MONDAY, July 27 (William Reed Huntington)

Never have I been a morning person. But when our new priest announced that daily Morning Prayer would begin at our church, I vowed to go in support of his efforts.

Had I read about this in the bulletin, I would have decided against it. After all, this would mean getting up by 5:30 a.m. every day to walk the dogs, get ready for work, and leave the country by 7:00 for the drive to church by 7:30.

In all my years, getting up by 7:00 a.m. had been a struggle. But my vow to attend this new service regularly was so quick and so public that I had to keep it.

Now, some three years later, I waken the dawn with God. My conversation with him begins as I step out on the porch with two dogs. As the shadowy darkness retreats on one side of the road, I see the first radiant glimpse of peachy blue skies on the other.  I see wildlife darting home after a night of grazing. I hear birds chirping in thanksgiving after a night of surviving predators.

And I'm all the more aware that this "night person" is functioning that early only because God is with me, a powerful thought that keeps me all day.

PRAY for the Diocese of Vanuatu (Melanesia)

Ps 56, [58] * 64, 65; 2 Samuel 2:1-11;  Acts 15:36-16:5; Mark 6:14-29