Last Sunday of the Church Year
1 Thessalonians 5.1-11 + Matthew 25.1-13
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
The church’s year ends with this command, “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.” Jesus illustrates this command for us by comparing the kingdom of heaven to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. These virgins are the bridal party who will accompany the bridegroom to the wedding banquet. Since the bridegroom could arrive at any time, even after dark, the ten virgins took their lamps with them. Jesus tells us that five of the virgins were wise and five were foolish. The foolish virgins took their lamps, but did not take any oil along with them. The virgins who were wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. The foolish virgins imagined that the oil they had in their lamps was enough. The wise, on the hand, would not allow for the possibility of not having enough oil. All ten virgins wait for the bridegroom. All ten virgins fall asleep as the bridegroom is delayed. All ten virgins are raised by the cry, “Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him!” And all ten rise and trim their lamps.
It is at that moment that the foolishness of the five becomes apparent. They started off with oil in their lamps, but once the cry awakens them from their slumber and they trim their lamps, they realize they had not watched properly. The little oil they had in their lamps was used up. And without oil in their lamps, their lamps could not burn and produce light. They turn to the wise for oil but the wise cannot give them any without depriving themselves of what they need for their lamps. The foolish virgins rush to those who sell oil, even though it is the middle of the night. While they are gone the bridegroom arrives. The wise virgins who watched properly, with oil for their lamps, were ready and went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut. The foolish virgins, back from the merchant, knock on the shut door and cry, “Lord, Lord, open to us,” only to hear in response, “Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.” The bridegroom only knows those attendants who are ready for him, who go out to meet with oil in their vessels and lamps aglow.
“Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.” The bridegroom is the Lord Jesus Christ. The ten virgins are all those who profess themselves to be Christians. As the virgins wait for the arrival of the bridegroom, not knowing when he might arrive, all Christians are called to watch for Christ’s return, the day and the hour unknown. The wedding banquet is everlasting life, while the shut door signifies finally of Christ’s judgment that day. The fact that five of the virgins in the parable—half of them—do not properly watch for bridegroom teaches us that not all who profess themselves to be Christians are actually Christians. They have the lamp. They outwardly appear to be waiting for Christ’s return in glory. But they have no oil for their lamp. The lamp is the human heart. The oil is faith in Christ, which enlightens the hearts with the gospel and burns with love toward God. Jesus’ warning is stern and dire. Since you do not know the day on which the Son of Man is coming; since you do not know the hour of His return, watch. When we think of watching for Christ’s return, we often think of watching for the signs outside of our ourselves. We may think of watching the heavens, watching current events unfold such as wars and rumors of wars. We watch society decay. Christ teaches us to see these things as signs of His coming. But these are not what Jesus wants us to watch for in this this parable.
The parable of the ten virgins teaches us to watch ourselves, lest our oil runs out and we find ourselves without faith when we die or Christ returns, whichever happens first. As the foolish virgins did not think it would be necessary to replenish their oil, many Christians do not think it necessary to feed, nourish, and replenish their faith by hearing God’s word. How many people profess to be Christian, yet when asked, “Where do you go to church?” their answer is, “Nowhere.” Yet faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom 10:17). To stay away from the preaching of God’s word is to cut oneself off from the place where oil is being sold, from the way God had ordained to give us faith, strengthen our faith, so that we persevere in faith unto the end and be saved.
This also means that those who profess themselves to be Christians must not only hear God’s word preached, but they must also have ears to hear it. They must apply it to themselves, meditate on it, and inwardly digest it. Too many who profess themselves to be Christians think that if they merely attend service, regardless of how they heard God’s word—their faith is strengthened. Still others who profess themselves to be Christians convince themselves that they cannot lose their faith no matter what they do or how they live. They say, “Grace abounds! No matter what I do, God forgives my sins!” They imagine that continuing in their sin is compatible with faith. That is, if they even think what they are doing is sin. So many who profess themselves to be Christians imagine that they can live as the world lives—with its priorities, its way of thinking—and that is perfectly compatible with faith.
But refusal to hear God’s word preached, complacency towards the word which is preached, and the desire to continue in sin cannot dwell in the heart with faith. They are the faith’s opposites. It is not enough that you have come to believe. Jesus says, “He who endures to the end will be saved” (Matt 10:22). Faith can only endure it if is fed and nourished by hearing and reading God’s word with ears to hear and hearts to believe it. The fire of faith in one’s heart can suffocated by complacency and deliberate sinning, which is why St. Paul tells the Corinthians, “I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified” (1 Cor 9:27). If faith is not fed and nourished by God’s Word and His sacrament, your oil will, over the course of time, fail. It is sobering to be confronted with the thought of your faith failing and you being unaware of it. Sadly, too many of those who profess themselves Christians are in that state, their faith has failed, their oil has run out, yet they imagine, because they have the outward trappings or a faint idea of faith, or simply a high opinion of themselves, that they are perfectly prepared.
Like the five foolish virgins, those who profess themselves Christians do not have the oil of faith will be shut out of the wedding feast. They will hear that terrible judgment, “Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.” Christ does not know them in this life because they do not hear His word with good and honest hearts. He does not know them in this life because they do not hear His voice in His word and follow their good shepherd in their deeds. The foolish will find the door to the kingdom of heaven, which had been opened throughout their lives, now shut forever.
Obviously, Jesus wants you to be wise virgins waiting for His return. He wants you to understand this situation and what it requires of you, so that with the wisdom He provides, you may continually replenish the oil of faith to enlighten your hearts with His gospel, so that they burn with love toward God. This is how Paul encourages the Thessalonians in today’s epistle: “But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Faith and love protect our hearts—from the love of sensing, from complacency, and plain old presumption. The hope of salvation—meaning the certainty of our salvation—protects our thinking from succumbing to the world’s priorities and way of thinking and keeps us ever mindful of the fact that God has appointed to obtain salvation through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. He wants us to endure to the end and be saved.
And to that end He provides oil in this life. He works faith in our hearts—and strengthens, fortifies, and builds it—through His word and sacrament. He wants you, dear saints, to endure unto the end so that when you hear the cry, “Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him,” He will greet you as one whom He knows as His own and take you with Him into the wedding feast of everlasting bliss of which we cannot even begin to imagine, for, “As it is written: Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Cor 2:9). “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming” to take you to this feast. Amen.
May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
