G'night
/
The verses I, and most people, know best from Psalm 139 are 13 and 14:
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
However, as I read from the Word this morning, Psalm 139:5 caught my eye.
5 You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.
Today I'm thanking God for hemming me in and creating boundaries for my life. One of those boundaries that I've been working to embrace over the past week and that I aim to improve upon in the coming weeks is the need for sleep. As Carolyn Mahaney puts it on page 60 of her book Feminine Appeal,
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
However, as I read from the Word this morning, Psalm 139:5 caught my eye.
5 You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.
Today I'm thanking God for hemming me in and creating boundaries for my life. One of those boundaries that I've been working to embrace over the past week and that I aim to improve upon in the coming weeks is the need for sleep. As Carolyn Mahaney puts it on page 60 of her book Feminine Appeal,
Sleep is a gift from God. Scripture says He grants sleep to those He loves (Ps. 127:2), and He makes our sleep sweet (Prov. 3:24). Sleep is a sweet restorer of physical strength. Thus we must make sure to get enough sleep daily so that our bodies are fully replenished with the strength they need.
God has designed our bodies to require sleep, and to cut corners may be an expression of pride - an arrogant disregard of our God-given physical limitations. God is the only one who does not need sleep. He is the Creator, and we are the created. Therefore, we should humbly embrace our need for sleep - however much we need.On that note, I've recently been advised that until my RA is more under control, or even in remission (a fabled place that I've never visited but that I hope to see someday), I should be aiming for 10 hours of sleep a day. In hopes of finding something to the contrary, I did some searching and found confirmation at Johns Hopkins and a group of research articles (that I can't link because they aren't freely available online; I accessed them through ECU's site using my permissions as a grad school student). Hmm. That definitely isn't happening now, and I'm not anticipating it anytime soon, but I'm working on increasing my sleep so that it is closer to that amount. And thanking the Lord for his perfect design in all things.