Back in the days when only young men prepared for pastoral ministry, a certain Dr. Eislen, president of Garrett Seminary, preached on [our gospel] parable in chapel. When he reached the climax of his message, he yelled at his seminarians, "Young men, tell me, would you rather be in the light with the wise virgins, or out in the dark with the foolish virgins?" Such laughter arose that chapel was dismissed early that day![1]
But seriously, folks . . .
If you notice, our gospel readings are changing from teaching about discipleship to teaching about the end times, the 2nd coming, the Parousia, the Day of the Lord. And in fact “The Day of the Lord” could be the heading for each and every one of our lessons today. Let’s take a brief look at all of them.
Amos was probably the first prophet to have his words recorded. He was the first to use the phrase, “The Day of the Lord,” about 2800 years ago. God called Amos, a herdsman, away from his flock to go and challenge the people in the town of Bethel, just 12 miles from Jerusalem. Now things were going pretty well in Bethel. Commerce was thriving, worship attendance was up, sacrifices were made as scheduled. But the people had become complacent. They were going through the motions. Israel expected the Day of the Lord—that day would be their day of triumph. God would intervene on their behalf, but selfishly they expected tribal victory. But God had other ideas, and in the words of Amos the Day of the Lord was to be God’s day. He asks them why they desire the day of the Lord, why do they want it to come, for it will be darkness, not light. It will be a catastrophic day of judgment, all doom and gloom and darkness. The Day of the Lord will be a terrible day of God’s visitation, a day of defeat because of Israel’s excesses and complacency. The next words are those of God himself, passionately rejecting sacrifice and feasts, offerings and music. God refuses to listen because they are not worshipping God in their hearts, they are just going through the motions. They are not humbly obedient, but arrogantly treating God as one of them. God calls not for worship and sacrifice, but for justice, a flooding torrent of justice and righteousness. We’ll get back to that.
The prophet is concerned for the day of the Lord as an occurrence within time and within history; the people of Israel were persuaded that human history is linear and purposeful, with a beginning and an end, and God was working out his purposes. One day God’s kingdom will come, “and the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea” (Is 11:9).
Our reading from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians also speaks to the Day of the Lord. The early church believed that Christ’s return was immanent, and as such were getting quite concerned at the delay . . . and now here we are two thousand years later, still waiting with anticipation. Paul’s letter was meant to address the concerns of the faithful followers, as some of them were dying and Christ had not yet appeared. And while I’m not sure how much of Paul’s words we can take as absolutely literal, as parameters defining the sequence of events on that Great Day of the Lord, we can get the flavor. Some denominations will point to this text as a literal description, and have built great scenarios on what will happen, but I don’t think that’s what’s intended. Paul is obviously addressing the concern of the church regarding some who have fallen asleep—those who have died, and others have raised the question regarding the relationship of the dead to the 2nd coming of Christ. Paul’s answer is that those who have died will be included in the same way as those who are still alive at the coming of the Lord. Paul’s language is vivid and dramatic and it’s easy to get distracted by the imagery, but these verses are primarily a glorious reassurance to those who are troubled. All who die in Christ, remain in Christ and will join with him in the Day of the Lord. And in fact, elsewhere Paul points to the very resurrection of Jesus himself as proof and guarantee that the church, the saints, will be resurrected as well. Christians can be confident of their future, that they will be with Christ, that death is not the end but merely a door to a better future. But this knowledge and belief should shape how we live—and we will get back to that.
In our Gospel we heard of the 10 virgins waiting for the bridegroom who had been delayed. It was getting late, and they were tired – as anyone who has participated in a large wedding will understand. They even fell asleep, waiting for the bridegroom to arrive, probably with his bride. These bridesmaids were tasked with providing lighting for the celebration that was to follow, and they had all brought lamps, and oil for their lamps. But when they waited . . . and waited . . . and waited . . . and slept . . . half of them used up all of their oil. They weren’t prepared, they weren’t expecting a big delay. Fortunately the other five had planned ahead, and had plenty of oil to keep their lamps going, but not enough to share. As the foolish women went off to buy oil—not an easy prospect in the middle of the night—the bridegroom arrived and went into the house, bringing the wise bridesmaids with him. They went in and locked the door, and the foolish ones were left out. So what’s the point? A couple things come to mind. First is that each of us individually is responsible for being ready for Christ. The day of the Lord will come and we will be held accountable. Our neighbor, our priest, our parent, our church, cannot be ready for us. We each must answer for ourselves. We need to have enough oil. We need to build up treasures in heaven. We need to be prepared, to have more than enough oil on hand. We need to get ready . . . and stay ready.
We are ready when our relationships with God and others are what they should be. We are ready when at any moment of our day, whether in the privacy of our home . . . or in the recesses of our mind, we are not ashamed to have the Lord meet us. We are also ready when we make sure that our children are adequately cared for, when we will not be ashamed at our credit card accounts being made public.[2]
Another way we get ready is to live our lives in light of our hope, in light of the Day of the Lord, in light of the Bridegroom’s return. And Amos tells us how: by justice and righteousness. We need to get outside of our selves, our comfortable churches, our smugness, and our complacency and do something about the injustice in the world, to take care of those who are in need. We tend to feel pretty good about ourselves this time of the year when we help a needy family have a turkey on the table for Thanksgiving - - and forget that they are hungry in January. We give away an old coat, a cheap toy, and forget that children need clothing in the summer. How can we make this a lifestyle? Believe me, I’m talking to myself as much as I am to you. How do we do righteousness and justice? What can you do today? What can I do today?
The Rev. Dr. James Howell tells the following stories:
Once Mother Teresa was invited to a hunger conference in Bombay. She lost her way, and arrived late at the appointed place. On the steps outside, she noticed a man, dying of hunger. Instead of going in, she took him, and fed him. Inside, they were talking about so much food supply in so many years, statistics here, statistics there -- while a real person was dying on the steps outside. That's how we do it, one at a time, not just talking, but feeding, touching. In our Church library we have a documentary on the life of Mother Teresa. There is this great moment when a wealthy woman from America finds Mother Teresa, whips out her checkbook, and says, "I want to write you a check to support your work." Mother Teresa looks up, shakes her head and says "No money." "What?" "No money." "You won't take my money? I have a lot of money, this money can help you." "No money." "No money! Well then, what can I do?" Mother Teresa smiled that inimitable smile, took her by the hand, and said, "Come and see." She led this woman deep into the barrios of Calcutta, searching, until finally she came upon a small, grimy child. Mother Teresa said, "Take care of her." and so the woman took a cloth, and bathed the little girl, took a spoon and fed her. And she reported later that her life was changed. Come and see. Touch someone. When Mother Teresa first came to the United States, she made a great speech in New York, in which she said, "You don't have to go to Calcutta to share in my work. Calcutta is wherever you are. Wherever you are, there are people who hurt, who need love. Find them. Love them. For in loving them, you love Jesus."[3]
[1] http://home.twcny.rr.com/lyndale/pentecost%2026A.htm
[2] Wilkins, Michael J. the NIV Application Commentary: Matthew. Zondervan, p. 818.
[3] http://www.day1.net/index.php5?view=transcripts&tid=435
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