Be Vigilant

Reflection on Luke 12:32-48

Armed robbery is one of the greatest problems in our country today. It has become so brazen that robbers even operate in broad daylight. That has not always been the case. In the past, they would only come to your house in the middle of the night. Nowadays, they operate both at night and during the day. We can say that night and day are the same to them. Sometimes, robbers even send their victims advance notice to expect them on such and such a day. And they keep their appointment. Telling the Police is no use. They too have suffered terribly at the hands of the men of the underworld.

Now, suppose you receive a letter from a gang of armed robbers that they will be coming to your house on a particular day. I am sure you will take steps to reinforce the security of your house to deny them access. Or else, you might even pack out of the house completely, and move to another place before that day. But suppose they don't tell you the exact day, they are coming. You will begin to sleep with one eye open. You will keep some good money in the house to give to the robbers whenever they do come. In short, you will be on your guard, you will be vigilant or, as Jesus says in our Gospel reading today, you will "stand ready."

Life is like that. Nobody knows when the Ultimate Robber of them all will come. I mean Death."It can come at any time, at any age, anywhere. Sometimes people know that they are dying, and can prepare for it. Some of them are put off by the thought that they will die soon, and rebel against God, against everybody, against the world. They refuse to prepare for death. But the vast majority of people don't get any advance warning that they will soon die.

Since most of us don't know when death will come, what should we do? Jesus says that we must "stand ready" at all times. We must be vigilant. If we knew the exact date of our death, and that it was near, most of us would stop being wicked, sinning; we would begin to be good, kind, prayerful, very religious. That is exactly what we should do when we do not know the exact date of our death. All those things that we would do. if we knew the date, we should begin to do even when we don’t know the date. We should begin to live the kind of life that we would like death to find us living.

A man was once asked what he would do if he knew that he would die within the next 24 hours. The man replied that he would continue to do exactly what he was doing. The man was able to say that because he knew that what he was doing was good, the kind of life he was living was upright, honest and pleasing to God. It would take him to heaven. Now, suppose someone told us the same thing: that we would die within the next 24 hours, would we be able to say, like that man, that we would continue to do exactly what we are doing, living the kind of life that we are living? If we can say that, then we are ready, vigilant. We have nothing to fear from the Ancient Robber, Death. Death will have everything to fear from us.