Are You Ready?

Can you remember a time when it wasn’t heard throughout the house at least once a day, “Are you ready?” It seems we’re always “getting ready” to go somewhere or we’re preparing to do something different. It is a question of preparation that always comes before something that is about to happen. This question is asked before we do a number of physical things: before leaving the house, before bedtime, before meals, before leaving for school, before starting a sporting event, etc. It’s important that we be ready for all the things we are about to do because with proper preparation we can avoid failure because our brain wasn’t into the task at hand or embarrassment because of the lack of equipment, like forgetting to bring your glove to a baseball game. We spend a lot of time “getting ready” to do all the things we do in this life – what about after this life? Are you “getting ready” for the day you depart this world? Have you even considered that there needs to be time set aside to prepare?  How much time should one take to “get ready” for eternity?

[Titus 3:1-11] Titus was a leader in the church at Crete and the apostle Paul wrote to him instructing him on how to be an effective leader of God’s people. “Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men.” How much time should one take to “get ready” for eternity? All day – every day. We are naturally disobedient and want to do things our own way, even though we know the outcome could be bad and the consequences detrimental to our well-being. When we disobey God and his Word, we separate ourselves from His love and grace, because we don’t like God’s law. Yet when we find that our selfish ways get us into more trouble than we can handle, man’s nature cries out to the same God to save him. We want to be forgiven of our sins and everything be okay again. We get caught and don’t want to pay the consequences of breaking the law of the land, but never give a second thought to the breaking of God’s law with its eternal consequences. Man is always looking out for his physical well-being, all-the-while neglecting his spiritual well-being. “...when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth (baptism) and renewal by the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38), whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.” “It was just before the Passover Feast. Jesus knew that the time had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love” (John 13:1). Jesus paid the consequences of man’s sin – “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21) - that through the Son we can be reconciled to the Father (2 Corinthians 5:18-19) and live in His grace. “If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator. If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist. If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist. But since our greatest need was forgiveness, God sent us a Savior.” (Roy Lessin) Have you accepted the saving grace of our Father in heaven through his Son who sacrificed his life to pay your sin debt? “Are you ready?” – Prepared for your eternal life?