Matthew 25:1-13 - A Wiseman Once Said… Be Ready
Doug Partin – The Christian Church – March 9, 2014
There have been times when I have learned a song at church, and sung
it with enthusiasm, without ever really understanding it at all. You may
have done the same on occasion. “Give me oil in my lamp” was one of
those songs for me. I learned it when I was in 5th or 6th grade and sung
it during junior church and at summer camp, but I didn’t know Jesus’
parable about the 10 virgins, so I didn’t connect the song with the
parable. And since I didn’t make that connection the chorus, which
includes, “sing hosanna to the king of kings” never made any sense to
me.
Had I understood that Jesus spoke this parable when He and His
disciples had returned to the Mount of Olives, not long after His
triumphal entry, and it was in response this question, “Tell us when
these things will happen and what will be the sign of Your coming, and
of the end of the age.” Then I would have connected it to Jesus’ return
and His people’s rejoicing.
Jesus answer really begins at the beginning of chapter 24. If you
were to read it, you’d find that Jesus spoke to His disciples about the
perilous times that will come before His return. He also reveals that
His glorious return in the clouds which connects it to Daniel’s visions
of the last days, and Jesus taught His disciples how most of the world
would be caught off guard.
Then, beginning in Matthew 25, Jesus told three parables that
further answer His disciples questions about the end times, but of
course, parables are not always as clear an answer as one might hope.
And I have found that there are a great many different interpretations
about them. It seems that once a scholar has decided how they see the
unfolding of the last days, they press this understanding upon Jesus’
parables. We are going to do our best to let the parables speak for
themselves.
The first parable was about 10 virgins who took lamps and waited
for the return of the bridegroom. Since all the disciples understood
marriage customs of that day, no explanation of what seems like a
strange behavior to us was needed. Being a bridesmaid back then, just
as it is today, was a great honor; and to do something for which you
would be shut out of the feast was the stuff of which a maiden’s
nightmares were made.
Jewish weddings were a multi-day affair, with more customs than
we’d care to bother with, and Jesus’ parable addresses only one aspect
of their social customs. In many traditional Palestinian villages in more
recent times, the wedding feast occurs at night after a day of dancing.
The bride returns home and prepares for the grooms arrival, and her
bridesmaids go out to meet the bridegroom. Historians have confirmed
that torches were used during this procession.
It is unlikely that the “lamps” to which Jesus refers were the small
Herodian oil lamps that most of us imagine, which were often used in
homes at that time. All the evidence points instead to small hand held
torches, which were also used in Greek and Roman wedding
ceremonies. These torches would have been comprised of bundle of
sticks that would have been wrapped with oil-soaked rags. Torches like
these could not burn as long as a household lamp, but they would be
much brighter. There have been some experiments that suggest that
these lamps may have only burned for about fifteen to twenty minutes
before the rags would have to be removed and new oil applied to them.
With torches in hand, the bridesmaids would escort the groom to
collect his bride, and then they would escort the couple back to the
groom’s home where the wedding feast was held.
Because not all the details of ancient Palestinian weddings are
known, there is some discussion as to whether the parable envisions
the lamps as burning while the bridesmaids slept, using up their oil; or
as being lit only after the first announcement of the bridegroom’s
approach, which most scholars believe. Either way, the lamps would not
have lasted very long, and extra oil would have been needed to escort
the bride and groom back to His house.
Jesus said that 5 of the bridesmaids were foolish. The Greek word
is actually “moron.” We get the idea. There were not like the other
five who were “wise,” a Greek word that mean “a thinker.” Jesus
wasn’t trying to be harsh in his description, just summing up their
difference. The morons took no extra oil for their lamps although it
should have been obvious that they would need it, and those who
thought about it realized not only realized that they would need it, but
they took the effort to acquire and bring extra oil.
We find in Jesus’ parable that the bridegroom was so long in
coming, and grooms were known for being less than prompt back in
those days, that all of the bridesmaids fell asleep. They were awakened
by a midnight by a shout, “Behold, the bridegroom! Come and meet
him.” They all rose and they all got their lamps in order. It doesn’t
actually say “trimmed” as some translations supply, but the word
“cosmos” is employed.
We usually think of “cosmos” as a word that means the universe
and all it contains, but it was their word for order. The cosmos, for
them, was not only the order that God had put in place, but the order
that they were able to enact, like wrapping an oil soaked rag around a
bundle of sticks to make a torch.
It seems a little odd that only during this process of ordering
things did the morons realize that they would run out of oil before the
night was done, but most of us can relate. We often realize our
unpreparedness for a given situation when it is too late to do anything
about it. How often have parents been told that by their children that
they need a piece of poster board for a project due tomorrow after the
store has already closed for the night? If we weren’t prone to needing
things at the last minute, stores would not be open 24/7 as they are in
many large cities today.
These foolish bridesmaids do what they can given the situation,
they ask the ones who were prepared to share their oil, but they are
told that they had only brought enough for themselves. Sharing at this
point would have made them all run out, and that was simply not an
option. So the prepared bridesmaids suggest that the unprepared ones
run back into the town and purchase oil for themselves.
I don’t know which villager was approached for the oil, but they
certainly had supply and demand on their side of things, although we
don’t hear about that side of the transaction. Waiting for the last
minute often costs you much more than purchasing things in advance.
Anyway, after they get their oil, they set out to catch up only do
discover that while they were away, the bridegroom arrived, collected
his bride, and were escorted back to his home and into the wedding
feast.
Jesus said that the door was shut. The unprepared bridesmaids
finally arrived, and they knocked upon the door, but the bridegroom
told them, “Truly I say to you, I do not know you.”
It is a harsh ending. One that we don’t like to hear. Why was it
too late. All the groom had to do was open the door. Jesus’ parable
reminds me of when God closed the door on Noah’s Ark. Surely
people from the area came and knocked against it, surely they asked to
be let in, but it was too late.
Jesus then told His disciples, just in case they had missed the
point, “Be alert, for you do not know the day nor the hour.”
It is a simple message: Be ready.
Jesus did not elaborate on what “being ready” meant, but the parable
indicates that all the bridesmaids began with oil. Oil in that day was
associated with anointing, with having a relationship with God. And
Jesus was talking to His disciples about the last days, when Jesus would
return again.
A lot of people have tried to sort out what having oil and running
out of oil really means. We want to know that Jesus was really teaching
his disciples. For me, it is pretty clear. If oil for the lamps is symbolic of
having a relationship with God, then some relationships are not going
to prepare you for Jesus’ return.
In particular, is the relationship with God that is based on the Old
Covenant. It may have been a relationship with God, but it was not
going to be sufficient to prepare you for Jesus’ return.
The oil that keeps you burning til the light of day, is the
relationship with God that is based on the new covenant that Jesus
would establish through His death, burial, and resurrection.
The disciples became the first ones to proclaim the New covenant
on the day of Pentecost. We have the “extra oil” for lamps by accepting
Jesus’ as the Messiah, our Savior, and receiving His grace and
forgiveness.
Jesus doesn’t want anyone to perish, so He has warned everyone
well in advance that He will return one day. He wants the whole world
to be prepared for the day when He returns. But the harsh reality is
that
Those prepared for His return will enter into heaven with Him, and
those unprepared will not.
Prayer: Gracious Lord, bless us to be a blessing. Amen.