For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. Titus 2:11-13
The Bible verse says we should be ready and waiting for the return of our Savior. Elsewhere in Scripture it says it is imperative that we should always be ready. But how? How should we get ready? I believe we can learn from some people around us who always have to be ready. You know,
* people like those who are on the highway patrol. Their job demands they always be ready and watching the traffic. The officers are keeping an eye out for lawbreakers, accidents and breakdowns;
* firemen are always ready as they listen for the alarm bell to ring or the ambulance paramedics who wait for the phone to summon them. These folks must be prepared. They know the catastrophe that waits if they forget to be prepared.
Consider what happens if a supposedly ready person is ill-prepared. What would happen if an air-traffic controller should become too sleepy or too bored to keep a careful watch on his screen? What would happen if a bus driver becomes negligent or distracted for a second? Thirty high-schoolers could lose their lives. The screener in the airport dare not let a dangerous package slip by him undetected.
For these people to be unprepared is tragic, but their situation is not nearly as bad as that of a person who is not prepared to meet Jesus, the just Judge.
Are you ready to meet Jesus? You are if Jesus is your Savior. You are if you believe in Him who was, according to prophecy, born in Bethlehem. You are ready if you acknowledge Him as the Redeemer who never succumbed to sin and resisted Satan's temptations. Indeed, every day of His life, Jesus resisted evil enticements, which trip us up.
You know how when He was among us He was hated and harassed. He was laughed at by those who didn't understand Him and called names by those who wished to demean Him. He was misunderstood by the common people, deserted by His friends, and betrayed by a close associate. He was tried by men who purchased the service of witnesses who lied about Him. He was beaten, threatened and passed around from court to court.
The king of His home country asked Him to perform some tricks while He was on trial for His life, and the representative from Rome, even though convinced Jesus was totally innocent of any charges, eventually condemned Him to death. Add to these traitorous trials the sins you and I commit, and we cannot begin to understand the evil Jesus carried to the cross.
Jesus died and rose so you might be forgiven and saved. His gifts are free; they are for you, and they should be held as being of the greatest value. When we do that, we shall be -- and stay -- prepared.
THE PRAYER: Dear Lord, grant that I may value and continuously cling to the salvation that has been won for me. This I ask in Jesus' Name. Amen.
In Christ I remain His servant and yours,
Pastor Ken Klaus
Speaker emeritus of The Lutheran Hour®
Lutheran Hour Ministries
Today's Bible Readings: 2 Samuel 19-20 John 5:25-47
To Download Devotion MP3 to your computer, right click here and select "Save Link As" or "Save Target As" or "Download Linked File As"