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"Watch Therefore"

I found this story written on a few sheets of note paper and tucked away in one of the books which was given to me many years ago by a very old adventist just before he died. I share it here with you because it is so right!

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Mark 13:35-37

Watch you therefore: for you know not when the master of the house comes, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning: Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping. And what I say to you I say to all, Watch.

The Haitian Adventist College was busy, very busy; they were to have the greatest honour that could be given to them for the President of the country was to be their guest.

Everybody was getting ready for this event, and working vigorously. The President was to arrive during the morning of the following day, but the hour of his arrival was not known, as it is usual for High Officials of that country not to announce the time of their arrival.

This is very similar to the coming of Jesus as mentioned in Matthew 24:36.

Early the next morning much remained to be done, but by eight o’clock the students had finished their tasks, but it was too early to get ready for the leaders were still working.

"What’s that?" one young man suddenly exclaimed. The reply quickly came, "Someone says the President is on his way."

"But how do they know? There is no telephone here and the leaders are still out working?"

This is very like the servant which said, "My lord delayeth his coming."

Half an hour later the message is repeated, and the leaders are now running to get ready but it is too late. The President has arrived and none of them were ready to meet him. The students may have been ready had they so wished, as they had ample time, but they were watching for others to get ready. Soon the leaders were running to the entrance but the President had arrived and gone, and it was now too late.

Yet there had been one who was ready, an old man poorly but neatly and cleanly dressed, had been at the College gates for several hours and he never left that place till the President had arrived and greeted him: little did he think when he left home that morning, that he would be the only one to shake hands with the President at that visit. But the old man was there ready, he made it his business to be ready and he was rewarded.

"What I say unto you, I say unto all, Watch."

oooOooo

This is not to say that the second advent will happen so suddenly or quietly that we could miss it, for we are going to be told the day and hour of His coming before He arrives and the events which will be happening around us will leave us in no doubt. (See quote below.)

But we do not often know when our personal "close of probation" (death) will occur. The "gates" in this story are our minds, for we must always be waiting and watching there.

Great Controversy pages 640-641

The voice of God [the Father] is heard from heaven, declaring the day and hour of Jesus' coming, and delivering the everlasting covenant [the Ten Commandments] to His people. Like peals of loudest thunder His words roll through the earth. The Israel of God stand listening, with their eyes fixed upward. Their countenances are lighted up with His glory, and shine as did the face of Moses when he came down from Sinai.

The wicked cannot look upon them.

And when the blessing is pronounced on those who have honored God by keeping His Sabbath holy, there is a mighty shout of victory.

Soon [some time later] there appears in the east a small black cloud, about half the size of a man's hand. It is the cloud which surrounds the Saviour and which seems in the distance to be shrouded in darkness. The people of God know this to be the sign of the Son of man. In solemn silence they gaze upon it as it draws nearer the earth, becoming lighter and more glorious, until it is a great white cloud, its base a glory like consuming fire, and above it the rainbow of the covenant. Jesus rides forth as a mighty conqueror.

Not now a "Man of Sorrows," to drink the bitter cup of shame and woe, He comes, victor in heaven and earth, to judge the living and the dead.

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