Home Tools for your Journey April 17

Thursday, April 17

I will not give sleep to my eyes or slumber to my eyelids, until I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling place for the Mighty One of Jacob.
—Psalm 132:4-5

Some things are so important that sleep must simply take a back seat. We may know that our bodies are weary and need rest, but we delay our sleeping because whatever it is we are involved in requires our complete and full attention.

We don't talk ourselves into depriving ourselves of sleep—we simply become so engrossed in the task at hand that sleep recedes into the background like a small figurine in a shadowbox. It isn't until we reach a point of exhaustion that we finally give our bodies permission to become limp and our eyes permission to close so that we can enter the healing land of dreams.

The Holy One does not expect us to deny our need for sleep—our bodies, created by the hand of heaven, are subject to the need for complete relaxation. But, let's put sleep in its proper place in our lives. It is the gift we are given for restoring our bodies to balance, not an indulgence for avoiding the real-ness of life.

If we can mindfully maintain a spirit of awareness toward life throughout the day, we will be a part of creating a dwelling place for the Holy One—in the world about us, and even in the midst of our own fragile selves.

O God, let me know when wakefulness to the movement of life is a sign of your presence in and through me.

The Signposts for April are written by Renée Miller and originally appeared on explorefaith.org in May 2004.