“You can go to bed without fear; you will lie down and sleep soundly.” (Proverbs 3:24)
I have heard of living for Jesus but what about sleeping for Jesus? Sleep and rest is Godly how do I know that? Well God created it so it must be. I think in today’s society people work hard, play hard but don’t really rest hard. We can burn both ends of the candle especially with all the technology and quickly become human doings not human beings.
We lose sleep at night from fear, fear of what we did do or didn’t do right, fear of demands, pressure and fear of what the next day may bring. Do we have any room left in our margins? Will we live up to this world’s expectations?
The thing is when I read the Bible I see an alternative story… Jesus is not really interested on how well you perform or not perform but is more interested in who you are and who you are becoming. We can do amazing things for Jesus but if we don’t become like him and love like him we are missing the whole point (see 1st Corinthians 13). Without love we are nothing.
The enemy will steal our time, our sleep and rest by keeping us busy but time and time again the Bible speaks about rest. God rested on the seventh day, Jesus sat at the well, Jesus was asleep in the storm, Jesus is sitting at the right hand of the Father. You sit to rest and I think, like Jesus, we love people so much better when we are well rested.
Think about Martha and Mary, who would you have approached if you were at the house with Jesus? Martha was worried, stressing out, performing, being a human doing. I wouldn’t have wanted to approach her as I have found out that stressed people stress people.
Then you have Mary who is calm, resting at the feet of Jesus and full of peace, now I would appreciate her.
If we want to love our cities we need to be approachable and I really think we become approachable when we rest at the feet of Jesus. So today turn off your phone, leave it at home, go walk and rest in Jesus.
You might be at the end of your rope but just like God said to the prophet Elijiah when he was running for his life and living in cave, “eat something and sleep” (1 Kings 19). By us saying that we don’t need sleep we are saying we are better than Jesus.
So, when you go to bed tonight, let go and let God. Have faith not just for living for Jesus but also have faith that you will have good night sleep so you will wake up refreshed to take on the next day loving God and loving people!
This article was written by Scottish youth pastor, Steven McLeish who serves at Destiny Church, Glasgow. He is also a spoken word artist with several videos on YouTube. These can be watched on his Spoken Light channel.
