STAY READY

Jesus tells us to watch. That word is not meant to create fear in the believer, but readiness. We do not know the day or the hour, so we are called to live awake.

Readiness is not panic. It is faithfulness. It is keeping the heart close to Christ, refusing spiritual laziness, and remembering that our lives are moving toward the day we will see Him.

The parable of the virgins warns us that outward appearance is not enough. Lamps can look similar for a time, but readiness is revealed when the Bridegroom comes. No one can borrow another person's surrender.

This is a loving challenge. Are you living prepared, or merely appearing prepared? Is your relationship with Christ personal, living, and obedient? Have you been delaying what God has been calling you to surrender?

There is grace today to return. Wake up. Trim the lamp. Seek the Lord. Let obedience become urgent again, not because you are afraid of losing His love, but because you belong to Him.

Jesus often connected readiness with faithfulness. The servant who waits well is not staring at the sky doing nothing; he is carrying out what the master entrusted to him. Readiness is seen in obedience today.

In Matthew 26:41, Jesus told His disciples, "Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation." That warning still speaks. A prayerless heart becomes vulnerable. A sleepy soul can drift into compromise before it realises how far it has gone.

This devotion is a loving alarm, not a sentence of condemnation. If you recognise that you have grown dull, the answer is not despair. The answer is to return. Wake up by grace. Come back to prayer. Come back to the Word. Come back to surrendered obedience.

2 Peter 3:10-11 tells us "the day of the Lord will come like a thief," and then asks, "what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness." Readiness is not speculation; it is holiness. It is living in a way that makes sense if Jesus could come at any time.

This should also stir compassion. If Christ is coming, then people need the gospel. Readiness is not only private purity; it is also a heart awake to mission, prayer, witness, and love for those who do not yet know Him.

Readiness also changes what we tolerate. If we are waiting for Christ, we cannot keep feeding the very things He died to free us from. The hope of His coming purifies, not because we are trying to earn salvation, but because we long to see Him with undivided hearts.

Stay ready. The Bridegroom is coming.