the beauty of a snooze button

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) releases an annual survey on American time use. This is basically a collection of data on how the average American spends his/her day. One of the statistics stuck out to me:

Sleeping:
Men – 8.56 hrs/day
Women – 8.76 hrs/day

I don’t get nearly that much sleep! I’m closer to the 6 hour mark on a regular basis, although sometimes I get close to 7 hours, usually on weekends. I’ve worked to fill my time with stuff to do. When I have down time, I find books to read, tv shows to watch, games to play. I barely have time to sit and unwind. I’ve basically cluttered my day with things to do so I won’t be bored. This eventually leads to less sleep. You see, I suppose my thought process is, why spend time sleeping when you can be doing something? I know, definitely not the healthiest approach, and something I’m resolving to change in the coming year.

I find I’ve filled my life with mundane things, things that I do day in and day out. I’ve come to realized that I have this tendency to ignore God’s glory in the mundane things, things like sleep, eating, or even going to the bathroom (yes there’s glory in that). You see, it’s easy for me to give God glory when I’m at church on a Sunday, singing my lungs out, but it’s hard for me to remember to give Him glory when I’m checking my email, or waiting in line at starbucks. I appreciate the fact that in 1 Corinthians 10:31, Paul uses the everyday activities to describe how we can glorify God: Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
While it’s easy to say I should do it all for God’s glory, what exactly does that look like in real life? How do I nap and glorify God at the same time? How do give God glory when I’m chugging a cup of coffee? These aren’t exactly questions I can answer, as I’m not really sure how I’d be able to glorify God in those moments. The only think I can think of is acknowledging that God is great and doesn’t need sleep or caffeine, but in his graciousness, has given us the privilege of doing the commonplace things to sustain ourselves like napping and drinking coffee.

Of course, this is much easier said than done. It means I’d have to change my behavior, as it has sort of been my tendency to ignore God’s glory in the commonplace things. Ohh boy, I have quite the task ahead of me…