“you also must be prepared,
for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come.”
America is obsessed with the future: the stock market, computers and electronic development, college, retirement, etc. We don’t like to wait, we are impatient. We want to be in control.
But only God is in control.
Advent is about Christ coming to us. He will come. But are we aware of all the ways he comes to us every day? Take a breath. Look around and see what God has brought us already.
In the days before cell phones (B.C. as I like to call them), my grandparents used to call us up and tell us they were coming for a visit. Since they sometimes stopped various places along the way, we were not sure when they would arrive. This meant we had to always be awake and ready. It was the certainty of the coming, not the timing which motivated this behavior of being ready at any moment. So it is as well in the exhortation in Matthew 24:36-44.
Like being pregnant, anticipating a birth.
You know it will be coming. You don’t know when, but pack your bags.