I had an “Introduction to Psychology” class in my first semester of college.  One day in the lecture the professor was talking about the moments when we are drifting off to sleep… that time between “awake” consciousness and “sleep” consciousness.  And then he said something like this, “I just love that feeling of just about, but not quite being, asleep.  I enjoy it so much that sometimes I make myself wake up so I can have that feeling again.”

I remember sitting in that lecture hall thinking, “That is so weird.”  And then thinking, “this guy is so weird.”  But then I thought, “You know, he’s right!” 

That moment just before sleep is really great!  Whether you’ve gone to sleep the moment your head hit the pillow or tossed and turned with the sea of the day’s events… that moment when sleep finally comes is wonderful! All the assurances and worries – successes and failures - pleasures and pains of the day are slowly fading away. And it’s just you… nothing more, nothing less… just you. 

I’ve come to know the moment just as I’m waking up to be the same kind of thing.  It’s a moment when it’s just me… just me and God. 

Tish Harrison Warren shares about this in her book Liturgy of the Ordinary in a personal way: 

“This morning I wake (slowly) on an ordinary day, but I wake in a bed I know, a house I live in, a routine and particular life. The palmist declares, ‘This is the day that the Lord has made.’  This one (this day).  We wake not to a vague or general mercy from a far-off God.  God, in delight and wisdom, has made, named, and blessed this average day.  What I in my weakness see as another monotonous day in a string of days, God has given as a singular gift.” 

My prayer for you is that you can begin to see the moment of waking up, as the gift from God that it is… a moment made for just you and God at the beginning of each new day!