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Sleepless?

On Tuesdays my alarm goes off a little after 5 AM…don’t ask.

I have been getting some extra sleep, so when I woke up before the alarm went off this morning, bright eyed and ready to start the day, imagine my concern when I turned my phone on to find out it was 1:30 A.M.

Still a whole lot of night left to go and my mind was racing like it was on it’s second cup of joe.

As I laid there, I asked God if there was something He woke me up to pray for…and goodness knows if I don’t get an answer right away I have my own list ready at all times.

So I prayed through some things, but before you think I am all holy and godly and such…I also ran a worried and fretting underlying conversation of things I had committed to and how was I going to get this and that done all the while interspersing this with petitions for various needs.

And if you think that is all that this hay-wired brain can do at 1:30 A.M., rest assured…there was a steady critique of how lame my prayers were and a subtle voice reminding me I am not supposed to be anxious about anything. So I would try to come up with some lines of praise but even that felt trite.

After what seemed like an eternity, I went to the kitchen to get a drink of water and noted on the stove clock that only 15 minutes had ticked by.

I was exhausted by now…but not sleepy.

Over on the table was a little book of meditations for morning and evening. I couldn’t find it before I went to bed so thought maybe if I read the evening one it would be just the word needed to stop this crazy cycle of thoughts in my head.

I opened to the entry for evening and am greeted with these words…

             At Night   

I Neither Slumber nor Sleep

….

seriously

Does God have a sense of humor, or what?

As I chuckled at the irony of the topic and my current state of sleeplessness, I began to read the words and not only does God laugh with us…

He truly is the comfort and word of hope we need.

I lift my eyes to the hills – where does my help come from?

My help comes from the LORD…the Maker of heaven and earth. 

He will not let your foot slip – He who watches over you will not slumber;

indeed 

He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep…

Psalm 121

We can rest and be at peace because He is awake.

And here is the great part.

He isn’t awake because He is pacing the floor.

He isn’t wringing His hands and going over all the things that will have to work out and all the things that might go wrong.

He is watching over us and those we love.

He is guarding us and guiding us even as we sleep.

He is awake because He has no need of sleep.

But we do.

So I let the words of the Psalm settle on me as I settled back under the covers.

And the last thing I remember whispering was a simple prayer of release of my concerns and a prayer of gratitude for the Holy One who watches over us <3

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