Prepare Your Hearts
Matthew 25:1-13
Here we are in
the second Sunday of November. We
survived the time change. We made it
through the elections and all of the campaign ads and phone calls. In two and a half weeks it will be
Thanksgiving. I would guess that there
are a number of you who are planning to visit family at that time and you will
be travelling. For some it may just be a
day trip but for others you may be gone several days. Imagine for a moment that you have the car
all packed and you are ready to go. As
you pull out of the driveway and start down the street you go through the check
list. Did we forget anything? Did we turn out the lights? Did you remember your phone charger? Did we remember those things that we wanted
to show grandma and grandpa? Everything
checks out and you are on your way. Then
there is that one thing that you forgot.
Did you fill up the car with gas?
How easy it could be to forget one of the most important things in all
the rush. You need fuel to get where you
want to go.
In a way, that
was like the situation in the parable that Jesus told about the last days. This parable of the ten virgins was drawn from
the experience of the people in order to teach them something about preparing
their hearts for the end time. You get
to learn a little about wedding customs but the thing that you need to learn is
that each of you needs to be ready for the Lord’s coming and when that time
comes there will be no second chances.
You need to be ready when the Lord’s trumpet calls. In all things you need to recognize how the
Lord has blessed you so that you can be prepared for whatever He has planned
for you.
As you heard,
this parable puts us in the middle of a wedding during the time of Jesus. Part of the typical wedding celebration of
that day was a grand procession to the place where the wedding feast was to
take place. Young women were chosen to
accompany this procession and especially if it were to happen after dark, they
would carry lamps which would light the way and give everything a festive
touch. These lamps were probably more
like torches carried on poles. At the
top would be rags soaked in olive oil which served as the fuel. A good supply of oil would be needed to keep
the torches burning throughout the time of waiting and the procession. We are told that five of the young women were
foolish and five were wise. The foolish
ones brought their lamps but not extra oil.
The wise ones had oil in jars that they brought along. When the procession finally was ready the
five who did not bring oil were caught in the embarrassing position of having
their lamps go out. They tried to borrow
some oil from the others but that would then not leave enough for any of them
to complete their task. In the end they
were left out of the wedding banquet.
In looking at any
parable, it is important for us to pick up on the one main point that Jesus was
trying to make. As we hear this story it
becomes pretty clear that Jesus wanted to show the importance of having your
hearts prepared for His coming. The difference between the wise and the foolish
virgins was the degree of their preparation.
You have to remember that Jesus was talking to His disciples here. It was not one of those times when Jesus had
to deal with the religious leaders of the people who were out to get Him. This was told to the disciples. That makes this even more important for you
to listen very carefully to the lesson that Jesus wanted to teach. All of the young women had lamps. They all started with some oil. They all slept as they waited for the
bridegroom to come. This would tell us
that to start with they were all essentially the same. This would tell us that many people start out
in the faith and then carry on with the many ordinary activities of life. But the difference comes in the preparedness
for the long haul. The wise ones had
fuel enough for the whole evening. The
foolish ones thought they could get by on their original supply. They didn’t make use of the fuel that would have
been easily available to them beforehand.
When the bridegroom finally came, it was too late for them to get more
oil and join the procession and come in to the wedding.
It was not just a
careless mistake on the part of the foolish ones. There was no second chance at that point for
them. So it will be when Jesus comes
again. You need to be prepared for His
coming. That preparation amounts to
simply having saving faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Those who believe in Him when He comes will
be a part of the great procession to the heavenly banquet with Christ and His
bride the Church. Those who have allowed
their faith to slip, those who have fallen away, those who have placed their
trust in themselves and their own works or any other thing, will be shut
out. It will be too late at that time to
run off and try to get the one thing needful that was offered so freely before.
God has given us
so many chances that those who reject that gift of grace can only be described
by the word that Jesus Himself used, foolish.
Yet those who reject the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit are
everywhere. Again as we look closely at
the parable you need to recognize that Jesus was saying that the foolish ones
are even among us. Even though some may
be in line for the procession, their hearts may not be ready for the Lord’s
return because they have continually rejected the source of power that is
necessary for true faith to fill the heart. That power comes from the Holy Spirit who
works through the Means of Grace, the Word and the Sacraments, to fill your
heart with the oil of faith that makes you ready to wait as long as it takes
for the Savior to come. That Spirit-endowed
faith not only makes you ready to go when the Lord calls you but it also
sustains you for the wait.
Through that gift
of the Holy Spirit, you are prepared to live your life for the Lord as you wait
for His return. That means that you are also
ready to serve the Lord in ways that He has made clear in His Word. A little later in this same chapter, Jesus
spoke about the ways in which we serve Him by serving others. Showing kindness and compassion to those in
need, strengthening and building one another in the Lord, spreading the Gospel
of salvation through Jesus Christ, praying for and supporting the work of the
church are all part of the life of faith as you wait for the time when our
Savior will come to judge the world and take His people to our eternal
home. The power to do all those things
comes from God. You need to recognize
that great source of spiritual fuel and make use of it in your life. If you don’t, you are like the foolish
virgins who waited with no supply of fuel for their lamps.
You may have every intention of being a
wedding guest when the invitation goes out but without the faith that trusts in
Jesus Christ alone, you will be like those who come late and find the doors
shut. You may wonder what went wrong but the truth is that there was no oil for
your lamp. There was no real faith and
trust in Christ alone. That is why Jesus
told a parable like this to His disciples.
We know that at least one of them did not believe. Judas betrayed Him in the end. Jesus’ warning was to all who are His
followers. Stay filled with the power of
the Holy Spirit by making good use of the Word and the Sacraments so that your
faith will remain strong. Let that faith
show itself in action as you serve the Lord by serving those around you. Use the power of the Spirit to share the
Gospel with others in the time that the Lord will give you. Just like the young women in the parable, we
don’t know when the Bridegroom with come.
We don’t know when Jesus will come again but He calls you to prepare
your heart with the spiritual fuel that has been so freely provided. Then you will be able to join the heavenly
celebration of the marriage of Christ and His Bride, the Church, for all
eternity. Amen.
Rev. Gerald Matzke
Zion Lutheran Church
Painesville, Ohio
22nd Sunday after Pentecost
No comments:
Post a Comment