Advent 1: The Banquet Door – Pastor David Tsai

Matthew 25:1-13
 
Paul encourages the Thessalonian believers to abide in hope because Christ has risen from the dead – the “firstfruits” (as I Corinthians 15:20 says) of the great deliverance someday coming for the rest of us.
Today’s passage is also about that final deliverance, but from a different angle: it is less about God’s grace and more about our responsibility. This parable is one of a whole group of parables, all told in response to a question from the disciples (see Matthew 24:3) about what the “end of the age” would be like. Many of the terms Jesus used and the stories He told are familiar to us if we’ve spent any time around apocalyptic preaching or literature about the end times: wars and rumors of wars, persecution, suffering, watchfulness, and even an angel with a trumpet.
Jesus threads a common theme through these parables: the need to be ready. No one knows when the Son of Man will appear, when the end will come. This parable is perhaps the crowning example of that.
The bridesmaids Jesus talked about were waiting for the arrival of the bridegroom so that the wedding banquet could begin, much as we do today, lingering at wedding receptions. While the happy couple takes photos, we nibble on a few pretzels and talk to friends, eager for the moment when the bride and bridegroom will appear. It was the task of these particular bridesmaids to wait as long as necessary and be as prepared as possible. But in fact, not all of them were prepared. The unprepared ones went out to buy oil for their lamps, and when they came back, they discovered they had missed the party. The door was shut, and they could not get in.
We may question this parable (and people have). We know from elsewhere in the Scriptures that God loves and extends grace to everyone. Why would the unprepared bridesmaids be shut out? C. S. Lewis is helpful here. He states in “The Problem of Pain” that “the gates of hell are locked from the inside.”
That is, through the choices we make every day as we move along our path of discipleship in this life. We are either growing closer to Jesus or further away; we are making ourselves more into or less into the kind of people who actually want to attend the Wedding Supper of the Lamb. In church tradition, we call this process “sanctification,” but the term matters less than grasping the concept. The work we do, the decisions we make, the people we help, the justice we fight for, the hope we preach, the prayers we offer, all these make us more Christlike. They help us keep our lamps lit, ready for the moment when the bridegroom comes.
 
Reflection
How are you becoming like Christ? Where do you need His help to become more like Him?
 
Prayer
Lord Jesus, thank You that the things we do for your Kingdom in this life are never in vain. Guide us as we seek to grow more like You every day and prepared for that great day of Deliverance.
Amen.