The Lesson of Love: Chapter 18 - One Day at a Time
By J.R. Miller
"And there was evening, and there was morning--the first day." Genesis 1:5
One of the secrets of happy and beautiful life, is to live one day at a time. If we would learn it, it would save us from the worry that in so many people spoils the days, and would add immeasurably to the value of the work we do. For, really, we never have anything to do any day--but the bit of God's will for that day. If we do that well--we have absolutely nothing else to do.
Time is given to us in days. It was so from the beginning. We need not puzzle ourselves trying to understand just what the "day" was in which God wrought in creating the universe--we may leave this matter to the scientific men and the theologians; but it is interesting to know that each day had its particular apportionment in the stupendous work. At the end of each of the creative periods we read, "There was evening and there was morning, one day." So it has been ever since.
Time is measured to us by days. Each day has its particular section of duty, something that belongs in between sunrise and sunset, that cannot be done at all if it is not done in its own hours. "There was evening and there was morning, one day, a second day, a third day." This breaking up of time into little daily portions means a great deal more than we are accustomed to think. For one thing, it illustrates the gentleness and goodness of God. It would have made life intolerably burdensome if a year, instead of a day, had been the unit of division. It would have been hard to carry a heavy load, to endure a great sorrow, or to keep on at a hard duty, for such a long stretch of time. How dreary our common task-work would be--if there were no breaks in it, if we had to keep our hand to the plough for a whole year! We never could go on with our struggles, our battles, our suffering--if night did not mercifully settle down with its darkness and bid us rest and renew our strength.
We do not understand how great a mercy there is for us in the briefness of our short days. If they were even twice as long as they are, life would be intolerable. Many a time when the sun goes down--we feel that we could scarcely have gone another step. We would have fainted in defeat--if the summons to rest had not come just when it did.
Night with its darkness seems to be a blot on the whiteness of day. It seems to fall across our path as an interruption to our activity, compelling us to lay down our work when we are in the very midst of it, leaving it only half done. It seems to be a waster of precious time, eating up half the hours. How much more we could accomplish, we sometimes say, if the sun did not go down, if we could go on without pause! Night throws its heavy veil over the lovely things of this world, hiding them from our view.
Yet night really is no stain on the splendor of day, no thief of time, no waster of golden hours, no obscurer of beauty. It reveals as much beauty as it hides--for no sooner has the sun set, leaving earth's splendor of landscape, garden, and forest in gloom--than there bursts upon our vision the other splendor of the sky filled with glorious stars.
