Sleep as a Spiritual Practice
In Brenna Rubio’s message yesterday she talked about three spiritual disciplines - sleeping, praying naked, and kneeling down. As we head into Holy Week, we’ll look at each of those as a way to move towards the cross and resurrection. Today, we’ll reflect on sleep as a spiritual discipline:
In vain you rise early
and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat—
for he grants sleep to those he loves. - Psalm 127:2
During a global pandemic, there’s more need for sleep. The extra emotional energy required to navigate through this new world is exhausting. For some of us, our work has shifted radically, which has demanded we work late nights and early mornings even though we never quite get enough done. And then for many of us, our children are home with us full-time - and there are few things that weary us more.
And yet, scripture says that one of God’s gifts to God’s beloved children is sleep. Sleep is a gift in several ways. In part it’s a gift because it’s physical refreshing, but moreso because it’s emotionally refreshing. And, whether you’ve thought of it before or not, it’s also spiritually refreshing - it’s harder to choose into connecting with God when we’re tired; it’s harder to be grateful when we’re tired; it’s harder to be patient when we’re tired. But on another level, sleep is a radical act of trust: we’re saying, “I surrender. I cannot do it all. I need to be cared for.” And as we mature spiritually, we can also choose to sleep with this attitude: “I trust that you are God and that you can take care of the universe for a while without me.”
What if you approached sleep tonight with this new attitude - that it’s a gift from God, and that you can choose into it as a spiritual practice of surrender and trust? it might make all the difference as you lean into the cross and the resurrection this Holy Week.
Holy Week Happenings at City Church: click HERE