Nobody's paging you at 3 a.m.

3:12 a.m. Red numbers glowing on the nightstand, eyes wide open, no idea why. Then an hour of your brain doing inventory before you slide back under. You blamed stress. Your age. The mattress. The news. It didn't cross your mind that a body can wake up hungry for something that isn't food.

Some of that waking may have been the last cigarette of the evening wearing off in the dark. Something in you surfaced asking for a top up, and you called it insomnia. It paged you at three and let stress take the blame.

Sleep is the floor everything else stands on. Your patience runs on it. Your mood runs on it. So does your ability to let an urge pass without arguing with it. If your nights are still rough right now, part of that may be the rebuild, and that part fades. God designed you to need the night, and He's handing it back. Once nothing runs out at three, the dark gets to stay dark until morning.

Guard it like it's worth something, because it is. Tonight, pick a bedtime and keep it like a promise to someone you respect. Then hand the night shift to the One who never sleeps. You keep watch tonight, Lord. I'm sleeping. Lights out. Nobody's paging you tonight.