Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Wakeful & Ready Servants


35 Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning;
36 And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. (Luke 12:35-36)

This reminds me of times when I was a teenager and I would come home from a youth stake dance around 11pm.  I always wondered if the door would be unlocked for me or whether someone would be awake to let me in if it was locked.  I wondered if I would might have to stand outside and bang on the door and the windows to get let in.   Thankfully, those times the door was locked, someone was awake and nearby, ready to let me in.

This imagery is interesting to me, not just because of what it tells about what Jesus wants to see, but also what He implies He doesn’t want to see happen.

He doesn’t want to be like a lord who comes back from a late night party and has to yell and hammer on the door for quite some time before anyone comes to let Him in.  Likewise, He doesn’t want to come back to the earth and find His own servants unaware and asleep and unready to receive Him because that would imply that they don’t care.

He wants the lights burning, showing people are awake.  What kinds of things are we to do to show the Lord we are awake spiritually and waiting for Him for His second coming?

He says he wants our loins to be girded about, showing we are still at work.  This isn’t supposed to be a situation where the servants all go to bed early or rest because the master isn’t home.  He wants us to work until He returns.

The cool thing is, the verse that comes after shows that there is a nice reward for those servants who do this:

Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. (Luke 12:37)

This could mean two things—first, a big sacrament meeting (as in D&C 27) with all the servants of God together and/or it could mean a big conference in which Jesus Christ does a lot of teaching and ministering and healing (kind of like when He came to the Nephites).

That’s something to look forward to, isn’t it?


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