Yesterday a post rocked me like never before. Someone else’s. I don’t think I’ll ever quite get over it. Today instead of giving you one of my own to read, I want to send you to it, to The Truth and Why I Have to Tell it. Be sure to watch the video after you read the post.
Not to cheapen or diminish it with commentary here, I’ll comment and add info in a future post. For today, click the link, and be rocked. And think about how we all need a lifeline.
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So what on earth do better sleep habits have to do with walking more intimately with Christ? It seems so utterly trivial! I think, “Who’s going to read blog posts about this? And how am I going to keep at it myself, it looks so small and insignificant and all?”
But deep down I know this is the thing I most need to do, when I put on common sense — and yes, spiritual wisdom.
It’s just not what my fleshly self wants to bother with. I’d rather have instant spiritual gianthood and effortless constant communion with Christ — blink! like that! — than plod along in any mundane discipline.
Just as it would be nicer if we could transplant a mighty maple instantly instead of tuck a tiny seedling into the ground, then wait, hoping, looking for progress, only to find at first it just seems to sit there, then later starts growing so sl-o-w-ly…
It would be nicer to be able to remove a big pile of dirt with some magical mighty machine, in one huge scoop, than to pick up bucketfuls, over and over and over.
But all the past habit changes that I’ve managed, all the effective growth of my Christ-life, started with one baby step, and grew by dogged perseverance.
I suspect even momentary acts of impressive heroism seldom spring from barren soulground, but instead from one long before enriched with faith and watered with virtue and cultivated with patience and cleared of weeds and diseases.
Now, if my get-to-bed-earlier aim is just some picayune legalistic goal to make me feel noble, to enable me to look down upon all those undisciplined creatures who just let their whims dictate their sleep habits (like I’ve been doing up till now!) — then I’d better not pursue it at all. (Worse than a waste of time.)
But I know this small undone thing hinders my attaining the higher goals I long to reach. And I’m supposed to get rid of every hindrance along with the sin that so easily entangles me, to run the course marked out for me (Heb 12:1 NIV). Lack of sleep is a hindrance for me, and it’s high time I admit it!
I just don’t function at optimum level. I fizzle as the day goes on. My attention runs to deficit. I drop things, lose things I just had a minute ago, and find myriad other frustrations trying my patience like flies in my face.
So, if I can, by the grace of God… better sleep habits in 2012!
…
But why this early-to-bed stuff? Why not just sleep later in the morning? And maybe pursue all my relational time with God in the evenings?
Next time…
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Linked to On Your Heart Tuesday
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You might also like this related post:
He snorts a laugh when I tell him. I’m aiming to get to bed by 9:30. Nightly. And purposing definitely to make it there before 10:00.
He laughs some more.
So I edit: Well, let’s make it aim at 10, get there definitely before 10:30.
(Here’s where I need my first new “white space” — as key to loftier successes.)
Two nights later (last night)…
I come snuggling in between warm flannel layers at precisely 10:15.
“There. I did it!” I say. “Put a checkmark on the chart.” (There’s no actual chart but in the mind, the invisible account sheet. And for sure, on this one I have an accountability partner, of sorts.)
“Now you only have 364 more to go!” he chuckles. He’s having a good time with this, anyhow.
He’s not acting mean. He just knows me. Miss Night Owl of 2011. And 2010. And… and… We both know I have maybe the world’s worst sleep habits.
But to the 364-day quip I confidently reply, “No, no, no. Not 364! Only 30!”
“You’re only going to do this for a month?” he asks. I hear the incredulity.
Might seem silly to him, but not to me. Perfectly sensible.
You see, I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions — learned not to, long ago! I make New Month’s Resolutions. And they actually tend to work.
Because… 28 consecutive days’ repetition of an action pretty much forms a routine in the brain — or mindless body, whichever. Then, the reinforcement of continuing it into the next month really starts to harden the wet cement of routine into the solidity of habit!
A third month, the thing is really firming up!
It works. It does.
And here’s the other thing: Grace. Grace unto self, as well as others.
As a parent, as a teacher, as a mentoring friend, I’d never declare anyone a failure the first time they fell down in their effort (or got hindered by something outside their control). So why should I do that to myself?
If a friend in need phones at 10:15, I’m not going to hang up on her angst or his grief for the sake of some punctilious regimen! And even if I go lax and fall short of perfect, what’s the sense in quitting? What kind of resolve is that? One of the best resolutions I ever read was Jonathan Edwards’ “to not be utterly cast down” if he stumbled in his resolutions, but to quickly correct his thinking and resume his efforts.
So even if January’s efforts fizzle, February offers a second chance.
And another grace thing I’d do for any friend: I pray for the supernatural help I know I need. God knows I’m doing this so I can “waken the dawn” to praise Him, so I can better order daytime’s hours to follow Him more effectively. He’ll honor that and help, I’m sure.
Then there’s a third thing: you, my readers. Blogging this little plan makes me answerable to you, as well as my grinning husband.
My report comes due at January’s end, not 2012’s. (Pray for me? I’m not being facetious… Though this goal may seem insignificant, it’s a step to higher things.)
This new year’s gifts:
~A fresh start
~ Laughter
~ Reading to each other — and laughing together, sometimes uproariously.
~ Getting to bed, and to sleep (!), at an earlier hour
~ The reliable help of God, giving me His strength in my weakness.
~ Flannel sheets in winter chill.
~ Awake alertness in early morning prayer.
~ Joy in God’s creation, stirred by my Bible reading’s cross-references.
~ Psalms of exultation.
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Related posts:
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Uniqueness, doubled.
A post on the Lord’s Day? I don’t think I’ve done that before! But this being January 1, brand new year, with me starting a new kind of Bible reading schedule, I thought I’d slap up a quick post in case someone else might like to try it.
I saw it on someone’s website: a link to a Chronological read-through plan. I thought, “Hmm,” clicked the link, and tried some year’s end readings.
Interesting, I mused, and began to consider. So near a new year’s start, I thought I’d like to begin the plan on January 1 (That’s today!) You can start any time, and custom-set your schedule on the website, but I like beginning fresh now.
If you’re interested, go here to the One Year Chronological Bible Online.
This link gives the scriptures in the NLT, but you can choose from a wide variety of versions, click the date, and read its scheduled passages right on your computer screen.
Preferring a more literal translation, I figured on just choosing my trusty NKJV. But Husband is starting his own new read-through, changing translations, as the last two times, and I’m thinking that might give me some new angles from which to look at the text. So I might just try a different translation, too, or do some version-hopping.
The one hesitation I had was encountering (I thought) no New Testament readings until I finishing the Old. How mistaken! Checking ahead, I see New Testament passages popping up within a short time.
So… I begin…
…and post this so if you want to try it, too.
Whatever plan or version or amount of Bible reading you aim to do, God bless your endeavor with the richness of His Word Treasury!
It struck so strongly, day after Christmas, I copied and saved it, and want to share it.
Spurgeon. In “Faith’s Checkbook.” His “withdrawal” for that day when many folks think about the year ahead: what they want to make of it, resolve to do…
Perfect timing. Before I make any “resolutions,” this is what I need to consider most:
(Dec 26 entry in Faith’s Checkbook, by C. H. Spurgeon)
(My responses follow.)
“‘Peter answered and said unto him, Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended’ (Matthew 26:33).
“‘Why,’ cries one, ‘this is no promise of God.’ Just so… it was a promise of man, and therefore it came to nothing. Peter thought that he was saying what he should assuredly carry out; but a promise which has no better foundation than a human resolve will fall to the ground. No sooner did temptations arise than Peter denied his Master and used oaths to confirm his denial.
“What is man’s word? An earthen pot broken with a stroke. What is your own resolve? A blossom, which, with God’s care, may come to fruit, but which, left to itself, will fall to the ground with the first wind that moves the bough.
“On man’s word hang only what it will bear.
“On thine own resolve depend not at all.
“On the promise of thy God hang time and eternity, this world and the next, thine all and the all of all thy beloved ones.
“This volume is a checkbook for believers, and this page is meant as a warning as to what bank they draw upon and whose signature they accept. Rely upon Jesus without limit. Trust not thyself…; but trust thou only and wholly in the Lord.“
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My own resolve can be good — is better than no purposing to strain forth toward Christ and christlikeness. But humility (or just honesty!) recognizes my own inability. Which is enormous. The most important things I’ve ever done, I didn’t really do at all. Rather, calling on God to make His strength manifest in my weakness, and thereby be glorified, I threw myself entirely on His strength, on His doing through me what I could not do myself.
So, before I even get started, let me recognize not only my very real need for changes, but also my inability to bring them about satisfactorily myself. Each “resolution” should be a prayer (daily) — for God to work in my life what needs doing and changing, and for His Spirit to keep me going in cooperative “working it out” along with Him — and also for acceptance of whatever He deems necessary to bring about those good results.
Sobering. But right and true, and yes, I can trust Him to bring blessing out of whatever He brings in.
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