper with Mama. I have to gather the horses and donkeys up before I go down the hill because it is harder to round them up in the dark. Morning light comes more slowly and evening shade comes more quickly. The sunset light no longer lingers as a benediction on the hills. The lazy light of summer is gone.
I wonder what the first mornings were like. Was the dawn of all creation a spring, summer, fall or winter day? Or perhaps it was all of them with creation time taking all the seasons to accomplish. Creation does take time... time to consider and savor the possibilities as well as the outcome. I suspect God took a long time, perhaps many seasons, so the pleasure of creation could sustain him in the hard, lonely, angry days to come as her creation children tested the Love that brought them into being.
The wonderful old Christian hymn “Morning is Breaking” was written in 1922 by Eleanor Farjeon. I love the images of the first dewfall, the first sunrise, the first day. But it is in the living of all the days that follow the firsts, all the seasons of the years as they flow by in a river of time, that we can choose to live as God intended, in the fullness of time. The fullness of time... not just our favorite season, not just in the firsts, but in all our days and in all our ways of being... filled with the Love that knows no ending. And as we live the seasons of our lives loving the One who first loved us, our light changes just as the morning light changes. It becomes brighter, steadier, softer, sharper, and sweeter as our soul’s creation ripens in the fullness of God’s time.
Dearly Beloved Three in One, let me not lose sight of times passing in the scurrying around days of my life. Catch me up in the glory of the season’s light that I might see Thee more clearly as my time is drawing to a close. For those whose light is flickering, keep them close by so that they might feel the warmth and see the LoveLight that surrounds their days even in the midst of fear and distress. May it be so for all of your Morning Creation. Amen.

Morning has broken...

My fall every morning routine... get up at 6:30 or 7... fix a cup of hot tea and eat breakfast... go to the stable and feed horses and donkeys hay... write for an hour or so... feed cows two to four bales of hay. Winter sees another afternoon feeding added to the mix. On Mondays I go to town with mama for a grocery/cat food/used book store/eat lunch out/physical therapy trip. Tuesdays I catch up on household work and get ready for my Wednesday class. Wednesday I teach a group of women who are exploring their creativity. We play for three hours with many different kinds of art material and I am always surprised by the sheer beauty that lives inside each person’s soul waiting for a path to be made plain. Thursdays are consumed by two three hour classes in picture matting and framing that I teach at our local community college. One class is in the morning and one at night. Fridays and Saturdays are at home days with Michael, tending to farm chores... bush hogging, wood cutting... and visiting with friends. Sundays have traditionally been reserved for church but since we left church, Sundays are becoming Sabbath with rest, ritual and relief from the press of the world.
This morning I am sitting at my computer listening to the sounds of friends moving back and forth, up and down the stairs, fixing breakfast, soft conversation of the easy sort that comes with years of relationship. It is the Morning Hymn for this Sabbath. After twenty eight years, we are having a reunion and I am reminded why I fell in love with these friends in the beginning. They know how to be and do communion and community. For all these years, they have met monthly with a book discussion as the formal agenda while they lived their lives together as the Family of God. Death, divorce, weddings, children with cancer, illness, successes, joys and celebrations have been held close in the tender hearts of this group. Countless meals prepared, prayers prayed, hugs handed out, tears wiped away, conflict managed with grace, differences diffused by the Love that binds these children of God together.
This group of women taught me how to make homemade bread, danced with me in worship (I have the pictures to prove it), celebrated the birth of our son Adam, introduced me to the world of organic eating before there was such a concept, made sand candles at the beach retreat, showed me how to live a creative joyfilled life in the midst of the “dailiness” of life, included me in a sisterhood that continues to this day. They showed up Friday with their husbands, their own sheets and towels, and meals prepared. I was allowed to cook the Friday night meal but everything else was brought by the group. We ate high on the hog all weekend long. It was wonderful slow food prepared with care and love. Meals lasted long after we had finished eating as we sat around the table talking and listening. Candlelight and fireflames lit and warmed the room and love’s warmth eased our hearts as we sat together. Every meal was Eucharist and all were welcome at the table.
Eukharistia... origin Greek...thanksgiving... combination of eu “well” and kharizesthai “offer graciously”... For this small moment in time on Sabbath Rest farm, all was well and all was offered graciously. We gathered together, the wine and bread of our lives offered up to one another and to God. Laughter, tears, worship, walks, hayrides, animal blessings, a new Psalm written for me, good food, remembrance of the lives we have shared apart and together... There is no hitch in the getalong of my soul this Sabbath. It has been a gracious plenty and I am filled up and overflowing with thanksgiving.

Peggy’s Psalm for the Animals ( A New Psalm 151) Written by Judy Timmons

O God, you have created them for our care and our pleasure,
The horse Junie B to munch the grass and give me rides in her saddle
The source of my long awaited desire to have a horse of my own.
The once silent donkeys who have found their voices,
Braying to let us know of their hunger or displeasure,
Following close on our heels to greener pastures.
Daddy’s cows and their descendants who marvel at these hills,
So different from flat Georgia pastures.
Barn cats and yard dogs, creations of Yours, all,
Doing their duties-taking care of the grain mice and
Chasing away intruders, whether on two legs or four.

O Lord, how wonderful is your creation of all these four footed beasts
That we fondly call friends and helpers on this much loved land of yours.
You have loaned them to us for a time as you have shared all your world with us
For our care and pleasure.

O Lord, they and we need rain to grow their feed and to nourish our soil and our souls.
Hear our prayer for life-gicing showers of blessings from the heavens.
Turn not a deaf ear to our entreaties.
Answer this prayer and pour down your healing waters of liquid love on all of us.