Or perhaps, as you have shaded your eyes from his noonday splendour, you
may have remembered that it was God in heaven who made that wonderful sun
to light up the sky, and that he has been shining down upon this earth ever
since; but did you ever stop to ask such a question as this--
How long has that great sun, which is now above my head, been shining in
the sky? Or, again, as he passed in glory out of sight, How many beautiful
sunsets have there been since he first began to "rule the day" and to rise
in the east and set in the west?
Ah! so long a time that no thought of ours could measure it; so many
sunsets that we could never count them. All we can know about it is that
there was a time, long, long ago, when the sun first set and a time when he
rose upon the earth, which was then so beautiful--fresh from the hand of
God.
This world of ours is a very old world, but there was a time when all was
new; not only the sun and moon, but all that you see around you had a
beginning--a birthday. There was a time when no such things were, and there
was a time when they began to be. Now it is about this beginning that I
want you to think a little.
[Illustration: "HOW PLEASANT THE LIFE OF A BIRD MUST BE!"]
As we open our eyes to-morrow morning and see the light come in at the
window, let us thank God that He has made His sun to shine upon us, to send
away the darkness and bring a new day. And as the light grows and grows,
and we lie awake and listen to the morning songs of the thrushes and
blackbirds and the chatter of the sparrows, do not let us forget that God
gave its own sweet note to every one of those warblers, and that the air
has been full of the songs of birds ever since the day, so long ago, when
the first little lark flew up, up, up into the blue sky and sang its first
song, so full of gladness.
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