A Wake-Up Call from Christ

Last Sunday of the Church Year

November 26, 2017

Matthew 25:13

A Wake-Up Call from Christ

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The parable is a warning, ending with this command from Christ:

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

MATTHEW 25:13 NIV 1984

The warning is that it’s possible to lose faith in Christ. It’s possible to give up hope that He is coming back.

The foolish virgins aren’t those who were confirmed and then immediately quit coming to Church. The foolish virgins are those who stuck it out, who served on committees, who pitched in on potlucks, and put their offering envelopes into the plate. But the Bridegroom was delayed, and as time passed they gave up hope that Jesus would ever come.

The wise virgins are not paragons of Christian virtue. They also fell asleep. They were told to stay awake and to watch, but they failed. But despite their sin, the wise virgins still expected the Bridegroom to come. They had more than the outward trappings of Christianity. They had oil, which here means faith in Christ.

And that's what saves: faith, and not good works. When Jesus the Bridegroom comes back, what you need is the faith that receives His promise. And His promise is that He died for those who fail.

This parable is well aware of the wise virgins sleeping, but it doesn't call them hypocrites. They aren’t hypocrites because even in their failure, they have faith. They hang on to the promise that the Bridegroom is coming back.

In the parable oil—faith—is what matters, not staying awake. But don’t read here that good works don’t matter. It matters when we don’t come to church or serve on committees or give of ourselves. While the parable is warning us that those things aren’t enough, it should make us want to dare to examine our lives, even our faith, and see if we’ve been sleeping. Christ told this story to stir us up. He wants to make us uncomfortable.

He wants to do this because He wants us to repent. We have fallen asleep and acted selfishly. We have not believed as we should. We have pushed what we know is right to the back of our minds, we have pretended that God wasn’t watching or wouldn’t care, so that we could enjoy our sins or pretend to not notice.

We have dangled our fingers in shark infested waters. We have neglected our prayers. We have allowed ourselves to become cynics and thought ourselves realists and we have not served our neighbors. We have been told to watch, but none of us has watched as we should. Repent, wake up, for no one knows when the Son of Man will return and we don’t want to be caught in sin.

We should also notice that the Lord treats the wise virgins as though they never fell asleep. He holds nothing against them. He died to save them from their failure to stay awake, so their sins aren’t going to stop Him.

This is why the hymn, “Wake, Awake” is so exuberant. The parable is a warning, but the hymn can’t wait. “Wake, Awake” is a call to repentance that fills the believers with joy. The cry “repent” is welcomed by those who have fallen into sin and want to be rescued.

The Bridegroom doesn’t come in terror to His bride, but in mercy. He comes to bring us into the bridal chamber.

First He declares us to be virgins, to be pure, holy, and innocent that He might bring us to the destiny of virgins. For we aren’t simply bridesmaids at this wedding. He is the groom; we are the bride. He joins us to Himself in Holy Communion by mystic union, His flesh entering into us. And in that sacred act He joins us also to the Father and the Spirit.

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. Amen.