Be Prepared!
A news article recently published the name of famous people that died in 2021. Some were old, many were healthy middle-aged, and some were healthy young people. Some died because they were sick, some died in unexpected accidents, and some died from the coronavirus.
I often wonder if they were prepared to meet their Creator.
Many years ago, Bobby Leach was the second person to brave Niagara Falls and live. He performed his death-defying stunt when he was forty-nine years old, sealed in a barrel. Fifteen years later he met his end in a way least expected, as the following news release records: “Bobby Leach, who achieved fame when he went over Niagara Falls in a barrel, died today of injuries received in slipping on an orange peel. Leach, who made the perilous Falls journey without dying, broke his leg when he slipped on the orange peel. Complications set in following an amputation, causing death.”
The case of Bobby Leach is only one of thousands reported, with many more untold. Heroes of many battles, escape the horror and death in war, only to die later from what starts as a virus infection.
The reality that your life can end in any moment must make you sober; although you survived 2021, there is no guarantee that you will make it to the end of 2022.
Even if you are healthy, have the best medical care, and have the best of what money can buy, as many of the famous people who died last year did, death does not discriminate. The big question is what will happen to you after you die, and what will you say when you stand before God, the Judge? The Word of God informs us, “And as it is appointed unto man once to die, but after this is the judgement” (Hebrews 10:27).
The safety or loss of our life often seems (and is treated by some) as a gamble. But if we could see as God sees, we would be compelled to say, “There is but a step between me and death” (1 Samuel 20:3).
The fact is plain: Be prepared! Your time may be short―much shorter than you dream or think! God says, “Acquaint now yourself with Him [God], and be at peace: thereby good shall come unto you” (Job 22:21). “Remember now thy Creator in the days of your youth” (Ecclesiastes. 12:1). “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
Why not start the New Year by accepting the love of God, receiving the forgiveness of your sins and the gift of eternal life?
John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31).
