More that rises in the morning...

    My would-have-been friend, Rich Mullins wrote a song when I was 9 yrs old about how "there's more that rises in the morning than the sun".  He listened and reported like a prophet on the deeper things that call out to the human soul, the Spirit that sustains all our humanity and creation.
   When I walk out on the back porch before dawn, I look east and see glowing lights on the horizon.  It is not a sunrise at all.  It is led and sulfur lights that have twinkled all night to report human activity of airport and shopping mall and franchises that eat off the cell wall of the city.
   What I hear is a few cars cruising up the main road and a few robins, all us early birds up to get something accomplished this Saturday before dawn.  Listen harder.  Listen longer.  I hear a distant train, an airplane, my children upstairs waking to play nerf war.  Listen more, hear the Spirit of God.  Become aware of His presence even in a suburb.  Even here and now.  Yes.  God is still within her she will not fall. God will help her at the break of day. (Psalm 46:5)
    Think through the day with gratitude, opening the porch doors for the fresh, crisp air of grace.  thankful for breath.
   Reflecting on the day, realize there is a battle to be fought and if I merely ignore it, I am therein defeated.  Blind and deaf to the beauty of God's heart would be our default and my defeat. I would simply believe that all we can see is all there really is, or worse yet, all we can feel is all that is real. Lord, keep us truly alive to the Life that is Abundant.  Keep us sharp and quick to Truth, Love, and gratitude. 
  The sky is getting lighter and it is overcast this morning. I don't see a sunrise still in the east.  But I do know that it is rising.  We are like campers in a tent waking to the light, the sun isn't visible.  But we cannot go on sleeping because the sun is making everything else visible and I know that it is time to get going.  Time to get going.