Wake Up – December 1, 2022

The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber.
Romans 13:11

Wake Up

Sunday, December 7, 1941, 7:30 A.M. All is calm and quiet in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The sailors are out of their bunks, but their pace is leisurely, relaxed. Many feel what a later generation would call “Sleep Inertia.” Under an easy schedule, they are allowing themselves the luxury of going slow, yawning an extra yawn, chuckling with each other at breakfast, savoring a second cup of coffee. They have no idea that they need to wake up NOW! They have no idea that in 25 short minutes, their world is going to change forever.

When God the Holy Spirit moved the apostle Paul to write his letter to the Romans, he saw to it that Paul’s letter was teeming with profound truths and promises. One of the great truths he proclaimed through Paul is that: “The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber.”

My old sinful self—the part of me that wants nothing to do with Christ—wants to keep my soul sleepy and indifferent. It wants to keep my soul presuming that I have all the time in the world to get serious about the only Savior I’m ever going to have.

And here you and I must confess that there have been many times we have given in to the spiritual sleepiness—we’ve given in to the indifference. We’ve given in to Satan’s lie that when it comes to any earnest focus upon our Savior-King—there is no hurry.

Thanks be to God that he pursues us through his Word. He calls us to repentance. He does what he needs to do to rattle us, rouse us, wake us up. For when the final day comes for each of us, he does not want any of us left outside. He wants us to be awake. He wants us to be with him. He wants us basking forever in the full forgiveness our King has purchased for us at the cross.

Prayer:
Lord Jesus, my King, forgive me for all the times I have allowed myself to become sleepy and indifferent towards you. Refresh me in your law and gospel. Draw me to yourself. Amen.