Prepare, don't wait

James 4.13-14 says, "Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.' Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away." Recently a friend and I were talking, she was sharing with me how she's trying to make decisions about the future and trying to see what the will of God is for her life. She's had people tell her not to worry about it, and to just let it all happen as God wills.

To a point I agree with that, but at the same time I think that's a horrible idea. God doesn't just want us to sit and wait for Him to work and show us what his plan is, he expects us to be ready.

Luke 12.35-40, "Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps lit. Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master will find on the alert when he comes; truly I say to you, that he will gird himself to serve, and have them recline at the table, and will come up and wait on them. Whether he comes in the second watch, or even in the third, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves."

Jesus is talking about his return here, and I feel this is how we are to live, ready but not sitting idle. I said this to my friend, "Spend today preparing for tomorrow, don't spend today waiting for tomorrow." We spend today working for the future, but if it never comes then what have we lost? If we are preparing, nothing. If we are preparing that means we are working towards something, not sitting idly by wasting the breaths God has given us.

St. Irenaeus said, "The glory of God is man fully alive." When we live life to the fullest, we glorify God. Billy Graham once said, "Live every day like Jesus will return today, but live every day like we have to plan for the next thousand years.:

I think this is the way Jesus wants us to live, ready for when he comes, but not sitting by terrified that the end of the world might be near. The Bible tells us that perfect love casts out fear, so we don't need to be afraid about the end of the world.

I look at my life, there are things I want to do; Bike across America, climb Mt. Everest, spend Holy Week in Israel, that's just a few. So I live preparing for these things, glorifying God as I do them, but if I never get to accomplish any of them, then that's fine too, and I glorify God all the same. We weren't made to be miserable, we were given life to live it, and when we live it fully we are glorifying God.

I don't know if this makes sense, it is all so clear in my mind, and I hope that I've been able to get that idea out.

"The glory of God is man fully alive." Live you're life to the fullest, glorify God in all you do.

Peace be with you.