Bat Upside Down in Apple Tree--and Will He Find Us Sleeping?

A few weeks ago, when we were picking those many bushels of apples,

Timmy found a strange sight.

It was a bat hanging upside down in the apple tree!

He [or she] was so sleepy that no matter how Timmy and Jonathan wiggled the branch and brushed past the leaves to look at it and get a picture of it, it just stayed right there.

Even when they prodded it off the twig and snared it into our apple picker,

it just reached out for something to hang onto and wouldn't budge.

Talk about sleepy!

I've had these pictures uploaded for weeks, waiting for a thought--

oh yes, those Anna Lucas thoughts! LOL!

Anyway, I thought about Jesus' words talking to His disciples,

"Watch, for you know neither the day nor the hour when the Son of man cometh.":

"When I come will I find faith on the earth?

How precious faith will be to God in these last days!

We are pressured at every hand to give up our faith, but let us be challenged to keep it and hold it as precious.

"Let us not sleep, as do others, but let us watch and be sober."

Let's not be like the bat hanging upside down in that tree,

so sleepy that nothing at all jarred him from his terrible, deep, deep sleep.

Stir us, Father, 

wake us from any sleepiness.

Teach us how to keep our faith in You strong and unsullied in these challenging days!

Here is a prayer that was on Jonathan's prayer app recently, which we prayed together.

It was convicting and comforting all at once.

"Change me so that I do ministry for your glory and the benefit of others, not to meet my own needs, and give me a great passion for your glory.  Help me to focus my ministry priorities, so that I do what is best to serve your purposes. Increase my usefulness and effectiveness in ministry, and protect me and my ministry. Please keep me in wisdom, gospel truth, and integrity of life and ministry. Help me love and forgive those who hurt me intentionally or unintentionally. Please make me wise in conflict. Help me trust your providential care of your Gospel work around the world, and not to confuse a good zeal for Gospel progress with an ungodly desire to get my own way. Help me to carry the burdens of ministry, trusting in your sovereign grace. Please give me a long life and ministry, and help me persevere to the end."
Amen.