It doesn’t matter all that much what you talk about, preparation is always important.  I was thinking of that when trying my hand in the kitchen recently.  The recipe I was reading had two time slots given: a preparation time and a cooking time.  Neglect the preparation time and the cooking time probably won’t matter all that much.  Spend your preparation time well and the cooking time has every chance of success.

Preparation time becomes even more important when we move from the kitchen to the office.  How many business presentations have been a flop, precisely because the presenter skipped on preparation time?  How many projects have ended in disaster because someone didn’t do their homework – which is just another way of saying that they didn’t prepare properly?  As a pastor and a preacher my worst nightmares have been dreams in which I find myself standing before an audience… and I haven’t prepared.

Presently we’re in the season where we are busy with our Christmas and holiday preparations.  So how are you doing with those preparations?  Those preparations are important too aren’t they?  The success of your family Christmas dinner depends a great deal on your preparations.  So does the success of you family holidays.

I find it interesting that God’s Christmas preparations took a very, very long time.  The first announcement of Christmas came already in the Garden of Eden.  God announced that one day the seed of the woman would crush the head of that evil enemy who led Adam and Eve astray.  I’ll go further and say that the whole of the Old Testament is really about God making His preparations for Christmas.  For example, in God’s choosing of Abraham He was preparing a people from whom Jesus, the Son of God would be born.  God did not skimp on preparation time for Christmas.

I mention all this because it bothers me that so many people make no preparations at all for the most important event of their life.  Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem in the fullness of God’s time.  But Jesus said that one day He would return on the clouds of heaven.  It is an article of our Christian faith that Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead.  And if Jesus delays His return you will still need to face Him anyway… you will do that in the moment when you breathe your last breath here on earth.  What preparations are you making for that?

Jesus once told a parable about ten young ladies who were waiting for a wedding to begin.  Five of those ten young lasses had make good preparations… they were ready.  If you had asked them about that they would have said, “Bring it on!”  The other five, sadly, had made no preparations at all – and the result was that they were shut out from the wedding festivities.  What Jesus was talking about was His return at the end of the ages… and He pictured that in terms of a wonderful wedding banquet… but a wedding banquet for which people need to make preparations.

Strange isn’t it?  There are people who wouldn’t dream of cutting back on their preparations in the kitchen when they are cooking or baking.  They know how important that preparation time is.  Those same people today have probably already made their Christmas dinner and holiday preparations.  They don’t want to end up with a flop.  Many people I know understand the importance of the old Boy-Scout motto: Be prepared!  But they have one blind spot: they have made no preparations for meeting Jesus.  And He is coming.  He came in Bethlehem as a baby to grow up and go the way of the cross.  But He’s returning to judge the living and the dead and you will meet Him.  Are you ready or not?

John Westendorp