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The Parables of Matthew
Prepared For Joy
Matthew 25:1-13
Introduction: You Need To Be Prepared
It’s hard to believe that the October earthquake that rocked our world
when we lived in the Bay Area happened 20 years ago. The world fell apart for
the more than 6 million residents of the area that day. All the attention
focused on the Battle of the Bay as the San Francisco Giants and Oakland A’s
played in the World Series. Then, bridges and freeway viaducts collapsed.
Buildings burned. Phones wouldn’t work. People died.
For several days large portions of the area were without power and water.
Slowly the world started to go back together for people. There was a good
outcome to the tragedy. We all learned the importance of being prepared. Once
the earth moves it’s too late. Preparation has to happen ahead of time and it
must be maintained. We put together two tubs filled with dried foods and military
MREs, emergency supplies to take care of necessities and even some cash to tide
us over until the electronic means of purchase could once again be used. You
may never have experienced a major earthquake, but you understand the need to
be prepared because of tornadoes, floods and blizzards. Even those don’t match
earthquake preparedness as hurricanes are the only natural disaster that
compare. But, even then, there is some warning. The problem with an earthquake
is that you never know until the ground starts moving.
As we near the end of our series studying the
parables of Matthew, Jesus tells a story about the importance of being prepared
for His return. In Matthew 24 Jesus talks to His disciples about the signs of
His coming and the end of the age. He tells the disciples that He doesn’t even
know all the details.
No one knows about that day or hour,
not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Matthew
24:36 NIV
He tells them His coming will be unexpected—like
a thief in the night. We are constantly reminded by television advertisements
that you always need to be prepared for the thief who might try to break in at
any time. Jesus challenges them to be faithful and wise servants who
will be rewarded rather than wicked servants who will be punished.
This leads to the parable of the ten virgins or
bridesmaids. The story told by Jesus ends with a pointed warning:
Therefore keep watch, because you do
not know the day or the hour.
Matthew
25:13 NIV
These words need to stay fresh in our minds as
we work our way through the parable.
God’s Invitation
The story Jesus tells usually steers the reader
toward the grim inevitability of impending judgment. That certainly is part of
the story. But, it’s only part of the story. Before we are done this morning we
will hopefully discover joy in the parable. The story invites us to be prepared for joy. It focuses us on the
unreserved, willing, hopeful anticipation Jesus wanted in His disciples and
desires in us. Joy is a part of God’s character. God breaks into our lives.
He came in the Messiah. He will come again at the Second Coming. In between, He
comes daily, hourly, momentarily as we are prepared for Him.
Lloyd Ogilvie describes the breadth of God’s
invitation to discover the joy in each and every day.
That’s not possible unless we expect and hopefully
anticipate meeting the Lord in each new day. He gives the day and He will show
the way. Disappointments become appointments for Him to give new direction.
Difficult people are gifts for new dependence on the Lord for what He will give
to meet the trying relationships of life. Perplexities are the prelude to
receiving new power from the resourceful Lord. He comes each day with the gift
of joy. Robert Louis Stevenson was right: “To miss the joy is to miss it
all.” Lloyd
Ogilvie
The Focus of the Story
The leading characters in the story are ten
bridesmaids. Five are said to be wise and five are foolish. The five with whom
you identify declares the state of your life and indicates what your focus will
be. If you identify with the five foolish bridesmaids, you are connecting with
those who deserve judgment. Identifying with the five wise bridesmaids means
you understand the Day of Judgment is coming and you are prepared for joy.
Weddings were a festive occasion in that day.
They still are, but nothing like what they were then. There was an entire week
of festivities. People were excused from their regular duties to be part of the
celebration. The high point of the week was when the groom came to the bride’s
house to take her to her new home. The bride asked 10 friends to be
bridesmaids. Because the groom came at night, their assignment was to carry
lamps to light the way as the joyous wedding party proceeded along the way.
Pranks are sometimes part of weddings. When my friend John was married,
some guys had written on the bottom of one shoe “Help” and on the other one
“Me.” When the couple knelt to pray those who might have been looking read the
message, “Help me!” You could tell those who didn’t have their eyes closed as
the snickers worked their way through the pews. As a pastor I’m always nervous
when it’s time for the rings to be exchanged. One common prank finds the best
man turning to the groomsmen next to him who turns to one next to him until
finally the groomsmen at the end of the line produces the ring to be passed
back through the line to the groom. At our previous church there was a catwalk
between the ceiling and the exterior roof to provide access to spotlights. The
walk ended right above the spot where the bride and groom stood. At one wedding
the ring was lowered on a string to the waiting groom. These are creative
pranks but I’m not sure, as most mothers of the bride would agree, that a
wedding is the right place for them.
In the story Jesus tells, the bridegroom kept the
time he was coming secret. The bridesmaids were to be waiting expectantly.
Jesus develops His story with dramatic skill. The bridesmaids fall
asleep—exactly what the bridegroom was hoping. Grooms kept the time of their
coming secret to see if they could catch them napping. The wedding custom
called for the bridegroom to send a courier ahead of him shouting, “Behold,
here’s the bridegroom; come out to meet him!”
The story has a gripping conclusion. They were
asleep. Five bridesmaids had brought sufficient oil but five had not. The cry
rang out and five were not prepared. They wouldn’t want to miss the one event
for which they had been waiting. They tried to borrow oil from their five wise associates
but were refused because there wasn’t enough oil to light all ten lamps. They
rushed off to buy more oil, but by the time they returned the door was shut.
Once the wedding party was inside, the door was closed and locked to keep out
wedding crashers simply looking for a free meal. The door was not to be reopened
for any reason. They could bang on the door all they wanted. They were not
ready. They missed the joy of the occasion.
The Meaning of the Story
The meaning of the story isn’t much of a
mystery. Jesus is the Bridegroom. Israel is the bride. Many were not prepared
for His first coming and will remain unprepared for His second coming. With
Israel’s rejection, God turned His attention to those who would hear and
respond. The Church became the object of His affection. One of the names to
identify God’s people is the bride of Christ.
We learn this lesson: Being prepared is vitally,
eternally important. Being unprepared and missing the joy is a pathetic tragedy
that doesn’t need to happen.
If we leave the story here we might just walk
away saying, “How sad!” There is, however, the matter of our own prepared
alertness. God breaks into our lives on
a daily basis. Am I ready for those daily interventions of His grace?
Are you? We need to be because we
are prepared for the final joy of His coming by being ready to receive joy
through His regular, daily interventions.
Important Lessons
In order to be prepared not only for the
ultimate day of His return, but for all the days—however many they may be—until
He returns, consider these important lessons we can carry with us to make sure
our lamps are ready to shine brightly when the Bridegroom comes.
1st Lesson: To Be Prepared For the Bridegroom Is To Have A
Relationship With Him
As Jesus told the story it wouldn’t be many days
before the Lord who taught this parable would be resurrected from the dead.
Easter brings an entirely different focus to the thought of being ready for the
return of the Bridegroom. We wait expectantly for the resurrected Jesus to
return.
The Lord who taught this parable unleashed His
presence on the Day of Pentecost as the Holy Spirit came to reveal the living,
holy God. The Holy Spirit living in us makes us expectant of the Lord’s
presence as we wait and watch for His daily interventions. We can hardly wait
to see how God will show up in our lives today. Maybe He has already shown up
today for you. Maybe you’re still waiting. The important thing is to realize
that having a relationship with Him means He will show up. All you have to do
watch so you won’t miss it!
St. Bernard expresses this reality in his
description of the monks in his order.
However early they would wake and rise for prayer in
their chapels on a cold winter morning, or even in the dead of night, they
would always find God awake before them, waiting for them—nay it was He who had
awakened them to seek His face.”
The Lord prepares us for what He has prepared for
us! Are
you watching for it? Are you prepared?
The five foolish bridesmaids should have been
prepared. They knew the bridegroom. They would have known to expect him when it
was least expected. They certainly should have anticipated it.
By knowing the Bridegroom, we are “prepared for anything” believers. We love Him. We know He loves us. We expect Him to break into our
lives even when we might not be expecting it. That’s the delight found in the
joy of knowing Him! He gives us what we need to live and uses the circumstances
of our lives for His purposes. One author notes:
The life in God is rich and ample beyond all description.
For anything and everything there is in Christ is ours for
the taking and the using; it is indeed pressed eagerly upon
us. And God’s generosity is inexhaustible and never tires;
keeps heaping grace on grace upon us, far beyond our reckoning. John Arthur Gossip
How then do we miss out on what God has for us? We do so by forfeiting the
privilege of our relationship with the Bridegroom. He
comes to us in our difficulties; He speaks to us in our uncertainties; He
reveals His power in our inadequacies.
2nd Lesson: To Be Prepared For The Bridegroom You Cannot
Borrow Preparedness
While God can use a life crisis to stab us
awake, you
need to understand that you can’t prepare for a crisis in the midst of the
crisis. Bay Area residents were reminded consistently and
persistently twenty years ago that the time to prepare for the earthquake was
before the ground starts shaking and rolling. The farther removed we became
from the fateful day; the less we heard the warnings.
When the announcement the bridegroom was coming
startled them awake, the five foolish bridesmaids were horrified by the reality
they didn’t have oil to light their lamps. They pleaded with the wise
bridesmaids to share their oil with them. It helps to understand a lamp was a
dish attached to a staff in which a burning wick floated in oil. Extra oil was
carried to replenish the supply as needed.
The five wise bridesmaids refused the request to
share their oil. They sound cruel and insensitive, but it actually is a wise
assessment of the facts. If they share, there won’t be enough oil for any of
them. They suggest instead that the unprepared bridesmaids go and buy some more
oil. They go but they find, sadly, you can’t prepare for a crisis in the midst
of the crisis.
Why do we sometimes run out of spiritual power? There are times when we run down, when we seem powerless to face the
challenges of life, when the sense of hopelessness threatens to overwhelm us.
We have to understand it’s not possible to borrow the power of the Holy Spirit
from others. Other believers can help us, support us, comfort us and advise us,
but they can’t transmit the power they receive from God into us. God’s power to face life’s crises comes in
being prepared through regular, intimate meetings with Him.
Why are some Christians more effective than others? We try to explain the difference as unusual talents, special
abilities and spectacular gifts. That’s not the case. God uses some very
ordinary people in Scripture for extraordinary results. God looks for daring and willing people who believe there is nothing
impossible for Him. The lives of God’s heroes are not marked by great deeds
performed by human skill, but by miracles of the Lord’s intervention in those
times of greatest need as they trusted Him with abandon.
3rd Lesson: To Be Prepared For The Bridegroom There Is A
Time That Is Too Late
Jesus’ story ends with a sad reality. The
bridegroom came while the foolish bridesmaids were trying to buy oil. The moment of opportunity passed; it would
never come again. They came and found the door closed. Do you see the pathetic picture of the foolish
bridesmaids knocking at the door and hearing the joy of the party but the door
is closed? Do you sense their agony as they lament, “It’s too late?”
There is a time when it is too late. It’s not
too late for God, but it is for us. Jesus isn’t saying that God’s grace has
limits. Rather He exposes our human nature. There is a time, after saying no
consistently to God in the daily affairs of life, when it becomes impossible to
say yes when we really need it. We resist His overtures of grace. Our repeated
resistance results in failure to follow through on His invitation to live with
Him forever. If we constantly say no to Him in our daily choices, it will be
impossible to say yes when the clock strikes midnight as physical life fades
away in death. We have settled into our rut and we aren’t going to be bothered
by anything or anyone for any reason.
Jesus sounded the warning for His listeners. Be
prepared for the coming of the bridegroom. Don’t wait until it’s too late. The
tragedy of standing at the closed door of opportunity and pleading to no avail
can be avoided by acting now.
Conclusion: It’s Never Too Late For God
Our earthquake emergency kit is no more. Once we
moved to Minnesota we stopped living in the urgency that The Big One could
strike at any time. The press to be ready was removed for us.
The press of eternity, however, always stands before us. Humanly speaking we can put ourselves in the dangerous place of being
too late. But, with God it’s never too late. As long as you can breathe your
next breath and listen to the warning of Jesus’ story there is still time. The
tragic lack of preparation by the foolish bridesmaids doesn’t need to be our
story. It doesn’t need to be your story.
As we finish we need to linger for just a moment
on the fact the bridegroom arrived late. In the story it serves as a wedding
prank. But, as we wait for the return of the heavenly Bridegroom, His delay
isn’t intended to trick us. It is a sign of His grace. What if the foolish
bridesmaids had realized as they waited they needed more oil? They could have
gone, bought the oil and returned ready and prepared for the announcement that
the bridegroom was coming. While this may not be stated in the parable, it is a message of hope for us.
There have been times when God waited for me to
be ready to encounter His joy in either a tragedy or triumph of life. If it
happened sooner I wouldn’t have been ready. I’m grateful for His timing as He
waited for me to be ready. The prophet Isaiah testified:
Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to
you; he rises to show you compassion. For the LORD is a God
of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him! Isaiah 30:18 NIV
Jesus gives each of us ample opportunities to be prepared for His joy—both in this life and the life to follow. Five bridesmaids may have
been unprepared but five were prepared.
That the upside to this story. They went to the wedding. They enjoyed the
party. They were prepared for joy.
Jesus gives you the opportunity to be prepared for joy. If
the shout were to ring out that the Bridegroom is returning today, are you
prepared for joy? You can be. It all begins by being prepared for
those places where He might break into your life today. Be ready for Him and
receive Him with joy!
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