by Eric Davis of The Cripple Gate – Sleep Disorders and the Glory of God

Editor’s note: This showed up on my Facebook a few days ago and instantly made my blood boil. I don’t know if the author is Quiverfull, but he is part of a very Calvinist organization. Reading through this he states not only are sleep disorders for the glory of God, but that he believes sometimes it’s for discipline and punishment. Sorry, but illness does not work that way.

Later in the comments the author complains that he has sleep apnea too and that the doctors efforts are not helping so he’s just going to wait for the Lord to heal it. Which tells me that he is extremely non-compliant with his sleep hygiene and use of his CPAP machine. If you are not willing to do the work required to help your condition it’s on you. If you don’t believe the doctor knows what he’s doing, like the author stated it is time to find another doctor.

This is actually a subject I know quite a bit about after being diagnosed with general sleep apnea 17 years ago and continually using my VPAP machine every single night to great affect. This week I picked up my newest VPAP machine. God didn’t give me sleep apnea to punish, educate, bring him glory or discipline me. It’s nerve damage, likely from birth since I used to stop breathing and turn blue as a baby.

On the original post Davis lists many conditions he claims are caused by insomnia and sleep apnea. He’s got a lot of them that are not linked to not sleeping, like asthma. This is one of the big disservices that those in the more fundamentalist versions of Christianity fob off on the chronically ill – the idea that you are ill because of unconfessed sin in your life. Illness is not the result of divine punishment!

This is great news. God’s grace truly is sufficient for sleep deprivation and the myriad of side-effects.

Now, this does not mean that God’s grace will instantly give you that eight-hour slumber. Rather, it means that God’s grace helps to endure it while trusting in the Son of God and his word. It means that he will not abandon us, ever. Even if we do die early, his grace will glorify us one day.

Whether corrective, preventative, or educational discipline, God uses sleep disorders to raise us up into more mature children. That’s the key to rejoicing in this suffering. In faith, we praise God for his goodness in treating us as beloved children. Let’s be sure we are being trained, and not embittered, by it all. He is doing so many good things; forcing us to spend more time with him, weaning us off the world’s comforts, and teaching us trust in weakness, to name a few.

And, as we struggle to see through the fog of our sin and sleeplessness, we trust with the eyes of our heart that one day, we will see crystal clear how our sleep disorder worked for the highest good and glory of God. It will. Count on it, believer.

Dream on, buddy. Oh, that’s right you don’t sleep so you cannot dream.

QUOTING QUIVERFULL is a regular feature of NLQ – we present the actual words of noted Quiverfull leaders, cultural enforcers and those that seek to keep women submitted to men and ask our readers: What do you think? Agree? Disagree? This is the place to state your opinion. Please, let’s keep it respectful – but at the same time, we encourage readers to examine the ideas of Quiverfull and Spiritual Abuse honestly and thoughtfully.

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