Our Newsletter
Our newsletter, "Cross Current" is published each Sunday.
Along with an up-to-date rundown of congregational activities, each edition features an interesting and challenging cover story that connects faith to real life.
Written by Rick Gamble, these articles are published the following week in the Brantford Expositor where Rick is the Religion and Ethics columnist.
To have these free, no-strings-attached articles delivered weekly to your mailbox, drop Rick a note at info@followers.ca
PHOTO: Rick (left) and a friend atop the Rock of Gibralter
Our newsletter, "Cross Current" is published each Sunday.
Along with an up-to-date rundown of congregational activities, each edition features an interesting and challenging cover story that connects faith to real life.
Written by Rick Gamble, these articles are published the following week in the Brantford Expositor where Rick is the Religion and Ethics columnist.
To have these free, no-strings-attached articles delivered weekly to your mailbox, drop Rick a note at info@followers.ca
PHOTO: Rick (left) and a friend atop the Rock of Gibralter
A Nightmare Scenario
Early superstition and modern science agree the best way to handle a nightmare is to get some things off your chest.
A clue is found in the word itself. “Nightmare” is a combination of night and “maere”, a word from Anglo-Saxon and Norse legends describing a spirit or demon who sits on a sleeping person and suffocates them.
In the myths, a nocturnal visitor creeps into people's rooms, jumps on them, and imparts bad dreams. At first, each victim feels a heavy weight on their chest and is unable to move, then life is squeezed out of them.
Today, it's thought mares were a primitive way of explaining a form of sleep paralysis that affects up to one in five people. It usually happens just before sleeping or just after waking. The afflicted can see and hear but not move or speak, and many feel a heavy pressure on their chest, along with a choking sensation.
To keep mares at bay in the early days, you were told to put your shoes near your bed with the laces facing where you'd sleep. Since mares were thought to slip in through keyholes or knot holes, you plugged those openings. And to get a mare off your chest, you were told to put your thumb in your hand, or promise the mare a gift, which it could collect the next day.
Even now there's no specific remedy for sleep paralysis, but researchers know we stay asleep during bad dreams but are awakened by nightmares. Essentially, nightmares indicate we haven't dealt with the anxiety accumulated during the day. That leaves us with feelings of fear, anger, or despair.
Though nightmares can have physical causes — like fever, or eating before bed which stimulates brain activity — stress and anxiety are the main culprits. Common nightmares include falling, being chased, accidents, and the injury or death of others. Children are often affected, especially those exposed to death or chronic illness.
Some research indicates nightmares begin with a single thought or scene (like walking down a dark alley), which the brain responds to with either a positive thought or a negative one. Since dreams evoke negative emotions 75% of the time, nightmares are common. In fact, some children have them once a week, and teens or young adults often have nightmares once a month. They're especially common among people who have post traumatic stress disorder and relive a traumatic experience over and over.
To treat the problem, doctors often use stress-reduction techniques, counselling, or 'imagery rehearsal”, in which sufferers change the ending of their remembered nightmare so it's no longer threatening. By rehearsing that new ending, especially before bed, the brain resolves the root anxiety.
Nobody is exempt from stress and anxiety, no matter how strong their faith. But scripture offers remedies to keep them under control and in proper perspective, beginning with prayer and meditation. Research is near-unanimous in support of both, and not just in a Christian context. Prayer and meditation are calming, with the proven ability to reduce stress, depression, and even pain. It's not that God is Mr.-Fixit who'll resolve every problem. Nor is it sinful to be concerned about what's happening around us.
Instead, prayer reminds us the powerful God who created everything knows and cares about us, and is actively involved in our lives; that He'll change the circumstances or change us; and that He'll give us strength, love, and wisdom to meet any situation. “Don’t worry about anything but pray about everything,” says the Bible. ”Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He's done.Then you'll experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Jesus.” (Phil. 4)
Notice the balance. When we pray about what we need while staying thankful for what God's already done, His past faithfulness gives us hope for the present. It also helps us keep our balance by seeing that, despite all that's wrong, we're still richly blessed. Add to that the need to choose positive thoughts, not negative ones. “Fix your thoughts on what's true, honourable, right, pure, lovely, and admirable,” adds Paul. “Think about what's excellent and worthy of praise. Stress and anxiety feed on negativity and despair. So starve them.
Another way to keep those threats from squeezing the life out of you is to surround yourself with support. That's why God made the church. We're called to love and lift up each other, bear one another's burdens, and make room for each other in our hearts. Healthy, loving churches reflect the love and concern of Jesus who calls us to “laugh with those who laugh and mourn with those who mourn” (Rom. 12:15).
But the biggest value of faith is how it changes the ending of even our worst nightmares. If we truly trust God, we have the absolute assurance we'll get what we need to make it through; that even disease and death won't have the final say; and that everything missing in this life will be restored when God decides time's up.
So face your fears, but believe. Rehearse new endings that bring hope, serenity, and purpose. And let the presence, power, and promises of God resolve your root anxieties.
Do that, and you won't have anything to lose sleep over.
By Rick Gamble. Reprint at will in not-for-profit publications. Originally published in Cross Current, the weekly newsletter of Followers of Christ, an independent, nondenominational church in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.
Early superstition and modern science agree the best way to handle a nightmare is to get some things off your chest.
A clue is found in the word itself. “Nightmare” is a combination of night and “maere”, a word from Anglo-Saxon and Norse legends describing a spirit or demon who sits on a sleeping person and suffocates them.
In the myths, a nocturnal visitor creeps into people's rooms, jumps on them, and imparts bad dreams. At first, each victim feels a heavy weight on their chest and is unable to move, then life is squeezed out of them.
Today, it's thought mares were a primitive way of explaining a form of sleep paralysis that affects up to one in five people. It usually happens just before sleeping or just after waking. The afflicted can see and hear but not move or speak, and many feel a heavy pressure on their chest, along with a choking sensation.
To keep mares at bay in the early days, you were told to put your shoes near your bed with the laces facing where you'd sleep. Since mares were thought to slip in through keyholes or knot holes, you plugged those openings. And to get a mare off your chest, you were told to put your thumb in your hand, or promise the mare a gift, which it could collect the next day.
Even now there's no specific remedy for sleep paralysis, but researchers know we stay asleep during bad dreams but are awakened by nightmares. Essentially, nightmares indicate we haven't dealt with the anxiety accumulated during the day. That leaves us with feelings of fear, anger, or despair.
Though nightmares can have physical causes — like fever, or eating before bed which stimulates brain activity — stress and anxiety are the main culprits. Common nightmares include falling, being chased, accidents, and the injury or death of others. Children are often affected, especially those exposed to death or chronic illness.
Some research indicates nightmares begin with a single thought or scene (like walking down a dark alley), which the brain responds to with either a positive thought or a negative one. Since dreams evoke negative emotions 75% of the time, nightmares are common. In fact, some children have them once a week, and teens or young adults often have nightmares once a month. They're especially common among people who have post traumatic stress disorder and relive a traumatic experience over and over.
To treat the problem, doctors often use stress-reduction techniques, counselling, or 'imagery rehearsal”, in which sufferers change the ending of their remembered nightmare so it's no longer threatening. By rehearsing that new ending, especially before bed, the brain resolves the root anxiety.
Nobody is exempt from stress and anxiety, no matter how strong their faith. But scripture offers remedies to keep them under control and in proper perspective, beginning with prayer and meditation. Research is near-unanimous in support of both, and not just in a Christian context. Prayer and meditation are calming, with the proven ability to reduce stress, depression, and even pain. It's not that God is Mr.-Fixit who'll resolve every problem. Nor is it sinful to be concerned about what's happening around us.
Instead, prayer reminds us the powerful God who created everything knows and cares about us, and is actively involved in our lives; that He'll change the circumstances or change us; and that He'll give us strength, love, and wisdom to meet any situation. “Don’t worry about anything but pray about everything,” says the Bible. ”Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He's done.Then you'll experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Jesus.” (Phil. 4)
Notice the balance. When we pray about what we need while staying thankful for what God's already done, His past faithfulness gives us hope for the present. It also helps us keep our balance by seeing that, despite all that's wrong, we're still richly blessed. Add to that the need to choose positive thoughts, not negative ones. “Fix your thoughts on what's true, honourable, right, pure, lovely, and admirable,” adds Paul. “Think about what's excellent and worthy of praise. Stress and anxiety feed on negativity and despair. So starve them.
Another way to keep those threats from squeezing the life out of you is to surround yourself with support. That's why God made the church. We're called to love and lift up each other, bear one another's burdens, and make room for each other in our hearts. Healthy, loving churches reflect the love and concern of Jesus who calls us to “laugh with those who laugh and mourn with those who mourn” (Rom. 12:15).
But the biggest value of faith is how it changes the ending of even our worst nightmares. If we truly trust God, we have the absolute assurance we'll get what we need to make it through; that even disease and death won't have the final say; and that everything missing in this life will be restored when God decides time's up.
So face your fears, but believe. Rehearse new endings that bring hope, serenity, and purpose. And let the presence, power, and promises of God resolve your root anxieties.
Do that, and you won't have anything to lose sleep over.
By Rick Gamble. Reprint at will in not-for-profit publications. Originally published in Cross Current, the weekly newsletter of Followers of Christ, an independent, nondenominational church in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.
