Be Vigilant

Jesus said to his disciples: “Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy from carousing and drunkenness and the anxieties of daily life…Be vigilant at all times and pray that you have the strength to escape the tribulations that are imminent and to stand before the Son of Man.” Luke 21:34-36

I did not know that our hearts may become drowsy from our daily anxieties! In the Amplified version, this is what it says: “But be on guard, so that your hearts are not weighed down and depressed with the giddiness of debauchery and the nausea of self-indulgence and the worldly worries of life…” In other versions, the word used for ‘drowsy’ are overcharged, overburdened, dulled, oppressed, laden, loaded down, clouded and made heavy. 

I guess that is why we have to be vigilant, alert, always on the watch, because anxieties are ever present. They are like the packages brought to our homes by Lazada. Sometimes we order them for ourselves even if we don’t need it! Sometimes we open other people’s packages. 

I know this is oversimplifying but with me, what works best is prayer. At the beginning and while the pandemic progressed, I was overwhelmed with anxiety for my brother who had been hospitalized. I was also thinking so much about how our business could survive, and how to provide for our employees. Then we were praying for so many people battling COVID, brothers and sisters in our community, their families, friends, friends of friends, priests and nuns, so many serious cases. Some even died 😭 I got palpitations thinking about the immensity of the situation. That is when my sisters and I started praying together. We were in different homes, and one sister was in Tokyo, but we prayed together every morning and never missed a day. My palpitations stopped, and I was able to see things from God’s point of view. 

We have to remember that anxiously thinking of all the things that can go wrong is not how to make things go right!