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It was near midnight, but feeling wakeful and restless, I had gone outside to sit on the patio. At this hour, no lights were visible and the only sounds were the distant murmur of traffic on the highway and briefly, the faint far away clatter of a passing train, fading away into the night. Only a sliver of moon showed in the sky and even the stars appeared to be in hiding. I had the sense of being all alone in a quiet, secluded world; not a depressing mood; rather one of soothing and peace in the surrounding darkness.
Suddenly, into the quiet night, there was lifted from the throat of some lonely dog, the longest, the saddest, the most forlorn and mournful howl l have ever heard. When the last quavering wail ended, silence fell again. And then, after a while, another sound--- but this time it was the midnight concert of a mockingbird, or a nightingale or some other night- bird. This was the sweetest, the clearest, the most beautiful and purest liquid music that one could imagine, pouring out it's magic into the night.
I could not but compare the difference in the two sounds that had fallen on my ears. The first, so sad a shiver, a chill of desolation crept over me. I thought, "How like the yearning, desperate cry of a soul facing the endless night of eternity without Christ, lost and wandering, with no home, no hope, no peace."
The second sound had been so utterly beautiful I found myself holding my breath on the brink of sudden tears. "This," I thought, is like the joyous song of a soul set free from the bondage and sorrow of sin, and has found forgiveness and gladness and release in Christ Jesus. "In Him the redeemed soul finds it's song of praise and with holy abandon, sings it's melody of peace, of assurance, of a home in Heaven, best of all of the Savior who wrote the music .
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