Highlighted Text: Matthew 25:1-13

Summary of the text:

Ancient lighting took work.

I remember watching a movie (I think it was The Mummy) where the protagonists descended into an underground structure built by the ancients. The structure was completely dark save for a beam of sunlight coming through an opening in the ceiling. By simply catching that light and aligning it with mirrors distributed around the room, they were able to brilliantly light the entire enormous underground structure. Unfortunately, real ancient lighting was nowhere near this effective! This is an important consideration, because the nature of ancient lamps and torches plays a key role in Jesus’ parable in Matthew 25:1-13.

But first, a note about Jewish wedding customs at play in this text. The typical Jewish wedding at the time took place at night, starting with the groom and his friends going to the home of the bride for the wedding ceremony [ESV]. After that, the entire wedding party would walk to the groom’s home for the celebration and banquet. To put it in contemporary terms, the wedding was at the bride’s house, and the reception was at the groom’s house.

When I was in Israel, I had the chance to observe a modern wedding procession. It was joyous. It was full of dancing. It was not, however, a swiftly-moving column of humanity. So in this time long before cell phones and GPS trackers, the friends and family waiting at the groom’s house for the wedding party had no clue when the wedded couple would arrive. They just had to be ready, late at night, with ancient lamps and torches at the ready.

Now back to where we started with ancient lighting. This part’s important. These oil-based lamps and torches had to be refilled or redressed every 15 minutes [ARCH]! I think this is a key part of the ancient world that we don’t understand very well. We buy LED bulbs rated for 10-15 years. I live in Colorado and we have emergency go-bags in case of wildfires. We can get survival flashlights that will last for days on a single charge. Can you imagine having to change the batteries on your flashlight every 15 minutes?

We turn on a switch and expect the lights to stay on. But in Jesus’ time, people had to work hard every fifteen minutes to keep the lights on at night. And so I believe the main point of this parable is that discipleship takes regular ongoing work. It’s much more like tending a torch every 15 minutes, not like an LED bulb that you buy once every 10-15 years.

In fact, the early Church bishop Augustine points out that this parable is not dividing those who have been baptized and those who have not. This parable is not dividing the Jew and the Gentile. This parable is not dividing the Christian and the pagan. Instead, Augustine writes about this parable:

These five and five virgins are all Christian souls together. But that I may tell you what by the Lord’s inspiration I think, it is not souls of every sort but such souls as have the catholic faith and seem to have good works in the church of God. Yet even of them it is said, ‘Five are wise, and five are foolish.’ [ACC]

In other words, this parable is dividing two groups of Christians: those who are regularly diligent about the practice of their faith, and those who are regularly lax in the practice of their faith. This parable is a warning to the faithful, not a warning to those who don’t know Jesus.

As in many of Jesus’ parables and sayings about the work of discipleship, this parable contains images of filling and images of emptying. The wise ones were able to add extra oil, and they also trimmed the charred wicks of their lamps. In other words, discipleship requires the discipline to both add and remove life practices. There are beneficial practices to add. There are patterns of life that need to be removed. Our lives of discipleship require the same combination of pruning and planting that the nations needed in Jeremiah 1:10 – “to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant” (emphasis added).

My transition into my 40’s came with the obligatory hip surgery. The only way to stop the cycle of hip pain was to literally carve out some bone. Those parts had to be removed. But recovering my functionality after the surgery required adding significant and regular physical therapy exercises. Long after I was released from PT, I still have to do maintenance exercises every day. If I stop my routine exercises, pain will return. So, too, our spiritual life requires the complete removal of some of our painful patterns and the regular addition of the patterns that bring us closer to Christ’s peace. But without those regular patterns and ongoing spiritual maintenance, we will drift closer to pain and further from Christ’s peace.

Since Thanksgiving Day is coming soon after this Sunday, and since it is often listed as one of the most stressful holidays, there is a near-term opportunity to practice this pruning and planting. What could your church folks stop doing that isn’t Christ-like as they approach Thanksgiving? What practice could they start doing to draw closer to Christ’s grace, mercy, and peace this Thanksgiving?

What does “foolish” mean?

Coming at this text from a different angle, I find it jarring to see Jesus referring to some of his followers as “foolish.” I would not recommend calling your church fools, but if you do, please record the video and send it to me so I can watch. I’ll bring popcorn. There are some pretty clear challenges and warnings in this text, but I also found some grace and hope when I looked more deeply into this word.

This is what I found in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament on this specific word for foolish:

The word implies censure on man himself ; his acts, thoughts, counsels, and words are not as they should be. The weakness may be due to a specific failure in judgment or decision, but a general deficiency of intellectual and spiritual capacities may also be asserted. The charge of folly does not have to be a definitive judgment. In many cases it is more in the nature of an admonition or warning, or it expresses the impossibility of understanding or following the thinking or acts of someone. [TDNT] (emphasis added)

Foolishness doesn’t have to be a permanent state – it can be changed. The “foolish” in this text were only labeled as such because of their lack of diligence, not some intrinsic and insurmountable flaw of their character and spirit. Further on in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, we see this extra tidbit: “The fault is one of lukewarmness rather than wickedness.”

In fact, if they had realized their mistake earlier, they could have purchased more supplies and been back in time for the groom. They had no way of knowing the exact timing, of course, but I think it is a key observation that the earlier we correct our course, the more likely it is that we’ll be back to enjoy the party.

Have you ever looked back on your past self and thought, “I was an idiot”? Before I had children, I wondered why so many families were always 5-10 minutes late to church. Couldn’t they just leave a few minutes earlier each week? Once I had children, I realized how foolish my thoughts had been. The best laid plans of mice and moms and dads go to waste when children are involved. “Did you go to the restroom five minutes ago when I asked? No. Let’s get your shoes on…wait…why do you only have one shoe?!?! Ah, I see you have a ketchup stain on that nice shirt you’re wearing.” This is essentially what happened this morning while I tried to get my kids ready for church. Where once I foolishly judged families for being late to church, now I am wiser and extend grace (including to my own family).

While that is a humorous example of being foolish in the past and wiser in the present, you can take the same principle and apply it to much weightier things as well. People often are more open to change if they see even small examples of how they did something similar in the past. One way to turn this temporary state of foolishness into positive action by your congregation is to help them see how they have grown over time already. Now that they have some momentum, help them take the next step toward Christ’s wisdom and away from the world’s foolishness.

Why not share?

Finally, I want to add a word about why the wise did not share their oil. My parents taught me, “Sharing! Sharing! That’s the thing to do!” Of course, my childhood self typically only applied that when I wanted someone else to share with me, but still. Why would the wise followers of Jesus not share?

I actually saw a scene very similar to this after one of the weddings where I was the pastor. This couple didn’t want rice thrown at them when they left the church. They wanted everyone to blow bubbles!

The couple provided a large cache of bubble bottles that had the little circular stems you blow through. So we all gathered outside the church and prepared the bubble fest. The wedding planner called out that they were coming, so we all initiated the deluge of delightful popping spheres! And we kept it up. And kept going. Still going. We started to run out of bubbles, because the couple took a little detour for one more photo.

Some of us had realized there would be a bubble shortage and we stopped blowing. Others ran out early. When people asked for others to share their bubble liquid, most replied, “No way! I don’t want to run out and leave the couple with no bubbles!”

It’s interesting to note that it was not just a selfish motivation. Most of the people who saved their bubble juice really wanted the couple to get the bubble deluge they wanted. It wasn’t just about having enough for themselves, it was a desire to celebrate the couple in the way they wanted to be celebrated.

In a similar manner, I believe the wise did not share their oil in Jesus’ parable because they wanted to ensure that the bride and groom had the celebration they deserved. From a preaching perspective, I see two potential applications. First, the discipline of adding spiritual oil and trimming painful practices grants its own reward. It’s not just a bunch of do’s and don’ts. These spiritual practices are a celebration that enriches your life. Second, you can’t ride someone else’s coattails. No one else can follow Jesus for you. Being married to a devoted follower of Jesus does not make you a devoted follower of Jesus. We all get to inherit Christ’s saving love, but we don’t get to import anyone else’s spiritual life and treat it as our own.

Preaching Themes

• Discipleship takes regular ongoing work. It’s much more like tending a torch every 15 minutes, not like an LED bulb that you buy once every 10-15 years
• Discipleship requires the discipline to both add and remove life practices
• Foolishness does not have to be a definitive judgment
• These spiritual practices are a celebration that enriches your life
• No one else can follow Jesus for you

References

[ESV] English Standard Version Global Study Bible

[ARCH] Archaeological Study Bible

[ACC] Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture

[TDNT] Theological Dictionary of the New Testament

Cody Sandahl has been the Pastor/Head of Staff at the First Presbyterian Church of Littleton, Colorado since 2015. Prior to that he was the Executive Pastor and Associate Pastor for Discipleship at the First Presbyterian Church of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He is passionate about equipping the saints for the work of ministry (Ephesians 4:12).

Cody came to pastoral ministry after a lifetime of programming computers and building robots, and he is the founder of the nonprofit Code4Kids. You can still find him down in his basement tinkering with computers, making things on his 3D printers, and shooting laser beams into things.

Cody is married to Becca, and they have two playful boys and one spunky dog who collaborate to ensure life is never boring.

Calls to Worship

From Joshua 24:14-15

Leader: Now therefore revere the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness
People: Put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord
Leader: Now if you are unwilling to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve
People: Whether the gods your ancestors served in the region beyond the River
Leader: Or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living
People: But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord

Cody Sandhal

Prayer of Confession

Holy God, we confess that we have been lukewarm about living our faith in Jesus each day. We put off to tomorrow what we know in our hearts you want to happen today. We go through the motions of religion without having our hearts utterly transformed by your presence. Forgive us, and help us to rekindle our faith into something useful and beautiful. Amen.

Cody Sandhal

Assurance of Pardon

Benediction

Sisters and brothers, if the torch of your faith is lit right now, it might fizzle out within fifteen minutes of leaving here today. So refill the oil of your faith. Trim the charred ends away from your life. Be ready to celebrate Jesus whenever he appears. Amen.

Cody Sandahl