Can't Sleep? What the Bible Says About Rest
There is a particular loneliness to lying awake while the whole street sleeps. You have tried the breathing exercises and counted whatever there was to count, and now it is late enough that you are worrying about how tired you will be tomorrow, which is its own kind of insomnia.
The Bible has more to say about this hour than you might expect, and none of it involves trying harder.
Sleep is a gift, not a wage
"In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat, for he grants sleep to those he loves" (Psalm 127:2). In Scripture, sleep is not something you earn by finishing everything. It is something you receive, the way you receive daylight or bread.
That is why the Bible's first full day of human life, in the Genesis account, begins in the evening: "and there was evening, and there was morning" (Genesis 1:5). You fall asleep while God keeps working. Rest is built into the order of things before you contribute anything at all.
God rested, and told us to
"By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested" (Genesis 2:2). The Creator was not tired. The rest was a declaration that the work was good and could be set down. Sabbath was given to people who had been slaves in Egypt, where no one was ever allowed to stop. Rest, in the Bible, is freedom.
You can hear the creation account tonight - Genesis is one of the free books on Sleep Bible.
The invitation for the exhausted
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matthew 11:28-29). It is the only place in the Gospels where Jesus describes his own heart, and the words he chooses are gentle and humble.
Rest for your souls is a larger promise than eight hours of sleep. But it is not smaller than that either. Matthew 11 is free to listen to, and it lands differently when it is read to you slowly in the dark.
For the night when sleep will not come
If you are not sure where to begin, answer four gentle questions and we will point you to a chapter for the way tonight feels. The Word has kept watch over sleepers for three thousand years. It can hold one more night.