Vigils Reading

PREPARING OURSELVES

TO MEET THE LORD

By Blessed Guerric of Igny1

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“BE PREPARED now Israel to meet the Lord, for he is coming”. And you

too my dear brethren be prepared as well; for the Son of Man will come when

you least expect him. He is coming, nothing is more certain than that; but when

he will arrive—nothing is less certain. Right up to the last moment we will not

know the actual time the Father in his almighty power has appointed. Even the

angels who stand before him have not been given the privilege of knowing that

day or hour. Our last day most certainly must come to us; but it is very uncertain

when it will come, where we will be or whence it will come. All we can say is that

it is knocking at the door for the old, and lies in wait for the young.

O that they would keep careful guard over themselves who see death so

ready to enter, nay rather who see it already entering. For has it not already

entered, at least to some extent, a body grown senile and decrepit Yet in many

who are already half-dead one can see worldly desires still alive. The limbs are

growing cold and the fire of avarice still burns within; life is coming to its end

and ambition still strains ahead. Because our youth or health perhaps appear to

promise some more years ahead of us death is not often before our eyes, but this

is just the very reason why, if we are wise, it should be in our thoughts, lest that

day come like a thief in the night and find us unprepared and unready. It is lying

in wait for us and we should fear it all the more for its being hidden, for we can

neither see it nor get warning of it.

There is therefore only one thing that makes us safe: never to think that

we are safe. For fear makes a careful man always prepared until at length fear

can give way to security and not security to fear. The wise man says: “I shall9

keep myself from my iniquity, seeing that I am powerless in respect to my

death.” He knows that the just man, if he is surprised by death, will be at rest?

In fact that man triumphs over death who was not overcome by iniquity during

his life.