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SWEET DREAMS TONIGHT!
My
Saviour, hear my prayer
Before I go to rest;
It is Your little child
Who comes now to be blest.
Forgive me all my sin,
And let me sleep this night
In safety and in peace
Until the morning light.
The final thing we should do at night as we lie down to
sleep is to thank Jesus for a good day, and pray for a good
night's rest! He has promised to
keep us in PERFECT PEACE if we keep our minds stayed on Him.--Isaiah 26:3.
So you'll find it very conducive to a peaceful night's sleep if you'll
get your mind off your worries and problems and think about
JESUS, and read something
short and soothing and comforting from His Word. In fact, there are many
precious promises in His Word that we can claim for a good
night's sleep:
"I will lie down and sleep in peace, for You alone, Lord, make me dwell
in safety."--Psalm 4:8.
"My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."--Exodus
33:14.
"When you lie down, you will not be afraid: You shall lie down, and
your sleep shall be sweet."--Proverbs 3:24
As we go to sleep, it's a good time to "commune with our own heart
upon our bed" (Psalm 4:4), to take stock of things and to reflect momentarily
on the day's events and accomplishments, and perhaps sometimes even its failures.
Ask yourself if it has been a day in which you've done God's Will in obedience
and yieldedness. Has it been a day that you're thankful for because you're
sure the Lord is pleased with it? "What have I done with my life?",
is a good question to ask yourself as you lie down to sleep at the end of every
day. "What have I done with my life THIS day? Did I live it for JESUS
so that I can lie down happy and contended, thankful and satisfied that
I have done my best this day and can now rest peacefully?"
"Now I lay me down to sleep;
I pray Thee Lord, my soul to keep.
Thy Love guard me through the night,
And wake me with the morning bright!"
"GUARDIAN
ANGELS ROUND MY BED...."
"The Angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear
Him, and delivers them."-Psalm 34:7.
Jesus never sleeps! He watches over you all the time! "He that keepeth
Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord watches over you."--Psalm
121:4,5.--And so do all of His Angels and Saints!--Isn't that a comforting
thought?
Thank God for His Guardian Angels who make it possible for us to lie down
in peace and go to sleep and not worry about enemies or troubles or anything!
They never sleep, they're always awake! They don't need to rest, because
they're not affected by gravity or weariness or hunger!
Our guards, the hosts of Heaven surrounding us, are on the job fulltime,
24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, ALL the time! Isn't that
wonderful? Even this World has never been able to fur nish any guards like
that! Praise the Lord! As the famous opera star, Mario Lanza, sang:
Guardian
Angels around my bed
Joining me in my prayers;
They hush the shadows when they dance about!
They shoo away the bears!
Guardian Angels around my bed
Standing by till I rise.
There's one with shining wings who holds my hand
And shows me Paradise!
OUR HEAVENLY EDUCATION!...
"In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep
falls upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; THEN He opens the
ears of men, and seals their instruction."--Job 33:15,16
Believe it or not, your SPIRIT, the real YOU, doesn't need
sleep! While your physical body is having to rest, your immortal
spirit is constantly busy
and thinking and dreaming and having spiritual experiences all the time in
your sleep. It doesn't have to sleep because it's immortal, eternal, spiritual. "The
things that are seen are temporal, the things that are not seen are eternal!"--2Corinthians
4:18. The physical dies away but the spiritual is forever, and even in your
sleep, it's busy all the time, having experiences, learning lessons, making
decisions and exploring!
Sometimes the Lord allows us to remember those spiritual experiences and
dreams. But it's undoubtedly a blessing that He doesn't allow us to remember
everything that our spirits experience while we're asleep! It would be too
much of a burden on our conscious minds to have to remember all that, when
we have enough in our present physical lives to think and be concerned about!
Sometimes the Lord lets us be TESTED in our dreams to see what we WOULD
do under such circumstances! It's a pretty realistic test under dream conditions,
because you don't know you're in a dream! You think it's really happening,
so your reactions are very realistic and genuine as to what you would REALLY
do under such circumstances!
Then, many times when you have to make a certain decision when you're awake,
it's much easier to make the right decisions, because hopefully you learned
the lessons while you were sleeping and making choices under
similiar conditions in your dreams.
So, thank God for our dreams!
They're part of our Heavenly spiritual education!
"I will praise the Lord, Who has given me counsel: Even in the night
He instructs my heart."--Psalm 16:7.
"THOU SHALT NOT BE AFRAID FOR THE TERROR BY NIGHT..."--PSALM
91:5
Though we tremble in the
dark
In need of help and cheer,
We have a tender Father's Word,
"Fear thou not, for I am here!"
There are a lot of different reasons why
people sometimes have bad dreams. It could be something you ate,
or something you
were worrying about when you went to sleep, and you just subconsciously
carried that train of thought on in your sleep. Sometimes bad dreams
are a warning from the Lord about something that's going to happen--or
is already happening that you don't know about. But WARNING dreams
from the LORD usually have something good and meaningful in them.
They are usually not ENTIRELY bad and always have some kind of
LESSON to be learned.
Some bad dreams could be a definite implantation of thoughts in your mind
from evil spiritual sources, in an attempt to try to influence your thinking
and scare you. The evil spirits try to fight us in our dreams just like the
good spirits are trying to HELP us in our dreams!
When you have nightmares, your spirit is actually battling evil spiritual
forces! The Lord sometimes ALLOWS it to see what you will DO, and what effect
it will have on you. He wants to see if you'll make the right decision to really
call on HIM for HELP! So bad dreams too are all a part of your spiritual life
and experience which continues in your sleep! Of course, it is NOT God's Will
that we have bad dreams all the time! If your sleep is troubled and you are
continually having nightmares or bad dreams, you should pray and rebuke the
Devil and ask the Lord to DELIVER you from such hindering dreams!
It's often helpful to have a NIGHTLIGHT on in your room because evil spirits
don't like the light! They are lovers of darkness because their deeds are evil,
so they flee from the light!--John 3:19. So it's good to always have a little
light on and not sleep in complete darkness.
You also need to specifically PRAY and ask the Lord to give you good dreams!
Sometimes we have bad dreams because we forget to PRAY and ask the Lord for
good ones! As James 4:2 says, sometimes "we HAVE NOT because we ASK NOT".
The Lord wants to be recognised. He wants you to know that you need Him! That's
why He wants you to pray!
If you know the Lord, then you're HIS child, and you don't have ANYTHING
to fear or worry about! You KNOW that the Lord is protecting and keeping you!
He hallows you around about and gives His Angels charge over you!--See Psalm
91:11.
THE BEAUTY OF THE NIGHT!...
Why fight insomnia with
a pill?
Why dread to meet the night?
There is no better time to find
The everlasting Light!
Those times in the night when you can't sleep are a wonderful
time to PRAY and PRAISE the Lord!
King David
said "I remember
Thee upon my bed, and meditate on Thee in the night watches"--Psalm
63:6. The night is so quiet and still! You can reach right up
to God and hear His Voice so plain--the still small voice in
the wee
hours of the night!
He likes to whisper like a lover in your ear in soft, sweet tones! He likes
to woo you in the night with His tender, gentle, loving Voice, whispering
in your heart, when the slightest whisper can be heard! It's often so hard
to
hear Him in the daytime with the clatter, the noise, all the other voices,
all the racket of the World pounding on your eardrums! But in the cool and
quiet of the night, it's all so peaceful and still. You can see the tiny
stars twinkling away so quietly, so sweetly! Like watching Angels, they
just wink
at you, they whisper to you, they talk to you without a sound!
While the Scriptures speak many times of DARKNESS with an evil connotation,
the physical NIGHT, created by God Himself, is NOT evil, and is often spoken
of as a blessing! Jesus arose a great while before it was day, so obviously
He rose during the NIGHT to pray! The Lord appeared to Solomon in the NIGHT
and granted him wisdom and knowledge as he had requested! And David in the
Psalms speaks so much of communing with God in the NIGHT seasons!--Mark 1:35;
Luke 6:12; 1Kings 3:5-15; Psalm 77:6.
So, if you wake up at night and can't go back to sleep, maybe God wants
you to PRAY! As soon as you get prayed up, you'll probably go right back
to sleep! TRY it!
When
at night you sleepless lie,
And the weary hours drag by--
Lift your thoughts to God above,
Bending down to you in love!
Feel His presence by your bed--
His soft touch upon your head.
Let your last thought be a prayer,
As you nestle in His care!
Ask Him all your way to keep,
Then--why then--drop off to sleep!
God
bless you! Good night and SWEET DREAMS!
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