Sweet Dreams

It is useless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, anxiously working for food to eat; for God gives rest to his loved ones. (Psalm 127:2 NLT)

While trying to sleep last night (this morning), I was doing what I most often do with my insomnia, I was praying. Praying for God to have mercy on me, I was overcome with all the thoughts of how out of control my circumstances were and that I had no way to ‘solve’ any of them. While asking God to show me what to do, the song ‘Lay me down’ came flooding into my mind, so as I laid there thinking about the words….I lay me down I’m not my own, I belong to you alone, lay me down, lay me down, hand on my heart this much is true, there’s no life apart from you, lay me down, lay me down…

I knew I was serving God, praying for others and for my family, but some area of my life I was holding out. I wasn’t giving EVERYTHING to God, I wasn’t giving God EVERY part of me.

With this revelation and the fact that I had been struggling for a couple of hours to fall back asleep, I began to confess to God that I knew I had so much wrong in my life, and it was only by his grace and mercy that I could come to Him in prayer for forgiveness, blessings, favor and answers. I was now exhausted, completely unable to sleep and frustrated with the situation.  I began crying out that even though I knew God was always with me and that His Word tells us we are not forsaken;  but when I struggled with my sleep that’s how exactly how I felt - forsaken - that I didn’t deserve the sleep and even though I knew every good thing is from God, so this inability to sleep and stay asleep was from the enemy, my mind argued that I must deserve this torment - I thought on how I always prayed for sleep and was unable to sleep, not understanding why this simple prayer couldn’t be answered. 

Knowing those thoughts were wrong and not inline with the scriptures and God’s promises, I asked for forgiveness for feeling that way, that God loves me and He isn’t withholding sleep from me and that’s when I fell asleep, I mean I completely passed out, no other thoughts, just sleep. This morning after I awoke and started thanking God for my sleep, I remembered that I had asked God the other day to show me where I needed to repent and well, we know God’s timing is perfect; so I believe God needed me to be in that sleepless, frustrated state to realize how I was holding my sleep issues against God, and what better way to show His faithfulness than to give me the deepest most peaceful sleep I had experienced in a long time.

But if we own up to our sins, God shows that He is faithful and just by forgiving us of our sins and purifying us from the pollution of all the bad things we have done. (1 John 1:9 Voice)