If there was a carpool to Heaven, I hope we'd have ourselves a convoy

It is always fascinating to me to drive past a bus stop. The people are always facing toward the direction the bus will be coming from, even if it is not scheduled to arrive for another 20 minutes. There looking onward changes nothing about the pace or speed of the bus--whether they watch for the bus or not, the bus will arrive at the same time. They are looking on; they are expecting.

Today I went to the gas station while fresh on everyones minds was the 20 cent spike in gas prices. The clerk at my friendly local gas station mentioned to me that this is just a taste of the increase in prices....her comment was not to my surprise. What was to my surprise was her response when I reflected on the fact that gas responses seemed a response to the multiple riots in the Middle East. The clerk then carried the conversation to the end of time and the prophecies that involve the Middle East. She said the end is coming and we better protect Israel, but this world is so messed up that it will be a good thing when it ends. Now, I'm not here to preach the whole 2012 thing or to tell you that the end is here. I couldn't tell you one way or the other. The Bible tells us that no man knows the day nor the hour. My point, instead, is to awaken your attention to the possibility.

Just as people waiting at the bus stop watch readily for the bus whether it is coming in 2 seconds or 20 minutes, so also we should be watching for the return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He is coming. It will be sooner tomorrow than it was today. Please don't let Him find you unprepared or without the covering of His blood. You and your soul mean too much to me and to so many others for you to miss the opportunity of a home in Heaven with Him. When you think you can't, you can...and for joy at His return, you must. Accept His salvation, His call, and watch with joy for that arrival.

2 Peter 3
1 This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder,
2 that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles,
3 knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires.
4 They will say, "Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation."
5 For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God,
6 and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished.
7 But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.
8 But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
11 Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness,
12 waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!
13 But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
14 Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace.
15 And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him,
16 as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.
17 You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability.
18 But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen."