If you keep yourself pure, you will be a utensil God can use for his purpose. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work.
2 Timothy 2:21
As people on this journey called life I have come to realize that we all must have the drive to develop our abilities and become the best that we can be so that we’ll be ready. If we’re prepared, perhaps our chance will come. But if I’m not primed, I’ll miss my opportunity, and it isn’t likely to come again. We need to live and think as if I’m only going to get one shot, so I must be ready.
I had a basketball coach in high school that taught us this principle. He always told us to concentrate on what you do have, not on what you don’t have. Having a positive attitude is the best way I know of to stay ready. Nobody did it better than Joseph in the Bible. He wasn’t the most humble when he was a youth, and he should have kept his conversations with God private, but he didn’t deserve to be sold into slavery.
Joseph didn’t let circumstances get him down. He stayed ready, got his shot and ended up running his new owner’s household until the owner’s wife went after him. Joseph, however, chose God’s way, so Potiphar said “Bye-bye.” Joseph actually went to jail for his stand. But he stayed ready, caught a break and ended up running the jail from the inside. Still he stayed ready, caught another break and became second in command of Egypt.
The hand of God at work enabled the breaks to come Joseph’s way. And God will do the same for you. But the point is that Joseph stayed ready and seized the moment when God opened a window of opportunity. Good ole Joe didn’t let his circumstances get him down. He looked at what he did have, not what he didn’t have, and stayed ready. Joe’s the kind of guy who would come off the bench in a basketball game and get you twenty or thirty points, if that’s what it took to win the final game.
It comes down to this! God opens windows of opportunity for those who stay READY!
