Being Alert

“Blessed will be those servants the master finds alert when he comes” (Luke 12:37). 

ALERT

Being alert is a quality that Jesus spoke to us about. In our sinful nature we seem to have a slothful slumber that is encouraged by the enemy of our souls—eat drink and be merry, who cares? 

Yet we have been created by God for a higher calling than simple biological life.

We can easily sit back and admire our position as human beings in the higher echelons of the biological league on earth. For instance amoebas are very small and can’t cover much ground when they move. They also struggle with direction. But dogs can move around much better because they have four legs to carry them from one place to another. on the downside they have to carry things in their mouths (which can’t always be pleasant, although the dogs themselves never seem to mind). Apes, on the other hand, can get around well, plus they have the added advantage of having hands in which they can hold things, which is certainly more effective than putting items in your mouth. But a disadvantage with monkeys is that they can’t talk very well and limit their communications to screams and oohs. yet humans can move around well, carry things in their hands, and communicate exceptionally well through speech. Yes, us humans are certainly close to the highpoint of God’s good creation. and we could content ourselves in that fact alone but it would be wrong to do so, because we have a higher calling to the rest of the inhabitants of planet earth.

They may be content with their biological lot but we are not. life started low and got higher with each successive leap, and human beings, though we were made a little lower than the angels, are called to reach up to where we can breathe that same spiritual air. For we have something lower biological life does not have—we have spirit. We read that God said, “let the earth produce living creatures,” then said, “let us make man in our image.” yes, we share a common chemical base with all biological life, but we also share a common spiritual base with spiritual life. God is spirit and we are made in his image.

Genesis is eager for us to grasp that we are made in God’s image because we have a nice learning aid in the form of a poetic verse.

“So God created man in his own image 

in the image of God he created him 

Male and female he created them. (Gen 1:27). 

Being aware of our calling and living up to it helps us to be “alert”.

The Apostle Paul presses this home: “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Cor 4:18). 

All that we see around us is material, and it’s true we live in a material world, but this world is temporary, it’s what the book of Revelation calls “the old order” (Rev 21:4). 

And the old order of things will pass away. Jesus gave us prior notice that we should “look up” when certain events started to take place, so we pray that we will be alert, understanding the times. 

“Do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed” (Rom 13:11).