Listen

“Be dressed for service and keep your lamps lit. Be like people waiting for their master to come home from a wedding celebration, who can immediately open the door for him when he arrives and knocks on the door. Happy are those servants whom the master finds waiting up when he arrives. I assure you that, when he arrives, he will dress himself to serve, seat them at the table as honored guests, and wait on them. Happy are those whom he finds alert, even if he comes at midnight or just before dawn.”

Luke 12:35-38

Think

In a Wall Street Journal interview called “What It’s Really Like in the Secret Service,” a former agent named Dan Emmett describes what it is like to work on the security team protecting the President of the United States: “Forgo sleep for 24 hours, skip lunch and dinner, stand outside of a house in the rain at 3 a.m. for several hours, take a cab to the airport and finally board a plane to a large city for a four-hour flight. Repeat this regimen for several days in a row… Agents often burn out after four or five years.”

It is incredibly difficult to maintain a constant state of vigilance and alertness. Our bodies need time to rest and recover. But Jesus encourages us to maintain a kind of spiritual alertness. We never know when Jesus will enter our lives and call us to action; this means that we must always be waiting and watching for Jesus. Living faith strives to be ready to welcome Christ.

Andrew Garnett

Pray

God, help me to be alert and aware to the presence of Christ; help me to be ready when Christ comes and calls me. Amen.

Go

Go today with a faith that is alive to the presence and the possibilities of God.