On conflict and not sleeping.

Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not the let the sun go down on your anger.

So that thing that Paul said, he's right. I don't know if everyone is like me. But when there is unresolved conflict, there is conflict when it comes to sleep. I've often thought that it comes as a blessing in disguise, God keeping things on a short leash if you will, not letting it get buried. I've spent a lot of years burying thing but a couple of years ago I began to sense this inability to do so anymore.

Paul knew that anger burns a hole in your heart or in my case, my stomach. But then again, the stomach/general gut area was understood to be more the core of the person in Paul's time. And though we pray and fight it and try to maintain the belief that it's a misunderstanding and that there is no real animosity between parties, when there is no communication to confirm such things, it's a constant battle to not allow the hurt to turn into hatred and bitterness. We battle to believe the best, but without actually talking to one another, we too easily turn towards believing the worst.

We fight to curb our passive-aggressive tendencies. But to do so means balancing voicing our hurt so that we move toward one another in a way that will bring life and truth and growth through the pain; not destruction, not a surface assuaging of the anguish that lives underneath. Relationships are dangerous. The great Pat Benetar said it well, “Love is a battlefield.” To maintain them we have to live in truth, not in lies. Live in grace, not in condemnation. Live in a type of love that is willing to sacrifice, to put others first. The type of love that is willing to own one's sin yet isn't afraid to call others out, as well.

It's hard stuff. Dangerous stuff. But when done well, it can change us. And save us. And maybe even let us sleep tonight. I'll let you know how that goes.

I leave off tonight with some lyrics that didn't make much sense to me until I learned that they were about the writer's relationship with his brother. As much as I dislike quoting songs everyone knows (unfortunately I have a bit of the elitist in me, sorry), I do reserve the right for the popular to sometimes be the profound. And tonight, these words finally make sense and feel particularly poignant.

I never knew that everything was falling through
That everyone I knew was waiting on a cue
To turn and run when all I needed was the truth
But that's how it's got to be
It's coming down to nothing more than apathy
I'd rather run the other way than stay and see
The smoke and who's still standing when it clears

Let's rearrange
I wish you were a stranger I could disengage
Just say that we agree and then never change
Soften a bit until we all just get along
But that's disregard
Find another friend and you discard
As you lose the argument in a cable car
Hanging above as the canyon comes between

And suddenly I become a part of your past
I'm becoming the part that don't last
I'm losing you and its effortless

Without a sound we lose sight of the ground
In the throw around
Never thought that you wanted to bring it down
I won't let it go down till we torch it ourselves

And everyone knows I'm in over my head