Night and Day

It’s funny what grabs you.

I was struck by some words recently – they were words from an Evening Prayer I was reading.

And they said (talking about evening):

This is the time

when others greet the morning

while we meet the night

I was struck by the profound truth contained in these few simple words -  

that as the day ends for us, it is just beginning for someone else.

That, as I lay my head down to sleep, someone else is waking and starting their day.

As I read them, I had a realization – it was one of those things I really should know, but yet at the same time, is so easy to overlook.

In fact, I’m almost embarrassed to admit it.

And it’s this.

Life doesn’t revolve around me.

I mean, we like to think it does.

Pretty much everything in our Western, highly individualised, iPhone/iPad society (the ‘i’ might be lower case but it says something pretty big about our culture) is about me.

And you.

It’s about the individual.

The result, I think, is that we come to think (and live) as if our world revolves around us.

And maybe that’s inevitable – we all have jobs and interests and concerns and needs. So of course, we will think about ourselves.

But this simple prayer acted as a corrective for me.

It kind of jolted me.

The world doesn’t stop when I go to sleep!

God isn’t chiefly concerned with me. And our country and region.

No….I’m just a tiny part of God’s cosmos.

There are another 8 billion or so people.

194 other countries with their respective concerns.

Plus the birds and animals and fish and insects…

…all the created order.

Yes, God loves me.

And is concerned with me. Intimately.

But the universe is so much bigger than just me.

So as you go to bed later, remind yourself, that,

This is the time

when others greet the morning

while we meet the night.