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The Yeshua Worldwide Network
of Churches
The Revd Janice Scott
The The Third Sunday Before
Advent
Readings:
-
Amos 5 vv 18-24 - Amos
warns that the Day of the Lord will be darkness, not light…
-
1 Thessalonians 4 vv 13-18 - ..but Paul maintains that Christians will be
with the Lord forever.
-
Matthew 25 vv 1-13 - the wise and foolish bridesmaids
Theme:
Are you ready for life's crises?
Matthew 25 vv 1-13
"Then the kingdom of heaven will be like this.
Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. 2Five of them
were foolish, and five were wise. 3When the foolish took their lamps, they took
no oil with them; 4but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. 5As the
bridegroom was delayed, all of them became drowsy and slept. 6But at midnight
there was a shout, 'Look! Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.' 7Then
all those bridesmaids got up and trimmed their lamps. 8The foolish said to the
wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' 9But the wise
replied, 'No! there will not be enough for you and for us; you had better go to
the dealers and buy some for yourselves.' 10And while they went to buy it, the
bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding
banquet; and the door was shut. 11Later the other bridesmaids came also, saying,
'Lord, lord, open to us.' 12But he replied, 'Truly I tell you, I do not know
you.' 13Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
One of my failings tends to be that of procrastination. If I'm facing a job I
really hate, I generally work under the maxim of "never do today what you can
put off until tomorrow." This means for instance, that cupboards and drawers
overflow with clothes I haven't worn for years because I just hate sorting them
out. I have far more exciting things to do than to sort through drawers of old
clothes! But my comeuppance occurs whenever we move, for then I'm forced to sort
through the drawers and the cupboards and it takes me forever.
I therefore have a great deal of
sympathy for those young bridesmaids who were so full of excitement about the
forthcoming wedding feast that they didn't bother to take any extra oil for
their lamps. And I have to confess to feeling a certain irritation with those
smug young ladies who were just too well prepared to be true, but who refused to
share anything with their friends.
Part of my sympathy arises from the
fact that the wedding was due to take place during the day, not at night. So it
was remarkable that the girls even took lamps, let alone oil. All of them had
sufficient oil to see them through the afternoon and evening. But who would have
expected the bridegroom to arrive for his own wedding at midnight? Nobody
expected the bridegroom to be late. If the bridegroom had been on time
everything would have been all right, for the lamps wouldn't have been needed.
The whole unfortunate incident looks very much like the bridegroom's fault.
There's an emphasis throughout the
Bible from the early days of the history of the Israelite people, on a God who
cares deeply about those people, and who therefore expects them to care deeply
about each other.
In an ancient country with no state
social security, the Israelites had their own strong ethical code in which
widows and orphans were especially cared for, and in which strangers were
afforded the highest levels of hospitality. And that code was enshrined in the
law by which all Israelites lived.
Deuteronomy 26 v 13
reads: then you shall say before the LORD your God: "I have removed the
sacred portion from the house, and I have given it to the Levites, the resident
aliens, the orphans, and the widows, in accordance with your entire commandment
that you commanded me."
Jesus not only continued this
tradition, but paid special attention to those who were poor, and often told
stories about sharing. Stories such as the tale of the farmer who wanted to keep
all his wealth to himself, but dropped dead that night (Luke
12 vv 16-20). And the yarn about the man
who wasn't afraid to get his friend out of bed at midnight because he'd run out
of bread (Luke 11 vv 5-8).
One of Jesus' most powerful
illustrations of the kingdom of heaven, is when God separates out those who
unwittingly have compassion on the poor and marginalised, from those who
unwittingly don't. "When did I see you, Lord, poor or thirsty or in prison,
and ignored you?" say the people. But Jesus says, "Depart from me, for
when you didn't do it to one of the least of these my brethren, you didn't do it
to me." (Matthew 25 vv 31-46)
And Jesus reinforced his teaching
through his own actions. He gave unstintingly of himself even when he was
dog-tired, and when the crowds were tired and hungry up on the mountain, he made
sure there was enough food to go round.
It comes then, as something of a
shock when Jesus tells this story about a group of bridesmaids, and actually
commends those unpleasant teenagers who refused to share their oil with their
friends.
Why is it, that as we come towards
the end of Jesus' ministry when events are really hotting up and the hostility
towards Jesus is dramatically increasing, that all his previous teaching about
consideration and unselfishness and generosity suddenly seems to be reversed?
From all that's gone before in the Gospels, you'd have expected those selfish
girls to be condemned, not commended. But although this may be the first thing
that leaps out at Western minds, perhaps it's not really what the parable is
about.
All the girls had been invited to the
wedding. All were welcome. Indeed, they were not only welcome, but as
bridesmaids held places of honour. The parable revolves around the
unexpectedness of the bridegroom's arrival, as do many of the parables of
judgement.
In the parable of the tenants in the
vineyard, the wicked tenants thought the owner of the vineyard would never
appear, so they indulged in all sorts of corruption and cheating the system, and
did their best to indefinitely delay the arrival of the owner. But he suddenly
and unexpectedly appeared, and judgement was swift.
In the parable of the talents the man
who buries his talent is fine, until the master suddenly and unexpectedly
appears. And then it's too late.
And this is the theme of the parable
of the wise and foolish bridesmaids. Everything was fine for all the bridesmaids
until the sudden and unexpected arrival of the bridegroom. And then for half the
bridesmaids, it was too late.
The girls who were ready were those
who had taken the unexpectedness of life into account. The just-in-case girls
who wanted to be ready and who had slipped an extra bottle of oil into their
pockets at the last moment because whatever happened, they were determined not
to miss out on this party.
We can't afford to take God for
granted. It's usually just when everything is swimming along really smoothly and
the sky is a bright, unblemished blue, that disaster strikes, that the
unexpected happens.
When that happens we need inner
resources of strength and courage and a reliance upon God to see us through. But
those inner resources don't magically appear. A relationship with God doesn't
happen overnight, it's something that takes years to gradually build.
Those who only turn to God when life
suddenly goes wrong, often find themselves disappointed, because they suddenly
discover that God doesn't respond or react in the way they expect. They haven't
taken extra oil. They haven't filled themselves over the years with the things
of God, they haven't made God's acquaintance, they haven't learned anything
about him.
And so they often find the door
apparently slammed in their face, because they've excluded themselves from God's
company and when the chips are down they have no idea how to approach him or
what to expect. The oil in their lamps has burned down and they have no means of
replacing it when life is at crisis point.
And in fact, the preparation is not
so great. All that the wise bridesmaids did was to pick up a spare flask of oil
and take it with them, just in case. They believed that the bridegroom would
come at some point. Even when it was far too late to expect the bridegroom ever
to arrive, they still believed and they acted upon that belief.
The foolish bridesmaids had no such
belief. They didn't know very much about the bridegroom, or they'd have realised
he might well be delayed. And as time went on and the bridegroom failed to
appear, they didn't go off to find more oil while they had the chance. They
simply shrugged their shoulders, assumed the bridegroom would never come, and
went to sleep.
We may not know anything about the
Second Coming, where or when that might happen, but we do know that in every
human life there comes at least one moment of crisis. Most human lives have many
more than one time of crisis. Those who want to be able to handle that crisis,
not only without going under but also growing through it, need to pick up their
spare flask of oil right now. They need to believe that at some point in this
life they are going to need God's love and comfort and support and strength, and
they need to act upon that belief.
All are welcome to the great feast of
life, but only those who believe and act upon that belief are able to enjoy it
to its utmost.
AMEN.
Revd Janice Scott
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