I have been reading a book called "Humility". I know some of you are thinking it is way over due. Actually it should encourage you that I am re-reading it. Even I realize I didn't get it the first time through. Anyway, today I read about sleep. I never thought about sleep as being a built in humbler. Every day I have to stop what I am doing and lay down for 8 hours because my battery is built to only last about 16 hours and then I am done. How strange! Scripture reminds me that there is "One who does not sleep nor slumber" and evidently I am not the "One". Sleep is also a gift. I find I cannot force myself to sleep. There have been nights when I got to bed late and had to get up early. I try to fall asleep fast. Have you ever tried that? It is lousy and never seems to work. I just lay there doing the math in my head. Ok, if I fall asleep right now I will get 6 hours. Ok, if I fall asleep right now, I will get 5 and a half hours. And so it goes. Sleep is a gift God gives me almost every night. When he chooses to not give me that gift then I am challenged the whole next day and just about everyone who comes in contact with me is also given a challenge. The last thing is the pattern of sleep is the pattern of the love of God. I lay down and trust that the next morning I will rise again by the grace of God. It is the resurrection I am reminded of every single night. Maybe that is why at the end of every creation day in Genesis it says,"And there was evening and morning the first day." It feels like morning comes first but it doesn't. It is always night and death and then there is morning and life. So, enjoy today but tonight as you lay down on your bed, let the joy of the Lord be your blanket and sleep in the arms of the God whose mercies will be new again in the morning.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
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6 comments:
A beautiful message.
I recently heard a speaker who was a sleep expert say that 8 hours of sleep is absolutely the number one preventative medicine for each of us.
Yet some nights I wrestle with God, because I do not want to go to bed at a reasonable hour, even though my body is screaming "Go to bed"!
Thank you Pastor Joe.
I too have read that book, Humility, and it has great insight and wisdom in it about the "true greatness" of humility. I need to read it again as well. I remember more from this author about redeeming your time and exchanging it for something good and holy. And getting a good nights sleep is a great way to redeem your time and restore your mind, soul, and heart. When I don't get sleep it interferes with my communion with God and threatens my tranquility...but often I feel that I need to stay up and get more things done or watch another stupid episode of Law and Order, which turns out to totally un-redeemable. I'll never get that hour back. Time may be non-renewalbe...but it's not non-redeemable.
Interesting that you brought up sleep as a gift Joe because I don't think many of that would have thought to list it as a gift. And when you get down to it, the number of unrecognized gifts would probably fill volumes.
Virtually every second alloted to us on this earth is a gift. We forget this. And instead of remembering that our blessings from Him are as in Psalm 1, we tend to think that a blessing is a state of contentedness, or a material thing. The Law of the Lord should be our spiritual residence. Meditating on Him and His word day and night is what constitutes a blessed man. If we would really do that, we would realize just how far we are from our Father, our Creator God. Sleep IS a blessing. And He does give us new mercies each morning. And the breath I am taking this very second is a gift from Him to me. What an amazing God, who loves his horribly depraved people. I am grateful.
I was moved by the insite that God says "there was evening and there was morning---the first day."--not the other way around. Our few short years here on earth really prepare us for death and "our first day".
So please everyone, be gentle to the new moms who would love to have 8 hours of sleep a night. :)
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