Are You Ready? 

   Tomorrow is Christmas Eve.  If they haven’t already, families will soon gather to celebrate Christmas.  Meals will be cooked, and shared, gifts will be exchanged.  All will be welcome and hopefully on their best behavior.  Are you ready?

   I’m not talking about great meals and presents, or the family stories that everyone has heard too many times.  Those things are wonderful and are an important part of the celebration, but not nearly as important as preparing to welcome the newborn King.  The gifts are nice, and speak of our love for each other, but the most important gift will not be under the tree.  He was placed in a manger in Bethlehem over two thousand years ago.

   Just as some people put off preparations for Christmas, many put off preparations for the next life.  Last second conversions, confessions and salvations are incredible blessings, and it seems some have decided that they will wait until that very last opportunity to consider their immortal soul.  God lovingly accepts their last second conversion and rejoices at another soul saved, for He is a loving and merciful God.

   The difficulty comes in the fact that we have no idea whether or not we will have than opportunity.  A truck crashing into the side of our compact vehicle may end it all in an instant.  A massive heart attack may not allow even a few seconds to consider eternity.

   So, I ask again, are you ready?  Are you ready to stand before our Lord and be judged by the one who knows everything about you?  Have you prepared, are you ready? 

Only you know the hour of our death.

We act as if it will never come.

We need to prepare ourselves.

Eternal life is at stake. 

Amen