I Will Lie Down And Sleep

"I will lie down and sleep for you alone, 

O Lord, make me dwell in safety."

Psalm 4:8

Many times I have had to rely on this verse, especially when my sons were young, because I had fears of us being alone at night while my husband Brian wasn't home, which unfortunately was quite often.

When Brian and I met, he was a mechanic. After we were married and I was pregnant with our first son, Brian was unexpectedly laid off from his work, so he took a job as a tireman at a tire store. A few years later, Brian was promoted to salesman in this store. Then a few years after that he was offered a job as manager of a tire store in another location. He was a manager for several years in two different stores. Then Brian came home one afternoon and shockingly told me he quit his job as manager to drive truck for one of his customers, an owner of a logging company. He told me he couldn't take the stress of his job any longer.

At the time I had four young boys at home to raise. Daniel was ten; Tim was eight, Chris was six, and Matthew was three. I am not going to lie and say I was this strong woman of great faith because I wasn't. I was still very much like that fearful insecure little girl that secretly slept behind a couch with her dog. I was scared to death. Fear arose in me as I asked myself these questions and doubted a positive outcome. Would I be able to protect our boys when Brian was gone? Would I be able to raise them to love and honour God as a single married woman? Would my marriage to Brian survive?

When Brian worked locally as a logging truck driver, he worked on average fifteen hours a day, but he was gone for seventeen because it took him one hour to drive to work each day. He worked six to seven days a week, never taking any holidays. When Brian was home, he slept. Then in the winter, he was forced to go up North for several months to work. This is when my fears intensified and became completely out of my control.

To try and lessen my fears at night, when Brian wasn't home, I had all of my sons take their quilts and pillows and sleep in the living room with me. I felt we were safer sleeping all together in a main room of the house than separate in closed rooms. We did this for many years.

However, I still struggled greatly to sleep. It would take me hours to fall asleep at night and if I heard the slightest noise when I did finally fall asleep, I would instantly wake up, and with my fears at their greatest peak, the cycle would start all over again. My intense fears created insomnia and I started to become physically sick.

When I prayed to God for help, He gently chastised me for not trusting in His Word. I knew what the Bible said. I was a Bible College graduate, but my fears were greater than my faith. Finally out of complete desperation, I took my Bible and cradled it in my arms throughout the entire night as a constant reminder of His Word. I did this for many nights and weeks until my fears were relieved and my sleeping pattern became normal again.The Bible became a powerful sedative and a great comfort.

To this day, if I become afraid at night and can't sleep because of fears, I will grab the Bible and bring it close to my chest as a reminder of God's precious words within.

Brian has been out of the logging industry for years now. He drives a low-bed truck hauling cranes, bridges, etc. He is home eight days out of thirty.

I look back and thank God that He gave me the strength and the perseverance to raise four sons to love and serve Him. I wouldn't have been able to do that if I were constantly sick with fear. I had to trust in God to overcome the fears and insecurities I had since childhood.

If you have any fears, I encourage you go to God's Word for comfort and strength. None of my fears ever came to past. However, if I continued to live in fear. I would have been mentally and physically incapable of being a good wife, mother, and children's ministry and music worker for God. My fears would have been a reality.

Trust God and His Word!