Fresh Flowers and Rain

I had to rush home from church this morning to get my work uniform into the wash. While that was happening I thought I would try to take a brief nap.

Sleep is an interesting thing. We can get into debt - it really is called "sleep debt", but we can also catch up and we can even store up a little (not too much, or it's counter-productive, but I won't be having that problem any time soon). Going through long periods of time with too little sleep can seriously affect your mental and physical health in very real ways; It can even shorten your life. (Just a little info there for those of you who don't already know)

So I didn't have a long time to nap, but figured I'd try and at worst would at least rest my body. My tummy problems were really acting up, too, so I knew I had to do what I could to try to help myself. I lay down and immediately the brain starts going a mile a minute. I prayed. I just focused on God - not about Him, but to Him (did the way I said that make sense?).

I fell asleep. A short time later, I awoke feeling like I'd slept for a while. I was worried that my alarm hadn't gone off. I got up to check and found that I hadn't been sleeping for long at all. It was even amazing how I felt considering the small amount of rest I'd had. I thanked God for this.

I crawled back into my bed and pulled the covers over my head to try to block out the daylight. Under my covers it smelled strongly of fresh flowers and rain. That was odd because I haven't changed my sheets and even if I had, my laundry detergent smells nothing like that. Curious, I sniffed the sheets and bedding (my son would laugh like crazy if I told him that!). Nope. They don't smell like anything. I know it's not the soap or shampoo I use. What is that? hmmm... it's actually the air under the covers. Now why is that?

Then I fell back asleep.

Then something humorous happened. At one time I'd been trying to train Nita the dog to follow scent. I had been working starting a local search and rescue team and was going to train her with the Ontario Provincial Police. A lot of other things got in the way and I never did follow through with that.

Anyway, one of the things I use to do with her was to hide in the house, cover myself with a blanket or pillows or bags and she would come and find me. She would pull the blanket off of me and bark (alert) to announce she'd won the game. Well, now, when I pull the covers over my head, she thinks I'm playing the game! That means she keeps pulling the covers off and barking right by my ear. Tough to sleep during that! So she was doing that today. I had to laugh about that.

On the way to work I was thinking about today's church service. I wondered if the pastors got really tired the way they pray so fervently for so many people.

I thought about how grateful I am for Pastor P's honesty.

I thought about scripture she'd read from Malachi about justice, about evil being shown. I've been so frustrated by people getting ahead by lying and cheating and hurting people while innocent people try and try and seem to get nowhere. I've been crying for justice for a long time - not just for me, but for others too. I've been asking God to reveal what's-his-name's true character to people and to let him get caught up in his lies. I suppose that's a vengeful sort of prayer, but it's honest and if that's not what God wants to do, then He won't. I figure that whatever God does about it will be the best and wisest thing anyway. And I suppose I'm more exposed than others to situations where there is injustice because my work involves helping and protecting people. Anyway, hearing that scripture was timely and encouraging.

I prayed that God would reign, that God would reveal evil, and that God would take care of these things as He said He would.

I'm reminded of something that Pastor R said during prayer - He asked that God restore what the enemy has stolen from me. Wouldn't it be wonderful if that happened! I'm still afraid to hope, though.

Tonight I asked God to restore faith to our people.

Really tired... tummy troubles were really bad today, but at least I didn't have that terrible pain in my back; It's just normal kind of back pain.

It helped with the abdominal pain to put pressure on certain points, but I didn't want anyone to know how bad I was hurting, so I didn't want to be holding my hand on my abdomen. My solution was to lean up against the edge of a counter and use the counter to put the pressure on. The thing about that solution though, was that I had to stand in an odd position to get it to work. So I'm leaning on this counter in this strange position pretending like I was just relaxin' there and everything was okay. Wonder if anyone wondered why I was standing like that.

My sister emailed me today. I was glad for that. She said that all my hard work will pay off, but I don't agree. I don't think it will. I think if anything comes of all this it will be because God gives it.

Gotta work the day job tomorrow. I'm going to try not to think about that tonight on my way to sleep. I'm going to ask God to help me to get done what needs to get done and ask Him to take care of the stuff I miss. Maybe that will help me sleep?

That smell of fresh flowers and rain was really neat. Still don't know what it was about, though.