LIGHT OF DAWN

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LIGHT OF DAWN

the gentle unfolding of light

untouched, untarnished and pure

Rev. Dr. Robert E. Donaldson

Published by

World Wide Web Witness Inc.

September 2001

ISBN pending

Preface

In the beauties of holiness, from the womb of the morning, you have the dew of your youth.

So says Psalm 110, regarding the Messiah. These things are given attention in detail in Joyful Jottings Ch. 9 (JJ 23). For the moment, however, our thought is on the beauty of the depiction.

The womb of the morning - this suggests the earliest tendrils, the first beginnings, the faintest stirrings of what is to become assured day. It is early, not polluted, and has not yet seen the dark enterprises, devious dealings and regrettable evils of man; nor for that matter, has it regarded the excellences of godly deeds, glorious triumphs of God's grace and noble kindnesses.

It is stirring from the light source, to become available to us. It is rather faint, yet filled with hope, a hope that is certain to be fulfilled. If the sun may die, yet the Lord God will not, and THIS, it is HIS SON of whom the Psalmist speaks.

Further, not merely is this a dawning light. It is that of One whose intrinsic nature is beauty, splendour of majesty coupled with holy humility which makes Him, in the format of a man, what my grandfather once called, delicious. Unfortunately he was not at that time a believer in Him, but this He saw. For that, one praises God.

In the beauty of holiness, in the dawn of the morning, then, we see this figure, so unlike the ugliness of sin, in the dusk of darkness, also assuredly to come. It is then that a new feature enters. He is also to be seen having the dew of His youth. There is nothing disabling, nothing veteran and deprived about Him: in the full force of vigour, unscarred by fading powers, ebullient and unstrained, needing no restraint, realised, expressive, the very word of God incarnate, He dignified the place of man, by showing the heights to which it could relate, restored the place for many, by providing the way to get there, and broke the hold not only of disease as an ultimate fear, but of death as terminal judgment, by breaking it, withering it with His own body, arising from its maw, or womb, as one incapable of there being retained.

In Psalm 110, there He is, spiritual, unmarred, holy, in the beauty of His life and drinking by the brook. Quietly refreshed by serene means, He continues to do what must be done, until it is finished (John 19:30), thus having purchased eternal redemption for those who so receive Him (Hebrews 9:12).

In this work, we shall walk with Him in His effulgent light, lustrous yet gentle, penetrating yet pure, and find the things fit for pasture, as He enables us and leads beside the quiet waters.
Things obscure in the pre-dawn dilemmas of ineptitude, where the sheep had no Shepherd, become clear in the light of His word, moving us to see, this way and that, with all the masterful gentleness of Him who alone has all understanding. It proceeds from Him with that sure grace so characteristic of the Shepherd, and so flitting, fleeting and flimsy in this world elsewhere. Even His servants are but followers, yet of One of such effusive light, radiant with gentleness. He and His word, for they are as written and as sent, Himself, they stand eternal, and this ? it is because He IS the Eternal (cf. Psalms 90-91).

For those not yet Christians, observe how He feeds His people among the lilies. Beauty is nothing to be ashamed of; the capacity to bear ugliness is fine: the desire to love it is folly. Let us then rejoice in the beauty of the Lord, and follow Him. Let us all come to delight in His truth. It moves not at all, but all things move because of it.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1

Softly, Softly, and Listen to the
Tone of His Voice

CHAPTER 2

Fixations, Fundamentals and Faith

News 167

The Australian, August 20, 2001
The Advertiser idem

CHAPTER 3

The Eternal State,
the Millenium
and A New Heavens and New Earth

CHAPTER 4

The Reward Obsession and its Pals

CHAPTER 5