Well, how about a flash flood warning for the second day of school? Did you sleep in a little extra? Did you get up early anyway and enjoy a leisurely morning? Did the delay disappoint you, because you were excited to come back to school? Or did the delay excite you, because, well, you’re a teenager and you always like school delays?

Regardless, the one thing that is for certain is what Proverbs 27:1 tells us: “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring” (ESV). Indeed.

So, what are we supposed to do with that? Panic, because the world is unpredictable? Withdraw, because we want to insulate ourselves from “time and chance” that “happen to [us] all” (Ecclesiastes 9:11, NIV)? Obstinately plow ahead without any regard for life’s changing circumstances?

How about, just be ready?

At the end of Scene 2 in Hamlet, Horatio tries to convince Hamlet not to engage in a fencing duel with Laertes, because Horatio has an ominous feeling about it. Hamlet refuses to back out and responds with the famous words: “There’s special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all.”

God’s Providence controls the world; we cannot know or control what is coming—including constant rain in the month of August. All we can do is our best to be prepared to take on whatever the day brings.

The readiness is all. Are you ready?

Have a wonderful day.