I use a white noise app to help me sleep, especially when I’m at a hotel. It makes the noise of a constant waterfall to bleed out all other noises around. With it, I don’t hear people in the hall or in the room next to me. I become oblivious to just about everything going on around me and I can sleep. It’s very handy to have.
In a spiritual sense, there is a lot of white noise all around us. It is designed to keep us from hearing God speak to us and to help us fall asleep. It is a tactic used by our enemy to keep us from doing what we’re supposed to do. We don’t hear or notice things going on in the spirit realm because we’ve been lulled to sleep.
I Thessalonians 5:6 says, “So be on your guard, not asleep like the others. Stay alert and be clearheaded.” Paul was telling us to be awake spiritually. Others have allowed the white noise of this world to put them to sleep spiritually. They aren’t paying attention to the signs of the times or to what is happening all around them because their eyes are closed. They wander through their spiritual life sleepwalking.
It’s time we wake up as the body of Christ. It’s time we quit sleeping and realize that it is still day and we must work while it is day. Jesus said, “The night is coming when no man can work.” We have a brief window to wake up and do real work for the Kingdom of God, yet most of us are sleeping because there is no urgency. We have no real desire to see others come to Christ or we’d be working like their lives depended on it.
When tragedy strikes, everyone has a sense of urgency and they rush to the scene to help others as quickly as possible. Adrenaline takes over and their bodies work through the pain and the weariness. That’s where we need to be right now. Our world is filled with orphans, widows, the poor, the needy and countless lost people. The harvest is ready, but there are only a few laborers working such a large field.
I pray that The Lord of the Harvest would send laborers to work. I pray that He wakes us up from our slumber and ignites a passion in each one of us to go out and share His love with the lost and the hurting. There are people all around each one of us each day who need us to be the hands, feet and voice of Jesus, but our eyes are closed to it. We are asleep and are taking it easy.
I think of the Titanic when it was sinking. If you watched the movie, the lifeboats were only half full. They reserved them for a select few while others drowned. They could have put more in those boats, but they didn’t. Instead, they floated to safety while thousands died a few feet away. We are no better than them when we sit comfortably in our lifeboats of salvation and do nothing to save those who are drowning. We need to wake up, hear their cries and lift them into the boats.
We have the answer. We have the ability. We are asleep though and aren’t doing much about it. What is the white noise in your life that is keeping you from hearing the cries of the lost? What is it that has lulled you to sleep spiritually so that you don’t hear those around you? What do you need to do today to wake up? What can you do to bring more into the lifeboats? It’s time we woke up and started working like there is no tomorrow.
Devotions by Chris Hendrix 