“In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o’clock in the morning, day after day.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald
Do you ever wake up in the middle of the night?
Some of you just rolled your eyes and thought a better question would have been, “Do you ever sleep all through the night?!”
I seem to wake up at the same time in the middle of the night quite often and it’s usually between 3-4AM.
There are a multitude of options that arise at that moment – Do I look to see what time it is? Do I get up and go to the bathroom? Do I just get up and start my day?
The longer I lay there, the more questions and thoughts coming rushing into my mind.
It’s like one thought peeked through the crack and saw that I was awake, so it went and woke all the other thoughts up. And just like that, they are all running around in my mind with as much energy as my dog has when I let her out of her crate first thing in the morning!
It happened again last night.
There I lie with every stressor question I can think of running around in circles in my head – What if I don’t get enough kids to sign up for the Mirror, Mirror event to pay for the room? What if because I stepped down from my position at the gym, we can’t pay our bills? What if it never stops raining?? (that last question was simply out of desperation for a tan and clean carpets!)
Insert your own stressor questions and can anyone relate?
One of the main concepts I speak on over and over is taking our thoughts captive.
“We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 2 Cor 10:5
After about 30 minutes of having these questions on a loop, it dawned on me to stop tossing and turning and take them captive!
So, one by one, I spoke the questions out loud (in my head) to God.
Me: God, what if I don’t get enough kids to sign up for the Mirror, Mirror event?
God: This is my event. Keep doing the work and let go of the results.
Me: What if we can’t pay our bills?
God: I am Jehovah Jireh (this means the Lord will provide). Keep doing the work and let go of the results.
Me: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
Alarm (several hours later): the song “Voice of Truth” (the irony is not lost on this one!)
Me: Time to get up and do the work and let go of the results!
I know that may sound simple, but because I chose to take the thoughts that were keeping me up to God, I am in a much better frame of mind today than I was last night.
Now, just because I took the thoughts captive, doesn’t mean I won’t ever think them again. But it does get easier to remember to take them to God and exchange them for His truth.
So tonight, if you wake up in the middle of the night, stop the crazy thought train and take each concern to God and have a GOOOOOD night sleep!
<>< KC