Tag Archives: Sleep

Sleeping in Church

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I came across this in John Cassian’s “The Institutes” in the section on the spirit of gluttony.

“This same old man declared, based on the following indications, that the devil has ever been the promoter of foolish tales and the enemy of spiritual conferences. For when he was talking with some of the brothers about important spiritual matters and notices that they had fallen into a kind of Lethean slumber and could not cast off the weight of sleep from their eyes, he immediately introduced a foolish tale.

When he saw that they woke up at once and pricked up their ears for the pleasure that it gave them, he said with a groan: ‘Up until now we were speaking about heavenly things, and the eyes of each of you were shut in deathlike repose. But when a foolish tale is introduced all of us wake up and shake off the torpor of the sleep that had mastered us. From this you should consider carefully, then, who was the enemy of that spiritual conference and who is the instigator of this vain and carnal tale. It is perfectly clear that it is the one who rejoices in wickedness and does not cease to foster the latter and to fight against the former.’”

As I read this I thought of all the times I’ve fallen asleep in church. I remember as a High School student sitting in the choir (which would sit in the front of the church facing the congregation) and falling asleep during the service. I’ve often wondered why I fell asleep. I don’t think I was overly tired. I’ve said on occasion that it was just a habit. Kind of like when you get in bed your body knows this is where you sleep and that helps you sleep. My body believed sitting in the choir meant it was time to take a nap. Even if I tried to stay awake, sleep would overcome me.

Perhaps Cassian has something here. By falling asleep I was unable to pay attention to what the pastor was saying. By falling asleep I was unable to reflect upon my spiritual life. My falling asleep kept me in the dark spiritually. However, if the pastor told a joke or a funny story I could start paying attention again. What’s with that?

Perhaps Paul has an explanation:

In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. (1 Cor. 4:4)

Either way…if you are a pastor and you keep seeing the folks in your congregation falling asleep, or struggling to stay awake…perhaps there’s more going on than you thought. You thought you were boring….that may be true…however, the “god of this world” has no interest in seeing them awakened to Christ.

Sleep Experiment update: Advice from Wesley

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It was about 30 days ago that I decided to begin getting up early. For 30 days now my alarm has gone off and I have gotten up without getting back into bed. I find I enjoy my times in the morning, although I am finding this time change thing a bit difficult.

As I was reading today I came across some advice from John Wesley on this very topic:

Yea, and it will be far easier to rise early constantly, than to do it sometimes. But then you must begin at the right end; if you rise early, you must sleep early. Impose it upon yourself, unless when something extraordinary occurs, to go to bed at a fixed hour. Then the difficulty of it will soon be over; but the advantage of it will remain for ever. (Sermon 89, A More Excellent Way)

I’m finding his advice is true! Getting up everyday at the same time is easier than sleeping in and trying to get back in schedule the next day. Also, going to bed early makes a difference too. I guess he was being Mr. Obvious there.

Update: Sleep day 13

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I’ve been on my new schedule for about two weeks now. Some days I’m tired. Other days I’m not too bad. Overall, it has been a positive experience. I’ve been able to do more and it is good knowing that before the day starts I have spent time with God. I can see why those who get up early say it is perhaps the best time of the day. In fact, I’m wondering if I should get up even a little bit earlier than I currently am….

Day 7 Sleep Experiment

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I didn’t realize moving from being a ‘natural riser’ to an ‘alarm clock’ riser would be so difficult. There were a few mornings that all I wanted to do was to turn off the alarm and get back into bed. God enabled me to overcome that temptation. It had to be God because every fiber of my being was crying out to get back into that nice, warm, comfortable bed.

Days 4, 5 and 6 were the hardest (so far). Today is day 7 and it is a Saturday. I usually sleep in on Saturday but everything that I’ve read pointed out the importance of keeping a consistent schedule so I’m trying to stick to it. Monday (day 9) will be a holiday so it will, again, be though for me to be consistent.

Why do this? Well, there are more interesting things to do in the morning. If I am able to consistently get up, then I will be able to consistently pray and read scripture each day. Before, if I slept in, my prayer time would either get limited, or I would pray instead of doing other things. Getting up early helps me get focused and use the day wisely.

When I stay up late, I would just waste my time watching TV. Even though I would tell myself I should pray and read, I would be too tired to do any of it. Now, I find myself wanting to go to bed at 10 pm – 11 pm (last night I went to bed at 10:30 pm…and it was a Friday!).

I should probably articulate that so far I am not missing my late nights at all. Getting up early has been a true joy (even though it has been hard at times).

My Sleep (or lack of) Experiment

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I’ve discovered many benefits of getting up before my family does. Getting up early in the morning gives me time for silence, prayer and reading scripture with little or no interruption. Recently I found on zenhabits of other benefits. So, I decided to kick things up a notch. After all, there are things that I want to do (like writing) and I just don’t have the time. I figure if I can gain some time in the morning, all the better!

My habit has been to get up when I wake up in the morning (around 6:30 am). This gave me about 30 minutes before the rest of my family would get up. On Saturday and/or holidays I would sleep in longer. If I was overly tired, or didn’t wake up by 6:30 am I would sleep in and try to fit things in somewhere else.

Since most of the information I’ve read about sleep discusses how important it is to get up at the same time every day, I realize that it might be time to say good by to the sleeping-in habit. I’m not real happy about that, but those that I know that get up every day at the same time seem to not miss sleeping-in. Since this is an experiment, I’ve decided to at least give myself a month without sleeping-in.

My experiment is to set my alarm for 5:45 am. When the alarm goes off, I get up and I stay up. As long as I don’t head back to bed, I think I will be fine. The challenge will be to not give into the temptation to head back to bed.

The first few days went pretty well. Today…well…I was very tired and I am still tired. I figured this would happen at some point. I’m use to staying up late and even enjoy staying up late. Why get up early then? Well, as one article said, there are more interesting things to do than sleep. In the evening I end up watching TV. In the morning I actually do things that feed my soul. I figure if I can change my sleep pattern to get up earlier I will be able to have more time to do things that actually matter.

I really would like to get up at either 5:30 am or 5 am, but the way I’m feeling now I don’t know if that will ever happen. I don’t want to go to bed before 10:30, so getting up at 5 or 5:30 am might be stretching things a bit. I plan on reporting back on this experiment and how it evolves, so anyone interested can see how it goes.

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