(Diddle, diddle, dumpling, my son Ryland)
It started at 1:30 AM, Thursday. I can't do math in my sleep-deprived brain at this point, but in however many hours it's been since 1:30 AM Thursday, I've had a couple hours of sleep. My husband has had less. Not good.
My husband was called out to investigate a messy crime at 1:30 Thursday, that began the blur that has occurred since. My dear friend took my boys last night when I had to go to work and there was no husband home to pass the baton of parenting to. She took them trick or treating, fed them dinner, made them comfortable beds and got them to school this morning on top of her own three. There's a friend! Very thankful.
I ended a 12-hours-on-my-feet shift with a doctor yelling at me over the phone for calling him to get an order. This is an aspect of nursing I've never embraced until this morning when it hit me, "Everything you endure by faith in the good sovereignty of God is only being used for your good." It actually made me smile and shake off the desire to tell Dr. Crabby Pants unkind things. Being a nurse highlights the importance of authority and the difficulty of submitting to it, and as a Christian it illumines an opportunity to suffer for doing good and thereby grow in Christ-likeness.
I still scratch my head though. You're mad at me for calling you for an order only you can give regarding an issue that is for the patient's safety and good?! One runs into this not infrequently as a nurse.
What if the Great Physician was so unapproachable and easily irritated? What a terrible thought! I'm so glad my God, who possesses all authority, invites me to call on him and his authority day or night, time after time after time. He is not bothered by my need for His "orders". He wants me to "wake him up" in the middle of the night. Not that God sleeps or grows tired, but I love it that in the Psalms, and in the parables Jesus told, God seems to be saying, "I understand, that you may feel like I'm sleeping. That's ok. WAKE ME UP! APPROACH ME! INTERRUPT ME! BE RELENTLESS!"
Awake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever! - Psalm 44:23
And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. He said, "In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, 'Give me justice against my adversary.' For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, 'Though I neither fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming.'" And the Lord said, "Hear what the unrighteous judge says. And will not God give justice to his elect, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them? I tell you, he will give justice to them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" - Luke 18:1-8
I'm glad my God is happy. He's not frustrated and irritated. He's totally confident and kind and has all power and yet does not "lord it over" us, but bends down to lift us up. He actually listens with desire for us to know we are heard and known by Him and He is not bothered by us.
Thank you Father!
Quieted,
Sheila
