ALPHA MAAMA (A.M.)

Falaite Sanuali 6, 2023

 

יום לילה Day and Night

‘Aho mo e Pō

GENESIS 1:5

GOD CALLED THE LIGHT DAY, AND THE DARKNESS HE CALLED NIGHT. AND THERE WAS EVENING AND THERE WAS MORNING, THE FIRST DAY.

SENESI 1:5

Pea na‘e fakahingoa ‘e he ‘Otua ‘a e maama ko e ‘Aho, pea ne fakahingoa ‘a e po‘uli ko e Pō. Pea na‘e efiafi, pea na‘e na‘e pongipongi; ko e ‘uluaki ‘aho ia.

Parents name their children on the day of their birth. So also, when God brought forth the mountains, the earth, and the world (Ps. 90:2), he started naming things left and right. The first two to be christened were Yom ("Day") and Laylah ("Night"). These two halves of the day were like twin brothers, with Laylah being the firstborn (darkness preceding light) and Yom the second-born. Yet, as with other biblical twins, it was the second-born, the younger Yom, whom God chose as his special instrument.

"We are not of the night or of the darkness," Paul says (1 Thess. 5:5). It was during Laylah's half of the day when Judas betrayed Jesus and Peter denied him, when thieves come, when people get drunk. We are children of light, children of Yom, "so then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober" (5:6). "The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light" (Rom. 13:12), for we await the arrival of the New Jerusalem, where the "gates will never be shut by day-and there will be no night there" (Rev. 21:25).

"Be gracious to me, O LORD, for to you do I cry all the day" (Ps. 86:3).