Another sleepless night last night. I may have slept a couple of hours - not sure. Spent a good part of the night praying and asking God what purpose He could have in mind for this"neverending" condition. He didn't give any answers.
I reread my journal from 2007, and the first time I wrote anything about Restless Legs was in July of that year. Our of curiosity I read further back to see what was going on in my life at that time, that may have contributed to the onslaught of RLS (some research indicates a link between stress and RLS symptoms). While I was never free from stress during our years in France, the months preceding the most severe RLS symptoms & sleep deprivation were possibly the most stressful of all. Long term interpersonal tension will wear me down more than any other issue in life, and this was my daily reality as a leader in the Namestan team. Not that it needed to be this way; I was too easily drawn into playing the role of a referee rather than that of a leader - and I wanted to please everyone involved. This, of course, is impossible. I'm also realizing that I have always found it difficult to stand up to others' inappropriate behavior, such as passive-aggression, blame shifting, or total self-absorption. When confronted with how their behavior is negatively affecting those around them, these folks would often have a strong emotional reaction and label my comments as "inappropriate" - all the while being totally blind & deaf to the wounds they were daily inflicting on everyone who had the misfortune of crossing their path.
None of us enjoys being confronted by our own self-centeredness, but the only path to freedom and joy is through understanding who we really are - the good, the bad and the ugly. Some call this "the last 10%", meaning that people will be "mostly" honest with us, but there are always those areas of our lives that everyone can see, but no one will address. Maybe it's our anger problem, or that we want to control everyone around us, or that we use emotional manipulation to get our way. The journey we've been on this past year has shown me some of those blind spots in my own heart - and one of the big ones is that I want to live at peace with those around me. This isn't a problem in and of itself, but it becomes an issue when my desire for peace means that I take responsibility for others' "stuff". When someone comes back at me with anger or emotion, I'll apologize just to keep the peace - when it isn't mine to own. Sometimes you just have to be willing to live with the fact that people will get mad when their sin is brought into the light, and some will choose to walk away, quit, or stab you in the back. I can't be responsible for their choices or their responses - and in many such situations the most effective response I could have given would have simply been silence. I hate silence, and I will always tend to fill it up with meaningless words (blah, blah, blah) - but the Spirit of God actually needs silence sometimes to get through to our hearts.
I was challenged yesterday when a friend sent me a text message that simply said, "2 Cor 6:2-6". Since I don't know the passage by heart (gasp!), I had to look it up. It hit me between the eyes. Here's the pertinent part:
"We urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain... giving no cause for offense in anything, so that the ministry will not be discredited, but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses, in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in hunger..." and the list goes on. I've never noticed that passage before, but it sure hits home now! I need to think about this one some more - but God wants me to live with my sleeplessness in such a way as to give no cause for offense and commend myself as His servant. Give me strength Lord! I've been seeing this trial as unfair and unreasonable . . . but I want to see it through God's eyes. I can't get there by myself Lord - I need your help.
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