One Lord, one body, one alarm

I was surprised during my recent “camp out” how many of my fellow preachers wake up to the same alarm.  Of course, pretty much everything surprises me at 5 a.m.  But we can discuss my love of sleeping another time.

       I don’t know exactly how many different varieties of cell phones we were carrying.  But a significant number of them sounded exactly like mine.  Naturally that got my mind going, even at 5 a.m.  Preachers from Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, and the uttermost parts of the earth — all being stirred from sleep by the same sound.

That happened for us all in the beginning.  We heard the call of the gospel (2 Thessalonians 2:14), and we arose from the sleep of the dead.  A new day dawned in our lives, and we thrilled to live it, basking in the glory of the light of Christ.

For many of us, it happens from time to time after that as well. Paul writes, “it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep’ for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed” (Romans 13:11).  We catch ourselves thinking, talking and walking in our sleep, as though our Lord was not coming.  But He is.  We need to wake up to greet Him.

Of course, the ultimate “alarm” will go off one day.  “The voice of the archangel and … the trumpet of God” will announce His arrival (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).  Everyone will wake up on that day. There will be no snooze button.  No sleeping through it.  Just billions and billions of our neighbors, along with those who have gone before, waking up to attend the most important meeting of our lives.