[510 words]
I generally use an Apple iOS device as a wake-up alarm. When the alarm sounds, text appears on the screen of my device and gives me this option: “Tap to snooze.” All I have to do is tap the screen of my nifty device and I’m right back to my comfortable, peaceful sleep for at least nine minutes more. A person’s use of the snooze button on his alarm is not the “end of the world;” however, I want us to think very seriously about the snooze button of our souls—before it is the end of the world.
Whether we want to admit it or not, our lives are terminal (Hebrews 9:27). Furthermore, our time on this earth is relatively short (James 4:14). Also, the end of this earth is definite (2 Peter 3:9–10). Finally, the time at which this world will end is unknown to man (2 Peter 3:10; 1 Thessalonians 5:2; Matthew 24:35–36).
Considering the latter facts, we can be certain there is a lot of uncertainty concerning the “when” of the ends of our lives. We are not promised tomorrow. Many people have died sooner than expected. And the time of the Lord’s return will not be known until it occurs. This should motivate us to want to be ready for the end all the time. “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Corinthians 5:10). If at the end, we be found in a continual state of sin, Jesus will utter those bone-chilling words, “Depart from me, I never knew you” (Matthew 7:23).
Jesus has sounded the alarm. He has called us all by His gospel to wake up, get up, and stay up. “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:14). We wake up when we come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:4; Romans 10:17). We get up when we humbly submit to the truth (Hebrews 11:6; Acts 2:38; Romans 10:10; Mark 16:16). And, we stay up by walking “in the light as He is in the light” (1 John 1:7). Sadly, too many of us continue to hit the snooze button of our souls. We live everyday thinking, “There is always tomorrow.” Instead of struggling through the difficulties of being followers of Christ, we choose to continue in our seemingly comfortable and peaceful slumber of sinfulness.
Dear friends, when we breathe our last, we cannot “Tap to snooze.” When Jesus returns, we cannot “Tap to snooze.” The time to be ready is now. “Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation” (1 Thessalonians 5:6–8). Are you ready?