February Special: Overflow of the Spirit Training Package & Free Video Event
Learn How to Release All the Gifts of the Spirit in Every Area of Life!

A Spirit-Energized Sleep Technique

Mark Virkler's picture

May I offer you a technique that helps me fall asleep at night, and at the same time aligns my spirit with the Holy Spirit so my heart ponders God's truths and God's grace all night as I sleep? I have used it for many years, and those I have shared it with and who have tried it, have said it helped them. So let's see if it could be of benefit to you, too. 

What keeps me awake is...

Thinking is what keeps me awake. I am to take every thought captive (2 Cor. 10:5). Thus I am to take control over my thoughts. So here are some of the ways I do that. Thinking is a left-brain function. So I want techniques that cause me to stop thinking and relax. Well, I can shift to the right hemisphere of my brain by picturing. So the technique below involves picturing. Also being focused on a single thought or word takes me down into my heart. The techniques below involve focusing on a single thought.

Slow Down Your Breathing, Relax, and Smile

Since falling asleep means you will be breathing slower, encourage sleep by choosing to breathe slowly and deeply, in for 5 or 6 seconds and out for 5 or 6 seconds. Keep a light smile on your face (see blog on the coherent heart state). When I am laying in bed and put a smile on my face, I can feel my entire body relax!

Focus on Jesus and the Holy Spirit 

"The Spirit of God has made me, And the breath of the Almighty gives me life" (Job 33:4).

Since "breath" and "spirit" are the same word in the Bible, when you breathe in, see the light of the Holy Spirit entering your heart and chest area and radiating out through your body. As you breathe out, see semi-light leaving you and going back to Jesus. Inwardly speak the name "Jesus." As you breathe in say “Je-” and as you breathe out say “-sus.” If you need peace or calm or joy or love, speak those words inwardly as you breathe in and out.

When you focus on the breath of God flowing through you, it helps calm and center you down into your spirit. It also helps you be fully present and focused on "now". Most of our stress and anxiety come from either worry over the future or guilt and regret from the past.

By controlling your breathing and meditating on God's Word you help prevent that tendency to "time travel" and instead are able to rest in the now I AM moment of God.

Results

This brings your heart, mind and emotions into alignment with the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit and relaxes you, and prepares you to receive Spirit life and revelation from the Lord Jesus Christ as you sleep. In addition, you should fall asleep quickly as this technique gets your mind to stop thinking as you relax into the presence of Jesus.

If you need to add some sleep tea, valerian root, Melatonin, and ocean waves on your bedside CD, that is fine also. I also use the "sleep" cycle on the "Apollo" extremely helpful, and if I wake up in the middle of the night, I reset it for another 60 minutes. Though I fall asleep quickly, I find I do need to add all these things to help me stay asleep. When I wake up in the middle of the night I may take another Valerian Root and/or Melatonin. That seems to help put me back into a deeper sleep. By doing everything listed in this blog, I can now get 8 hours of sleep a night which is important to maintain health. 


Some people would suggest that this is New Age and yogic "breathe in the light; breathe out the darkness." So let's respond by discussing what biblical principles would allow a Christian to use these techniques.


I do understand that things done by New Agers may be similar to Christian things and that can be disconcerting.

However, I did not get this from the New Age Movement. I believe they are the one’s copying the truth. The New Agers are counterfeiting us; not us, them.

As I mention in the 4 Keys to Hearing God's Voice video series, New Agers counterfeit things that: 1) are real and 2) have value. So I would be glad to discover the reality that has enough value to pay to counterfeit it. New Agers do many things I do. They get married, drive cars, eat three meals a day, and have families. I surely am not going to quit these things just because New Agers do them.

I do not live in reaction to New Agers. God has not called me to do that. I live according to the Bible and the Holy Spirit. And if every New Ager does what I do, or none do what I do, it is completely irrelevant to me. What they do has no bearing on my life. I do not live in reaction to them or their activities, nor do I copy them or their activities, nor do I even study them or their activities. I have read the introduction to one book which overviews what New Agers believe, just so I could write our book Am I Being Deceived? which explores the differences between New Age, Christianity, and Phariseeism. It is here. I cover much of the same information on video in the training module, Decoding Deception.

The reason I slow down my breathing is because I understand that when I am asleep, I am breathing slower. So this becomes a mechanical way to move me in the direction of sleep and get me where I know I need to go and will be at when I am asleep.

Also, in Greek, the word “breath” and “spirit” are the same (pneuma), so it is clear from Scripture that when I breathe in, I am breathing in God’s Spirit. The Bible also says that one of God’s characteristics is that “God is light,” (1 Jn. 1:5) so I can see His Spirit entering me as light when I am breathing in. God's light is pure and holy, and since I am still involved in the process of cleansing myself from all defilement of body and spirit (2 Cor. 7:1), I would see my light as a "semi-light," not as pure as His light. Positionally, I have put on Christ's righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Cor. 1:30). Practically, I am working out my salvation with fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12,13).

The reasons I say the name Jesus over and over are: 1) because I love Him, 2) because I am to be fixing myself on Him (Heb. 12:1,2) and 3) because I know that fixing my mind on a single focus quiets it so I am not thinking (and it is thinking that keeps me awake at night).

Sometimes I need Jesus’ peace or calm so I may say the words “peace” or “calm” over and over. Often I also ask the Holy Spirit to grant me wisdom and understanding concerning a situation I am seeking to resolve, and I then awaken in the morning and the resolution is there in my heart, as my spirit worked on it all night. Song of Soloman  5:2 tells us our spirits do not sleep at night. We find in the Bible that God granted lots of revelation at night through dreams

 


  • Discover the healthy changes which take place within your body as you fall asleep utilizing the technique suggested above. You enter the coherent state.
  • Natural steps I take include taking Valerian Root before going to bed.

 

Related Blogs: 

Gifts of Healings   
Add new comment

Comments

Anonymous's picture

I'm listen your teaching listen the voice of God. Please pray for me to become an God son.

Mark Virkler's picture

I am glad you want to become a son of God.We have laid out the steps to salvation on our website. You can find them posted here: http://www.cwgministries.org/salvation

Please meditate through them carefully, and then pray the prayer at the end, from your heart. The Holy Spirit will respond and come and fill you and you will be saved.

Add new comment

CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.

Results

Results 351 - 360 of 485

Pages

How to Build a Winning Team eBook

How to Build a Winning Team eBook

by Mark and Patti Virkler | 105 Pages

Can I succeed like others have? What do I need to do? How do I go about it? What if I don't have the gifts necessary to do something great?  The wonderful truth revealed in Scripture is that God uses ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary feats, especially when they say, "Yes, Lord" to the destiny He has prepared for them!

Price: $12.95

How to Deal Effectively with Your Sexuality eBook

by Six Contributing Authors | 80 Pages

Question: How do I handle my sexuality? It is such an intense, persistent and driving force. I battle with pornography. How do I tame this monster within me? I see so many people and even Christian leaders fall, and I don't want to fall. I want this to work! I feel trapped and no-one is preaching a sermon on how to handle this. So I grit my teeth, try my hardest, and fail over and over again, and then get consumed with shame. Can you help me? Have you found any answers that work?

Price: $9.95
How to Receive the Baptism in the Holy Spirit eBook

How to Receive the Baptism in the Holy Spirit eBook

by Mark and Patti Virkler | 44 Pages | Published 2002

This brief booklet walks a person through the main obstacles to speaking in tongues, and shows how each one can be successfully overcome. It is down-to-earth, practical and biblical, and in it Mark Virkler shares the struggles he went through before he was able to speak in tongues. Some were theological issues and some simply practical issues, like the fact that if I am going to speak in tongues, I will need to speak. Otherwise, nothing happens.

Price: $2.66
How to Walk by the Spirit eBook

How to Walk by the Spirit eBook

by Mark and Patti Virkler | 136 Pages

Are you like many western Christians who have been taught little about how to sense their spirits? Do you have trouble even defining what spirit sensations feel like within you, much less recognizing them? This training was birthed from Mark’s passion to live out of his spirit, and thus release the anointing of God. The problem he faced was lack of clear biblical definition as to what his spirit felt like. So Mark looked up every verse in the Bible on heart and spirit.

Price: $13.95
Imagine That eBook

Imagine That eBook

by Rev. Jimmy D. Smith | 85 Pages

Beginning sometime around my 72nd year, my imagination really started to wake up again.  I was reading Dialogue with God, by Mark and Patti Virkler, when wheels began to turn.  In the weeks that followed I decided that this was a “do” book, not just a “read to learn” book. I began to do what the book suggested. Somewhere along the line I felt that the Lord gave me permission to experience the freedom of using my imagination to worship Him, to talk to Him, and more importantly to hear from Him.

Price: $7.95

Intimacy With God Through Journaling [Kindle Edition]

by Janet Gilham

It is a joy to celebrate the release of another new ebook of two-way journaling by one of our students, Janet Gilham! It was an honor to write the forward to this book, which contains 28 days of journaling. This makes it ideal to use for a month of your daily devotions. Each journal entry reveals the heart of God toward you and thus brings warmth and healing to our wounded hearts.

Price: $3.99
Intimacy with the Holy Spirit eBook

Intimacy with the Holy Spirit eBook

by Mark and Patti Virkler | 223 Pages

This book leads you in meditating on and journaling about several hundred verses that discuss the Holy Spirit. You will grow in intimacy with the indwelling Holy Spirit, and the anointing within you will increase! You will exclaim as the disciples did on the Emmaus Road: “Did not our heart burn within us…while He opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32)! In addition to being led to journal through these verses, you will read numerous two-way journal entries from Mark Virkler, as well as a powerful five-page prayer at the conclusion of the book.

Price: $10.95

Journaling Questions e-booklet

100's of journaling questions arranged in categories

Jumpstart your two-way journaling! People often ask me, do you have good journaling questions I can use in my dialogue with Jesus? The answer is yes! Predicting the date of His return is not going to work out well. So how about hundreds of GREAT two-way journaling questions you can ask the Lord!

Price: $6.95
Lamad Faculty Handbook eBook

Lamad Faculty Handbook eBook

by Mark and Patti Virkler | 78 pages

This book presents lamad (revelation-based learning) standards  for teachers and curriculum writers. Lamad is a Hebrew word found in the Old Testament and it is translated "to teach" or "to learn."  It is a kind of learning that involves the Holy Spirit granting divine revelation to the heart of man. Thus it goes beyond western rationalism as a learning methodology.

Price: $7.96

Meditation: How to Study the Bible in the Presence of God ebook

Click here for Kindle version.

This book is our more academic version of this topic, designed more for the theologian.

Our practical, hands-on, user-friendly version for personal or group use is Hearing God Through Biblical Meditation.

Price: $2.99

Pages