Jolted awake, my soul a furnace burning with passion and thoughts flooding through my mind; I half consciously look at the clock, 3 am why am I awake? I close my eyes and roll the other direction but, this heat within me won’t let up . . . blindly I reach into the night stand beside me searching for a pen just to write down half sentences at a time, that feel as if each is burning through my finger tips to be on paper. The next morning I stare at the piece of paper scribbled with unfinished thoughts of my “inspired middle of the night words” curious how it is all meant to mesh together.
Turns out sleep researchers have been studying this activity for years. By the early 20th century due to extended light exposure from electricity daytime activities stretched into the night, revolutionizing the sleep cycle. Prior sleep had been divided into two segments, separated by a period of night-waking that lasted between one and several hours. Historian A. Roger Ekrich writes, “When dreaming, our minds create imagery from memories, hopes, and fears. And in the dead of night, drowsy brains can conjure up new ideas from the debris of dreams and apply them to our creative pursuits.”
When talking to a friend about the reoccurring night writing, his perspective added some clarity to the mess of thoughts I was having trouble to make whole. He said it was as if I had an Angelic Ghostwriter, a heavenly muse if you will, taking advantage of the time I am disconnected from worldly thoughts to flood me with vision and purpose. As if I didn’t already think God was cool, He is constantly blowing me away with the realization of all the ways He reaches out to His children. Ekrich’s research makes scientific sense of why we still wake in the middle of the night today as our ancestors before us. However, what he lacks to explain beyond daylight and artificial light is why we are wired that way. We already understand it makes sense that the enemy attacks us at this vulnerable state with ‘bad dreams’, fears, and anxiety . . . but why wouldn’t it make sense that the Creator and writer of our lives wired us to have a time where we are in silence to guide us according to His will.
Last night I was talking to one of my squadmates, Meg, about how I have felt so disconnected from writing recently and wasn’t really sure what to blog about. Her idea was to write the bits and pieces of random midnight notes and see how my friends and family thought the pieces of the puzzle fit together. As I was reading through them though, I came across something written on May 25th that really pulled on the strings of my heart and decided to share that:
“One of my favorite things is to hear people’s stories to Christ. Maybe, because hearing of their redemption reminds me just how big our God is. I hid from my own story for so long; scared to dive back in and relive moments of my past, but if I had not done so I would have never had my eyes opened to see how my story is a story of a Father’s true love for His child and a radical redemption of a lost soul. Or how the terrible pictures painted by my wild imagination of my self-image and experiences were all just a facade from the enemy trying to overcast the true hero in my life – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”
Why this was a thought that came to me in the middle of the night I will probably never understand. However, this is what I know – around that time in May I was struggling a lot to express my heart authentically because of some of the reactions to my announcement of the World Race and fundraising efforts. Waking up to these words and even reading them now reminds me that His love for me is genuine and the transformation His love has done in my life is real and that doesn’t need and explanation, rather it needs a proclamation!
“Trust in the Lord with all of your heart, and do not rely on your own understanding. Acknowledge Him in all your ways, and He will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6
