Before you read any further, pause. Take a few minutes to evaluate your spiritual life.
How is your relationship with God? Are you on fire, full of zeal for the Lord? Are you keeping the Lord at arm’s length? Or are you just trudging through, day by day?
What about your prayer life? Are you committing to prayer and dialogue with God every day? Or just when it’s most convenient to you?
Have you followed the Ten Commandments and lived out the Beatitudes? Or is your life muddled by sin and shortcomings?
Well, consider this your wake-up call. I’m considering it to be mine.
Today’s Gospel reminds us of the need to be vigilant, “for you do not know on which day your Lord will come” and “for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come.” Our faith teaches us that Jesus Christ will come again. In fact, we profess it each Sunday at Mass when we say “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end.” Whether or not those words truly sink into our heads and hearts is a different story but it is true. There will be a second coming.
With this knowledge in mind, using the self-evaluation you just did, are you ready? Are you ready for the second coming? Or, in another sense, are you ready for your judgment day, when you meet your Creator? The life that we live right now, the decisions that we make, determine where we will spend life after death. If we have freely chosen God and loved Him, we are rewarded with eternal life in heaven. If we’ve done the COMPLETE opposite of that, well, we are subject to eternal separation from God in hell. If we’re somewhere in between, the state of purgatory will purify and prepare us for heaven.
The good news is that we have a chance to get ready. We have the chance to change our way of life, to repent of our sins and work hard for the eternal reward of heaven.
So, are you ready?
Erin is a Cleveland native and graduate of Franciscan University of Steubenville. Following graduation, she began volunteering in youth ministry at her home parish of Holy Family Church. Her first “big girl” job was in collegiate sports information where, after a busy two years in the profession on top of serving the youth, she took a leap of faith and followed the Lord’s call to full-time youth ministry at St. Peter Church. She still uses her communication arts degree as a freelance writer and statistician, though. You can catch her on old episodes of the Clarence & Peter Podcast on YouTube as well as follow her on Twitter @erinmadden2016.
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