alone time

(originally posted 5/18/08)

Ashtyn has gone to bed all by himself for quite sometime now. At around 7:30 or 8:00PM we put him in his bed, tuck him in and turn on a movie and he falls asleep, usually, pretty quickly. Lately, though, he has been playing that "bedtime" game again where he will come out of his room what seems like 100 times each evening for various reasons. He either wants a drink, has to go potty, needs a snack or wants to watch a different movie. He has also most recently started asking for someone to come in and lay down with him until he falls asleep. We generally try to just tuck him back in and let him fall asleep by himself so that he won't grow dependent on us being next to him to sleep but sometimes it's hard to look into his eyes and say "no". About a week ago we gave in and Brandon laid with him one night and I did the next. Since then, it has been hard to get him to fall asleep by himself again. He has asked every night for one of us to come to his room. Last Tuesday, in particular, Brandon was watching "The Deadliest Catch" and I was reading a book. We thought Ashtyn was asleep but indeed he was not and around 8:30PM he came down the hallway and asked for someone to come lay with him. I tried to handle him, since Brandon was watching his show, and I escorted him back to his bed. He begged me to stay but I really wanted to keep reading my book and so I tucked him in and kissed him goodnight once again. This happened a couple more times over the next 20 minutes or so. At around 8:50PM, I finally agreed to lay with him. As I was laying there watching my son fall asleep the Lord spoke to me...

Lesson Learned? My son was not only asking me to lay with him he was really asking to spend some time with just mommy. The house was quiet and he was longing for the comfort and safety of some alone time. Many times in our lives the Lord is asking us for the same thing. He keeps approaching us asking different things from us (a drink, snack or movie) in the hopes that we will put down what we are doing and tend to what he is asking. We may, in fact, do these little tasks but we do them in a hurry and get back to our own thing. Then when the Lord finally reaches out and asks, or even begs, for our full attention and our time we reluctantly put down what we are doing and spend the time. The crazy part about that night, and what really hit me, was that I was reading a christian book. The Lord pointed out to me that the very thing that I was doing was a "good thing". There was nothing, within itself, wrong with my reading that book. In fact, I probably should read that book but at the time the Lord (Ashtyn) wanted my full attention. Sometimes, God will ask us to put down something that isn't bad for us and in fact is a VERY good thing...but it's just not the time for us to be doing it. We have to be sensitive in those times and make sure that we are guided by the Holy Spirit so that we will know when the appropriate time to continue in our "good thing" is and when it is time to lay that "thing" down and simply lay with the Lord and be quiet.