In the dark of night, when my eyes are open, all the trials of life seem amplified. The heart turns moronic when left to its own devices. I know this is true because I’ve experienced it hundreds, maybe thousands, of times. God’s word confirms that my heart isn’t to be trusted.
The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick;
Who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9)
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5)
Watch over your heart with all diligence,
For from it flow the springs of life. (Proverbs 4:23)
The psalmists often view the night as a time for worship and meditation. Perhaps they also felt the fragility of their own hearts in the dark and understood they needed to seek the Lord to recover stability.
l will bless the LORD who has advised me;
Indeed, my mind instructs me in the night. (Psalm 16:7)
When I remember You on my bed,
I meditate on You in the night watches. (Psalm 63:6)
LORD, I remember Your name in the night,
And keep Your Law. (Psalm 119:55)
My eyes anticipate the night watches,
So that I may meditate on Your word. (Psalm 119:148)
Night and day are the same to God. He’s not affected by emotions or fears. He is a constant source of stability, comfort, and strength. His provisions cease not simply because the moon replaces the sun.
Yours is the day, Yours also is the night;
You have prepared the light and the sun. (Psalm 74:16)
If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me,
And the light around me will be night,”
Even darkness is not dark to You,
And the night is as bright as the day.
Darkness and light are alike to You. (Psalm 139:11-12)
I want to view the night in this way: a time to rest and to be with my King. I love falling asleep whispering His exaltations. And should He stir me for earnest, fervent prayer, may I enter the battle with Him as the warrior He is shaping, not the defeated former self. There is great light in the night when I fight right!
My friend Sandy used to call my nighttime activity “prowling.” We joked that a little man named Prowley ran the nightshift for the gears in my brain. She’d often say, “Put Prowley away, honey, and go schreep.”
Be gone pestering ponderings.
Away with you, mental wanderings.
I sigh but say goodbye to the howling of prowling.
Why?
Because I have better things to do with the night.
To declare Your goodness in the morning
And Your faithfulness by night. (Psalm 92:2)
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