Sermon for the Last Sunday of the Church Year
1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 + Matthew 25:1-13
Collect of the Day: O Lord, we implore You, absolve Your people from their offenses, that from the bonds of our sins which, by reason of our frailty, we have brought upon ourselves, we may be delivered by Your bountiful goodness; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns, with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Collect for the End of the Church Year: We thank You, Lord God, Heavenly Father, that in the past Church Year You have preserved Your Word among us in purity and by it have effectively enlivened our souls; and we implore You, that You would graciously forgive us all our neglect, unbelief, and disobedience with respect to Your Word, and continue to give us this precious treasure with Your blessing forevermore; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns, with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Come, Lord Jesus! When do people pray that prayer (besides the common table prayer that we often use, asking for the Lord’s spiritual presence and blessing on our meal)? Come, Lord Jesus! We pray that, one, when something really bad happens, or in those moments when the state of the world appears truly bleak, so maybe you’ve said that prayer quite bit lately. Come, Lord Jesus! And you mean it! But two, most of all, we pray it on Sundays. That’s when we’re most focused on the Lord’s coming, and focused on His call to repentance before then, and on His redeeming work on the cross, and on His glorious resurrection from the dead, and on the forgiveness of sins, and on the sanctifying work of His Spirit. Sundays, at our Divine Service (where, ironically, we aren’t even gathered today for reasons our members know). But normally, on Sundays, that’s when we’re most engaged in prayer, in praise, in actively contemplating the Lord’s words and promises to His people and His plans for this world, culminating in His coming, in His return to put an end to this world, to raise the dead, and to give the inheritance of eternal life to all who are found faithful when He comes. Yes, if Jesus came back on Sunday morning, while we’re in the midst of praying, Come, Lord Jesus, which of us would be taken unawares?
Of course, the likelihood of Jesus appearing during the brief time we’re (normally) gathered together on Sunday mornings is not very high. It’s much more likely He’ll come in the in-between times. We’ll call it, “in between Sundays,” when we’re not actively engaged in worship. Now, yes, some of us also gather regularly on Wednesday evenings, and you may well spend some time in Bible reading and in prayer during the week. But there are plenty of moments between Sundays when you’re going about the business of your vocations, living life as usual, tending to your daily routine. Most of our lives are lived in between Sundays.
If we’re wise, we take that into account ahead of time and prepare for those in-between times, for those moments of normalcy, for those times of “life as usual,” so that if Christ returns when we’re looking down instead of up, when we’re not directly focused on His return, we’re still ready to receive Him. We bring along extra oil for our lamps, as it were.
But if we’re foolish, we won’t give it a thought. We’ll just enjoy our Sunday morning gatherings at church (when we can have them), pray for Jesus to come, and then forget about Him until next week. Or maybe it won’t even be next week. Maybe we go a longer time between Sundays. No big deal, right? Surely Jesus will plan His coming around our worship, so we’re sure to be ready! That’s called, not bringing along any extra oil for our lamps.
I hope you’re starting to see the connection with today’s parable of the Ten Virgins. It’s a perfect parable to end the church year with, because another year has passed in the Church, and still Jesus hasn’t come back. And the longer He takes, the easier it becomes to focus on other things, just as the excitement of those ten virgins who went out to wait for the Bridegroom eventually waned, the longer they waited, and they fell asleep. Now, that’s OK for those who were wise enough to bring along extra oil. But for those who weren’t, things turned out terribly when the Bridegroom finally arrived. And so we have here an important parable, a sobering parable for in between Sundays.
The Bridegroom in the parable was obviously a very important man, and the wedding an important one. These ten young ladies were to be a special part of his entourage, waiting near the wedding hall for him to arrive so that they could escort him on the final leg of the journey. When they entered the wedding hall together, that’s when the great and endless celebration was to begin.
All the virgins had to do was wait and be ready with burning lamps when the bridegroom finally arrived. Five of them took their simple job very seriously. They also took seriously the fact that the bridegroom never told them at exactly what time he was coming. Their wait could be short or long. It’s easy to be prepared for a short wait. But for a long one? For that, they needed extra oil for their lamps, and they brought it.
The five foolish virgins, on the other hand, didn’t give any thought to the length of the wait they would have that night. They assumed the bridegroom would come quickly, within a few hours. They were ready for him when they first went out. They were ready for a while longer. But they didn’t use the opportunities they had early on to prepare for the longer wait they would have. So when the cry came at midnight announcing the Bridegroom’s arrival, they woke up and realized it was too late. Their lamps were going out. There was no more time to get oil. By the time they went out and bought some, it was too late. The doors were closed. And when they knocked and cried, “Lord, Lord, open the door for us!” all they heard was that terrible reply: “I do not know you.”
The Bridegroom in the parable represents the Lord Jesus, who as the model Husband, loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. The wedding in this parable is when He finally comes to pick up His Church and to bring her into the new heavens and the new earth that He will create after He judges and destroys this world. He’s told us that He’s coming. But He has intentionally not told us when.
The ten virgins represent active, believing Christians who truly start out waiting eagerly for the Bridegroom to come. They truly acknowledge their sins, repent of them, trust in Christ alone for forgiveness, are baptized, receive the Lord’s Supper. They all start out praying, Come, Lord Jesus! At least, that’s their prayer on Sunday.
But half of them, in this parable, don’t consider that their wait may be long, and so they don’t take the simple measures to make sure they still have a burning, living faith when Christ comes, which must still be burning at the end if we are to enter the heavenly mansions with our heavenly Bridegroom.
What are those measures? What does it mean to bring along extra oil? Most simply, it means using the means that God has provided to keep our faith alive. Hearing the Word and pondering what you hear. Receiving the Sacrament with seriousness as well as with joy. And making plans to continue to hear the Word and receive the Sacrament regularly, from Sunday to Sunday, throughout your whole life, knowing that faith needs to be fed and nourished if it’s going to keep burning.
And then there’s prayer, another simple tool God has given us to keep us from going astray from Sunday to Sunday, to keep our hearts and our minds set on Christ and on the things above.
If you take the Word that you hear on Sunday with you into the rest of the week, if you go back and ponder it, if you add prayer to your weekly routine, then even when you’re not actually reading the Bible or thinking about the sermon or saying a prayer, even when you’re sleeping, you have the oil you need for your lamp at the ready. And faith will not die. It’ll be there on Sunday and in between, so that, whenever Christ comes, you won’t have to scramble and go searching for it. You’ll be ready for the Bridegroom to come.
Come, Lord Jesus! We pray that prayer again today. We’ll be praying it every Sunday in earnest for the next four weeks during the Advent season. “Come, come, Emmanuel!” And in between Sundays, you have today’s parable to warn you not to grow apathetic about your faith and about the things God has given you to sustain it, because the Bridegroom will come when the world doesn’t expect Him. Yes, even the troubles and challenges life throws at us and the worsening state of affairs in this world are means the Lord uses to keep us from getting distracted, to keep us longing for the Bridegroom’s return, to keep us focused in between Sundays, and praying more and more, “Come, Lord Jesus!” Yes, Come, Lord Jesus! Amen.
