glorious: live accordingly. Live worthy of your hope. Aim high. Set your
night, and which is not yet full day. 'Joy cometh in the morning.' This is the period of the morning star; the second coming; the first resurrection; the deliverance of creation; the restoration of Israel, and the kingdom of the saints. It is to this that the promise here refers, 'I will give him the morningstar;' and it corresponds with the 20th of the Revelation, 'Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection.' It is something very bright and glorious, yet not perfect,—intermediate between night and noon. (3) The eternal state. There the full sun shines in its noonday glory. All is perfection; every trace of the curse is wiped away; every cloud and mist pass off; the new heavens and the new earth are manifested in their perfect glory. 1. Seek to be sons of the morning.—In one aspect this is identical with being children of light and day. But it expresses more. Such have their special portion in the glory and freshness of the dawn. They catch the first ray of streak of coming sunshine. The world's night will soon be done, and all whose portion is in it shall perish with it. But the morning cometh! Let us seek our portion there, and, seeking it, be conformed to the glory which is then to be revealed. Live, and act, and walk as sons of morning. Let the world recognize you as such. Let there be streaks of dawn seen upon you. 2. Live upon your prospects.—The 'things hoped for' are the Christian man's prospects,—prospects in which there is no uncertainty, and over which there hangs no cloud. Look at them; study them; keep them constantly before your mind. Fix your eye upon the morning-star. Draw strength, joy, comfort, vigor, out of them. They are meant to yield all these. 3. Live up to your prospects.—They are very bright, unspeakably glorious: live accordingly. Live worthy of your hope. Aim high. Set your affection on things above. Be not conformed to this world. Take up a high and true position. Forget the things behind; reach forward to that which is before. Press toward the mark. Be molded by these blessed hopes. Think of the morning, and the morning star; keep separate from the night, and the men of the night, and the things of the night.