Loving God, you welcome us into your kingdom through our Lord Jesus Christ and call us to active participation in your mission. Grant us the passion and the wisdom to take your call seriously, and keep us rooted and grounded in you through your Holy Spirit; for we ask it in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Joe tends to go with the flow. He is non-committal about most things, always waiting to see which way the spirit is going to move him. I might add that Joe is pretty much the opposite of those who serve in the armed forces. They are quite definitely “all in.” But Joe? -- He’s pretty non-committal, and especially when it comes to religion. Although he says that he believes in God, Joe is careful not to get overly involved in anything. He attends worship sometimes – but only when it’s convenient for him. He throws two or three dollars in the collection plate – or maybe five – depending on what he happens to have in his pocket. He makes $40,000 a year, but that is of no consequence when it comes to worship. Joe would not want to go overboard or make too much of a commitment. That simply isn’t his style.

It doesn’t really occur to Joe that if everybody were like him, there wouldn’t be any church. It also doesn’t occur to Joe that God might actually require a commitment on his part. After all, God will always be there for him, right? And then Joe shows up late to the wedding banquet, and the doors are already closed, and the bridegroom says to him, “You can’t come in here. I don’t know you, and I will have nothing to do with you.” And suddenly Joe wishes that he had paid more attention when it really mattered.

I keep thinking of the gospel passage where Jesus is – figuratively speaking – trying to shake the people awake (Mt. 12:38-42). He says to them, “Look – the people of Nineveh were wider awake than you! When Jonah preached, they repented and turned their lives right around. Look and see! There is something greater here than Jonah. Look – even the Queen of Sheba was more with it than you are. She travelled a great distance to come and hear the wisdom of Solomon, and there is something greater here than Solomon! Wake up, people, and see what God is doing right before your very eyes!” Isn’t this a very similar message to the parable from today’s gospel?

Turning to that parable for just a moment, keep in mind that in each of the parables that Jesus tells, there is always something in the story that would have been absolutely shocking to the people who first heard it. Often the message of the parable is to be found in this shocking part of the story. And so, in the parable of the ten bridesmaids, which part would have been the most unbelievable?

The answer perhaps becomes a little bit clearer when we understand how weddings often took place in Palestine as Jesus knew it. When a couple was to be married, the bride would wait at her parents’ home with her bridesmaids. Meanwhile, the groom would negotiate with the bride’s family over the financial details of the marriage. It was considered a sign of respect on both sides for these negotiations to last as long as possible – showing how highly valued the bride-to-be was by both her parents and the prospective groom.

Because of these lengthy negotiations prior to the wedding, the groom was always delayed and usually arrived at the bride’s home close to midnight. Once the groom arrived, a torch-lit procession would follow, leading the couple to the groom’s family home, where the wedding would then take place. Of course, it was the job of the bridesmaids to be ready to accompany the bride in this procession through the night.

Surely the shocking thing in this parable is not that the maidens fell asleep, or even that the bridegroom was delayed, but that 5 of the bridesmaids would care so little about their participation in the wedding! They knew that the bridegroom would be delayed. They knew that they would need lamps for the procession with the bride and the groom to the wedding. And yet, they didn’t care enough to come prepared. Is it any wonder that when they finally get to the wedding banquet, the bride and groom want nothing to do with them? And how many people are there who seem to care just as little about their relationship with God?

God is putting on a wedding banquet. We are invited guests – in fact, we have been asked to participate in the procession. However, without a lamp that is trimmed and filled with oil and ready to go, we cannot participate. Are we going to bother to prepare ourselves for the feast? Are we going to take our roles seriously in God’s kingdom and be prepared and ready to serve at all times?

It strikes me that the foolish bridesmaids in the parable are kind of like people who just don’t take Jesus very seriously -- like Joe. These are the people who just go with the flow, who might say at times that they believe, but don’t want to get too involved with anything. These are the people who don’t bother to worship or to pray much and don’t really make much of an effort or put themselves out. These are the people who are simply along for the ride and just assume that the door will always be open to them.

God has invited us to the feast and into full participation in his kingdom. Are we in, or are we out? The oil in those lamps is something like the Holy Spirit within us. Our light shines and our lamp is lit when we take the time to nurture our relationship with God. We do this through spending time in prayer, through spending time with the Scriptures, through worship and Christian fellowship, through receiving Word and Sacrament. This is how we grow in our faith and in our knowledge of God through Jesus Christ. This is how we prepare ourselves to recognize God at work in our lives and in the world. This is how we learn to pay attention to what God is calling us to do.

I was reminded this week of the Canadian Lutheran Youth Gathering that was held in Saskatoon in 1986. At this gathering there was a carnival that illustrated beautifully how easy it is for us to forget about God and totally miss what God is doing. The carnival included things like Bingo, tricycle races, Dungeons & Dragons, and various other carnival-type games. While all of this was going on, the entire passion narrative was played out, including Jesus’ arrest, trial and crucifixion. The vast majority of the participants didn’t even notice what was happening.

Afterwards, when we talked about what had happened, all illusions were shattered that we would have done something to stop it when Jesus was crucified. Most of us had been too occupied with meaningless games even to notice what was going on, and even those who tried to intervene were intimidated and carried off to the carnival “jail.” A holy moment was happening right there, and we didn’t recognize it.

The carnival, of course, was a set-up, but its message is not any less real. Do we recognize God when he shows up in our lives and in our world, or are we too occupied with things that will not matter in the end? Are we spiritually “plugged in,” ready to recognize God’s leading and to respond at the right time? Do we know God well enough through Jesus Christ in order to recognize God at work?

God has invited us to the feast through our Lord Jesus Christ. We are asked, not only to be present, but to be active participants in the kingdom of God. Let us, then, continue to nurture the Holy Spirit within us, ready to recognize God wherever he appears and to answer God’s call to active service. Amen.

Lectionary 32(A)      Matthew 25:1-13
November 9, 2008
St. Luke’s Zion Lutheran Church
Pastor Lynne Hutchison

© 2008 Lynne Hutchison  All Rights Reserved