In the dawning, long before the light of day turns it to morning, the stillness is thick. The song birds are absent. It is early. The darkness is changing ever so slightly. Staring intently for long minutes reveals only minute changes. Then there are thin threads of dark blue ribbons above. Each moment they appear fatter and lighter. Darker thicker ribbons separate them from the pitch black which has enveloped all that could be seen the night before. The stars have faded behind the overcast skies. 
Moment by moment the lighter ribbons seemed to be thinner but not overwhelmed be the darker ones. Slowly the light is coming. Not brighter but stronger. Then it happens. There is just a hint of the other color. Then the hue grows, maybe pink, maybe yellow. Ever so slightly but it is true, the dark is ebbing. It is promised.
The trees revealed their nakedness which has been hidden from the light. No thick green canopy adorned their massive branches. No buds sought to be loosed, no flowers eagerly greeted the growing light. Longer hours of nightly darkness has robbed them of the richness they required. There is no teeming of new life sounding out of their gnarled limbs jutting in every direction. Empty nests declared from the crooks they rested upon that it was once so. Life is circled and continued. Its incessant activity has not stopped but has moved in its continuing arch of fulfillment. The new has come, the aged has passed, light has shined, the dark has covered and the cycle will continue. It is promised. It will not fail.
It is a new thing, but it has happened before. Never has it been exactly like this. Just as each fallen snowflake from yesterday is different, so the dawning is not as any has ever been. The promise it carried is the same. Even when the dark has begun to overcome and enveloped the struggles and triumphs of the day before, it is known. There has been a night before that day and the dawn has ended it. The day before has been the same, and the one before that. As long as each memory is recalled, it has happened so. It is coming and would not, could not be denied. It is the promised sign. It is always going to come. It could not, would not ever fail. Each long night has always brought forth the new dawn. Each dark time of terror, each time of joy cloaked from the light, each has yielded to the light. A new day, a time of restoration of the light. The night is done. The day has dawned.
After such a great time, there are only wisps of darker gray scattered over the bluing sky. It is a lighter joyful openness spanning from the horizon in every direction. Yet there is an emptiness. It is not the final dawn. It is not the final fulfillment of the promise. It is not the Day Star arising. Once again it declares those oft repeated words, “I will come again”. To those who have known the glory of the rising within their heart, it is another moment of praise, adoration and affirmation of the love which is their inheritance. It is the continuing reminder that He will come again. It is His promise that He is present in this dawn and one day they will be present with Him. Some day by day, as their time of waiting is enveloped in the gift of death without sting or sorrow. Some waiting alive, living in the hope of His appearing as He promised.
Just as the sun does not fail to extinguish the dark, even so He will not fail to come as He has promised. The Angels asked “Why do you stand gazing up into heaven?” He is coming just as He promised. He is coming to bring liberty. He is coming as surely as the Dawn is coming, as surely as the sun will extinguish the darkness. He is coming because He promised. He is coming because He loves us. He is coming to judge the living and the dead. He rewards those who have trusted in Him for their eternal souls. He pours out His wrath upon those who reject His truth and believe the lie. All will stand before Him. Some praising and rejoicing. Some in silence. Condemned by their own rejection of who He is. It is promised.