You know neither the Day nor the Hour

A sermon for the twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost, November 12, 2023

Trinity Episcopal Church of Morrisania, Bronx, NY

Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

Today’s Gospel is one of Jesus’ parables. One important thing to remember about parables is that they are not allegories, they are stories. An allegory has the form of a story, but each element of it refers to a particular thing outside the story—in other words that there is sort of a code and if you figure it out, you know who the bridegroom is, or who the wise bridesmaids are, what the lamps represent, and so forth. That kind of interpretation of Jesus’ stories can end up being misleading. Jesus’ parables are stories that deserve to be heard as they are without presuming any key to interpreting them.

The story starts, “Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.” In the ancient world, in ancient Palestine, a wedding was the biggest event that most people ever attended. The Yankees weren’t winning the World Series with the big after-party or ticker-tape parade. The coronations of the Roman emperors or their triumphal entries after winning wars took place way across the sea in a city that was, for the most part, known only by legend and imagination. And, truth be told, only a very few of the ordinary rural folk ever really made it to Jerusalem for the observance of Passover or any other major festival. In a local village, a wedding was huge. It involved virtually everyone. It was the best news and the most hopeful thing that anyone ever had in those places and at those times. I venture that this was the case, perhaps especially, in the less lavish weddings of humble people with few resources for throwing a huge party. Being a bridesmaid was a huge and important honor. And these ten young ladies are there to welcome the star of the show, make ready, and get the festivities started. (I realize that nowadays the bride is, rightly, the star of the show and indeed the bride’s role may have been equally important back then, but this story centers around the bridegroom.)

So this is a big deal, and welcoming the bridegroom is a big deal. You have ten bridesmaids, and in among all the bustle of getting dressed up right and being ready, five of them thought, well maybe we should have some extra oil with us for our lamps in case things get delayed. Apparently the other five said, oh, there’s a big hurry and he’s supposed to be here in half an hour, this lamp will do, help me fix my hair.

Sometimes we expect things to happen on a schedule that doesn’t quite work out, for whatever reason. About 25 years ago or so, when I was working at Union Theological Seminary, one of our doctoral students was the pastor of a church in the northern part of the Bronx, I forget which neighborhood. And she got married, a wonderful woman to a wonderful guy, and the wedding was at the church where she was the pastor. The wedding was scheduled for 2 pm and the church was packed by ten minutes before. I was sitting on a window ledge with my kids. And the word filtered out a while later that there was a little delay with the bride’s arrival. And hymns were sung and love was shared. And more hymns were sung. At 4:15 we got word that the bride was soon to arrive. The wedding took place and we all rejoiced, though the bride was two and a half hours late to her own wedding at her own church.

So, it’s not such an inconceivable thing that a bridegroom might be delayed, in the real world as a well as in story. And as little control as I had over my friend and doctoral student, how much less control do we have over God and God’s timelines, especially when the expectations we have of God don’t come from an engraved wedding invitation but from our own imagination and interpretation of ambiguous signs?

So the story of the bridesmaids continues. And remember this is a story, not an allegory, and there is nothing in here saying that any of this is rules or judgments by God or Jesus or anything. We have the wise bridesmaids and the thoughtless bridesmaids. And the thoughtless ones are the ones who said, yeahyeahyeah, oil, let’s take care of what I’m interested in first. And we reach the critical point in the story, and these thoughtless girls suddenly realize they need more oil and they turn to their friends: “Oh poor me, give me some oil.” What do you think the thoughtful girls are going to say? Of course they are going to say—“uh uh. No way. Go get your own oil.” What were these foolish bridesmaids thinking? Oh yeah, they were foolish, they weren’t thinking.

The kingdom of God is here and is coming, we do not know the hour when we need to be ready. At every hour we need to be thoughtful, ready to celebrate with the joyful and ready to mourn with those who mourn. This living business, especially abundant and joyful living, is not about us, it is about reaching out and respecting others, realizing the possibilities of loving for God’s sake in our lives. We might get frustrated, when the things we hope for don’t happen on our schedule, or when the things that happen are not what we wanted at all. But God has great things for us, we just make sure that we remember to keep a supply of oil for our lamps at hand.

As Mary, the one truly wise virgin says in our canticle:

The Lord has mercy on those who fear him in every generation.

He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel, for he has remembered his promise of mercy

Song of Mary, Book of Common Prayer, p. 91

Salt of the Earth

A sermon for the fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, February 5, 2023

Trinity Episcopal Church of Morrisania, Bronx, New York

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.”

Last week’s sermon noted that Jesus’ entire life and teaching was commentary on the Old Testament. It was not just in our own day that people thought that Jesus was teaching something different from the scriptures of Israel. Some people liked Jesus for bringing what they thought of as novelty and new fashions, while other people hated him for upsetting the ways they thought the rules supported their habitual ways of life—and often made it easy for one group to lord it over other groups and prosper at their expense.

But Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is not a set of rules designed to put a new group in power. Jesus calls us to account for how we live in the world in which we find ourselves.

 “You are the salt of the earth.”  I have always had difficulty understanding what this means. I won’t say that I’ve figured it out and it’s now crystal clear, but here is something I’ve discovered. Both times that Jesus says this in the Gospels it is followed by the phrase which our translation renders, “but if salt has lost its taste.”  The translators do their best, but they’re struggling with an idiom that doesn’t fit in our language. But the word that’s translated, “lost its taste” actually means “becomes foolish.”

So, what would it mean if Jesus stood up and said, “You are salt, but if the salt has become foolish, it’s no longer good for anything?” It’s a jarring figure of speech—we have to focus on it if we want to figure it out.  One commentator observed that “salt is to food, as wisdom is to life.” A foolish chef who didn’t use seasonings would have tasteless food. And salt is necessary to life; even people on a restricted salt diet have to take in salt through the food they eat because without salt, we die. Likewise, without wisdom, the life of people or a society becomes selfish, inconsiderate, unstable—even when the rules that society has come up with are basically okay.  Applying rules without wisdom yields a society with defective human bonds and imbalances that causes it to fall apart.

Jesus says, “if the salt has become foolish, how can its wisdom be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled underfoot.”  What Jesus is doing is not dismantling rules or traditions—he is bringing the blessing of the life of God to this world.

And living a life of wisdom doesn’t happen just because society lives by the rules. Today is the first Sunday of Black History Month, and next Saturday the Diocese of New York will celebrate the life of Absalom Jones at the Cathedral. Absalom Jones was born enslaved in 1746. He was moved to Philadelphia where he learned to read and was married. Eventually he was able to attain freedom, first for his wife, and then for himself. He was a leader and teacher in the church and the African American community. He was eloquent in preaching the Gospel and in the struggle for the abolition of slavery. He lived his life as a pastor and advocate, and his church, St. Thomas African Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, continues his work two centuries after his death. But Absalom Jones didn’t live to see the abolition of slavery in the United States. He certainly didn’t live to see the end of racism and the ill treatment of black people in this country. Indeed, the treatment he and his congregation received from the Episcopal Church was typical of that ill treatment—not being allowed participation in the convention of the diocese, as an example. Absalom Jones’ career wasn’t a procession of triumphs—it didn’t look like success to everybody. But he was the salt of wisdom, the persistence of God’s compassion in the midst of this sinful world.

So if we spend our lives seeking to be compassionate, or honest, merciful or courageous—the things we learn in following Jesus—then our wisdom will grow. We see the fruits of decisions and learn better how to shape what we do for best results. When Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth,” he is honoring the wisdom that is in each of us.

At the same time, we need to be humble about our wisdom: it’s just a little seasoning. No one is wise enough to control the whole planet. No one’s power does more than influence the flavor of life a bit. But if we abandon the way of God’s compassion, and our salt becomes foolish, all of our purported wisdom is nothing—just trodden underfoot.

“You are the light of the world,” is a parallel illustration. Jesus is encouraging us—that is, urging us to have courage. Our life in his love is nothing to be ashamed of or hidden, our wisdom is to be shared. “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” It’s not that we gain heaven by our good works—what Jesus is saying is that the fruits of our wisdom glorify God. Scripture is the repository of wisdom over countless generations. And when our traditions and practices are faithful to the love of God in Christ they convey the distilled wisdom of the saints of the church throughout the ages. Yet the “law and the prophets” and the “teaching of the church” are not legal formulas to be used to defeat your opponents and reward your cronies—they are wisdom to be seasoned by the salt of yourselves—not the foolish salt, but the flavorful salt of your knowledge of God’s compassion.

As St. Paul says in our epistle today:

“We do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak of God’s wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heard conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him”—these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.”

1 Corinthians 2:6-10

The teaching of Jesus which we are exploring in the Sermon on the Mount fulfills the law and the prophets, revealing the Spirit by guiding us to understand God’s will in the wisdom, mercy and compassion of God.

Lay aside Immaturity, and Live

Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Lay aside immaturity, and live, and walk by the way of insight.

A sermon for the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost, August 15, 2021

Trinity Episcopal Church of Morrisania, Bronx, New York

Over the past few weeks the gospel lesson has been from the sixth chapter of John, where Jesus talks about being the Bread of Life. Our scriptures tell us that partaking of the Bread of Life is to live in him, the one who is Wisdom incarnate. Jesus lived for us, and he lived so truly that he was the target of all the evil of his time, indeed of all the evil of all time. Because of that he died for us, and God raised him from the dead that we might live.

But what does it mean when scripture says to live in him? We can learn about what this means from today’s lesson from Proverbs and Ephesians.

Our lessons today both talk about Wisdom. What they’re referring to is the Wisdom of God—also called Logos, which means The Word, which is Christ. “Wisdom has built herself a house,” our lesson from Proverbs says. A great banquet is prepared. For whom? For those who are “simple” that is, immature, not wise or good at making the best choices or doing the best things. In other words, pretty much all of us.

And it goes on to say that we should eat of the bread and drink of the wine at this banquet. And then we should “lay aside immaturity and live.”

Our epistle lesson sounds the same note: “Be careful then, how you live—not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time—because the days are evil.” We don’t need to go back to Jesus’ time to see how true this is: we can see it today, all around us, with people choosing foolishness rather than wisdom.  Look around us: All sorts of fools are refusing to get vaccinated because they think that asserting their, so-called individual rights will get them somewhere better than taking the wise course to maintain their own health as well as to protect their families and their communities. It’s folly! And take note: this folly is pure selfishness, and the bad results are easily predicted. Paul mentions in Ephesians drunkenness, which also has predictably bad results, and I’m thinking the apostle would say the same thing today about how people and some of their elected officials are reacting to a public health emergency like the pandemic.

The immature look only for immediate gratification with no thought for consequences. Then there are also those that are planning and plotting, but it’s only for themselves; they could care less what happens to others. So much of what I see today in the political realm, especially in these bogus controversies advanced by vaccine refusers, is just that sort of immaturity. And make no mistake about it: This serves their interest of holding on to their privileges and capitalizing on other people’s fear and ignorance to get even more power, while neglecting, or even despising what’s good for others. I won’t cite examples—it is very widespread. It is widespread and it is also not the case that people are often pure examples of immaturity and greed or of generosity and maturity. We can find examples of generosity and care for others, examples we would all do well to follow instead of becoming more addicted to wealth, greed, and increasing immaturity.

Our scriptures today invite us to the feast of Christian maturity, of the joyous life of sharing and growing in wisdom. “Come and eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.” Living as a wise and mature person is not about being sour, rigid or negative, it is a celebration of living. But it is a celebration of living that is broader than self, it is the life of the whole community, of everyone, not just our closest allies or people who can be manipulated to make our own lives more pleasant. Wisdom is a banquet to be enjoyed, to be enjoyed by everyone. “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up.” Eternal life, not limited by our fears or our addictions. Eternal life in that we can give it away and still be alive and refreshed.

At Trinity we do give. Our mission is to give and live for the sake of others, particularly here in this neighborhood where many have a lot of need. The thrift store, the meals, the back-to-school day, the simple acts of being there for and praying with our neighbors are all part of the shape of generosity that, is a growing welcome, a growth in wisdom, where we all are living together and partaking of the Bread of Life. If we’re not growing in wisdom together, we sometimes may fall into the trap of smugness or condescension. But sharing of our substance and welcoming our neighbors is part of the process of growing in wisdom. We join in that banquet. We are invited in, as it says in our lesson today from Proverbs:

Wisdom has built her house, she has hewn her seven pillars.

She has slaughtered her animals, she has mixed her wine, she has also set her table.

She has sent out her servant-girls, she calls from the highest places in the town,

‘You that are simple, turn in here!’

To those without sense she says,

‘Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.

Lay aside immaturity, and live.

Proverbs 9:1-6

The Salt of Wisdom

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.”

Last week I said that Jesus’ entire life and teaching was commentary on the Old Testament. It was not just in our own day that people thought that Jesus was teaching something different from the scriptures of Israel. Some people liked Jesus for bringing what they thought of as novelty and new fashions, while other people hated him for upsetting the ways in which their understanding of the rules supported their habitual ways of life—and even made it easy for them to lord it over others and prosper at their expense.

Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is not an innovative set of rules designed to put a new group in power. Jesus calls us to account for how we live in the world in which we find ourselves.

“You are the salt of the earth.”  I have always had difficulty understanding what this means. I won’t say that I’ve figured it out and it’s now crystal clear, but here is something I’ve discovered. Both times that Jesus says this in the Gospels it is followed by the phrase which our translation renders, “but if salt has lost its taste.”  The translators do their best, but they’re struggling with an idiom that doesn’t fit in our language.  But the word that’s translated, “lost its taste” actually means “becomes foolish.”

So what would it mean if Jesus stood up and said, “You are salt, but if the salt has become foolish, it’s no longer good for anything?” It’s a jarring figure of speech, you have to pay attention to it and try to figure it out.  One commentator on this observed that “salt is to food, as wisdom is to life.” A foolish chef who didn’t use seasonings would have tasteless food. And though some people need to be on a restricted salt diet, a diet with no salt whatsoever leads to severe problems with muscle contraction, water balance in the body, and neurological problems. Without salt, you die. Likewise, without wisdom, the life of people or a society becomes selfish, inconsiderate, unstable—even when the rules and structures are fundamentally sound. Approaching rules without wisdom yields a society with defective human bonds and imbalance that causes it to fall apart.

Jesus says, “if the salt has become foolish, how can its wisdom be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled underfoot.”  What Jesus is doing is not dismantling rules or traditions, he is bringing the blessing of the life of God to this world.

Living that life is not automatic. Yesterday, some of us went to the Cathedral for the Diocese of New York’s celebration of Absalom Jones.  He was born enslaved in 1746. He was moved to Philadelphia where he learned to read and was married. Eventually he was able to attain freedom, first for his wife, and then for himself. He was a leader and teacher in the church and the African American community. He was eloquent in preaching the Gospel and in the struggle for the abolition of slavery. He lived his life as a pastor and advocate, and his church, St. Thomas African Episcopal Church in Philadelphia continues his work two centuries after his death. But Absalom Jones didn’t live to see the abolition of slavery in the United States. He certainly didn’t live to see the end of racism and the ill treatment of black people in this country. Indeed, the treatment he and his congregation received by the Episcopal Church was typical of that ill treatment—not being allowed participation in the convention of the diocese, as an example. Absalom Jones’ career wasn’t a procession of triumphs—it didn’t look like success to everybody. But he was the salt of wisdom, the persistence of God’s compassion in the midst of this sinful world.

As time goes by and we get experience, it becomes clearer what things will work and how they will work; what the consequences of anyone’s actions or non-actions might be—sometimes in subtle ways that aren’t so easily explained.  Of course, some people become skilled in stealing people’s money or abusing others—there’s a certain kind of wisdom in old criminals. That’s not the only sort of foolish wisdom that some pursue. But if we spend a life, seeking to be compassionate, or honest, merciful or courageous as we learn in following Jesus, then our wisdom will grow. We see the fruits of decisions and learn better how to shape what we do for best results. When Jesus says, “You are the salt of the earth,” he is honoring the wisdom that is in each of us.

At the same time, we need to be humble about our wisdom: it’s just a little seasoning. No one is wise enough to control the whole planet. No one’s power does more than influence the flavor of life a bit. But if we abandon the way of God’s compassion, and our salt becomes foolish, all of our purported wisdom is nothing—just trodden underfoot.

“You are the light of the world,” is a parallel illustration. Jesus is encouraging us—that is, urging us to courage. Our life in his love is nothing to be ashamed of or hidden, our wisdom is to be shared. “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” It’s not that we gain heaven by our good works—what Jesus is saying is that the fruits of our wisdom glorify God.  Scripture is the repository of wisdom over countless generations. And when our traditions and practices are faithful to the love of God in Christ they convey the distilled wisdom of the saints of the church throughout the ages. Yet the “law and the prophets” and the “teaching of the church” are not legal formulas to bludgeon your opponents and reward your cronies—they are wisdom to be seasoned by the salt of yourselves—not the foolish salt, but the flavorful salt of your knowledge of God’s compassion.

As St. Paul says in our epistle today:

“We do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak of God’s wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heard conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him”—these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.”

The teaching of Jesus which we are exploring in the Sermon on the Mount fulfills the law and the prophets, revealing the Spirit by guiding us to understand God’s will in the wisdom, mercy and compassion of God.

The Fool has said in his heart

A sermon for the 10th Sunday after Pentecost, July 29, 2018

Calvary Episcopal Church, Flemington, New Jersey

The fool has said in his heart, “there is no God.”

Usually when people hear this line from Psalm 14, they think that it is about whether someone thinks God exists or not. That somehow it’s a question of philosophy and that the resolution of the argument over the fact of God’s existence will resolve all the other problems. But that’s not what this psalm is about at all. The existence of YHWH, the God of Israel, was for Israel an unquestioned fact. There was no intellectual argument about that—God was the definition of the community of Israel. Without God they had no identity or existence.

If we look at the next line, we can get an idea of what is going on: “All are corrupt and commit abominable acts; there is none that does any good.”

The psalmist is referring to fools who behave as if the living God does not exist; as if the bonds of the love of God binding the community together don’t exist or matter at all.  The fool forgets about God.

Our Old Testament Lesson today is the famous story of David and Bathsheba and Uriah the Hittite. David was a great leader, a great warrior who was anointed as king, seized the kingdom from Saul and consolidated the twelve tribes of Israel into one effective kingdom. He is remembered not only as a great warrior, but also for his beauty, his ability as a singer, and he is credited by tradition as the author of the Psalms. The story takes place in the spring, and the text reminds us that that is the traditional time for kings to go out and fight their wars. Why have wars at all? Why not use the spring to plant crops and take the flocks to fresh green pastures? Well that would be one alternative, wouldn’t it? But with ancient military technology and logistics, you couldn’t successfully send armies into the field in the winter. The environment would do in your army without any input from the enemy. We hear the same about combat in Afghanistan to this day. What I actually find a little puzzling is why the warrior king sent someone else to lead his army in this war. Somehow, this time was different, or perhaps he was different now.

So, Joab was leading the army out in the field, and David was lounging in his cedar house in Jerusalem. David gets up and goes up to the roof to look around in the late afternoon. He sees a woman bathing, a beautiful woman, Bathsheba, the wife of one of his officers, Uriah the Hittite, who was away at the war. He sends for her and has sex with her and the next thing you know, she’s pregnant. To cover up his affair, David has Uriah recalled from the battlefield and encourages him to go home to his wife.

But Uriah won’t go home, he stays at the king’s palace, because as far as he’s concerned, he’s still on duty.  Uriah’s mission was to support his colleagues who were in harm’s way in the conflict with the Ammonites—he wasn’t going to take time off while that was going on.

That puts David in a bind. If Uriah would not spend time with his beautiful wife, the illicit nature of the pregnancy would be obvious and David’s adultery would be revealed.

Let’s think about this for a moment. David was a man of great power and wealth. He had important responsibilities. Most regarded him as courageous. Yet at this point he abandoned his responsibilities to his people, responsibilities entrusted to him by God, responsibilities that extended far beyond himself. If you look at the whole of the story told in the books of Samuel, David was not the passive recipient of these responsibilities, he sought them out, even fought for them. The responsibility and stewardship of his country’s well-being was something he freely accepted. And now, he acted corruptly, simply to satisfy his own desires he coerced a woman, the wife of another man, to have sex with him and then corruptly sought to cover up the consequences of that choice. This harmed both Bathsheba and Uriah at the outset.  The thing is, corruption doesn’t just stop, there’s no easy reset button. When David’s quick cover-up didn’t work, he tried something more desperate. In order to make Bathsheba a widow, he manipulated his country’s military, he arranged for the troops to do something contrary to any battle plan, or indeed their own safety. He ordered them to put forward a hot attack and then to abandon Uriah the Hittite to be slaughtered. David caused his army to lose one of its best officers to cover up his own lustful indiscretion. David had gone down the steps of selfishness, greed, deceit and corruption and betrayed his army and indeed his country. As this happened, it became for David, as if his commitments to God did not exist, as if God was not real for him.

“The fool has said in his heart, there is no God. All are corrupt and commit abominable acts; there is none who does any good.”

This story is too long for just one Sunday lesson, so it continues next week. I won’t say now what consequences are in store for David. But David was a fool as the psalm explains.

It’s not necessary to be a fool, though many in the world would like you to think it is when they blame others for their own corruption. The opposite of being foolish is being wise. We know wisdom in Jesus. Here’s just one sample from today’s lesson from the Gospel of John: There’s a huge crowd and Jesus talks with his disciples about how to get them fed. Philip observes that they have nothing like the finances to take care of the problem. Jesus just waits—and Andrew looks around for the resources they do have. There was a young person who had a decent sized lunch: five loaves and two fish. The young person contributed what he had, and from that Jesus fed the five thousand people with leftovers to spare. Jesus intentionally did not do this alone, he started with the imagination, resources and generosity of the community. God’s wisdom is in the generosity of God’s people, one with another, their welcome and support of one another, not in the selfishness of a wealthy, powerful and corrupt fool.

Jesus withdrew when they wanted him to be their king, but when the disciples were in trouble out on the lake, he came back to them and said, “It is I, do not be afraid.”

Let us pray.

O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon us your mercy: that, with you as your ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we lose not the things eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

 

“When the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them…”

A sermon at Trinity Church of Morrisania, Bronx, NY  – November 9, 2014

Today’s Gospel is one of Jesus’ parables. One important thing to remember about parables is that they are not allegories, they are stories. An allegory has the form of a story, but each element of it refers to a particular thing outside the story—in other words that there is sort of a code and if you figure it out, you know who the bridegroom is, or who the wise bridesmaids are, what the lamps represent, and so forth. That kind of interpretation of Jesus’ stories can end up being misleading. Jesus’ parables are stories that deserve to be heard as they are without presuming any key to interpreting them.
The story starts, “Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.” In the ancient world, in ancient Palestine, a wedding was the biggest event that most people ever attended. The Yankees weren’t winning the World Series with the big after-party or ticker-tape parade. The coronations of the Roman emperors or their triumphal entries after winning wars took place way across the sea in a city that was, for the most part, known only by legend and imagination. And, truth be told, only a very few of the ordinary rural folk ever really made it to Jerusalem for the observance of Passover or any other major festival. In a local village, a wedding was huge. It involved virtually everyone. It was the best news and the most hopeful thing that anyone ever had in those places and at those times. I venture that this was the case, perhaps especially, in the less lavish weddings of humble people with few resources for throwing a huge party. Being a bridesmaid was a huge and important honor. And these ten young ladies are there to welcome the star of the show, make ready, and get the festivities started. (I realize that nowadays the bride is, rightly, the star of the show and indeed the bride’s role may have been equally important back then, but this story centers around the bridegroom.)

So this is a big deal, and welcoming the bridegroom is a big deal. So you have ten bridesmaids, and in among all the bustle of getting dressed up right and being ready, five of them thought, well maybe we should have some extra oil with us for our lamps in case things get delayed. Apparently the other five said, oh, there’s a big hurry and he’s supposed to be here in half an hour, this lamp will do, help me fix my hair.
Sometimes we expect things to happen on a schedule that doesn’t quite work out, for whatever reason. Fifteen or twenty years ago, when I was working at Union Theological Seminary, one of our doctoral students was the pastor of a church in the northern part of the Bronx, I forget which neighborhood. And she got married, a wonderful woman to a wonderful guy, and the wedding was at the church where she was the pastor. The wedding was scheduled for 2 pm and the church was packed by ten minutes before. I was sitting on a window ledge with my kids. And the word filtered out a while later that there was a little delay with the bride’s arrival. And hymns were sung and love was shared. And more hymns were sung. At 4:15 we got word that the bride was soon to arrive. The wedding took place and we all rejoiced, though the bride was two and a half hours late to her own wedding at her own church.

So, it’s not such an inconceivable thing that a bridegroom might be delayed, in the real world as a well as in story. And as little control as I had over my friend and doctoral student, how much less control do we have over God and God’s timelines, especially when the expectations we have of God don’t come from an engraved wedding invitation but from our own imagination and interpretation of ambiguous signs?
So the story of the bridesmaids continues. And remember this is a story, not an allegory, and there is nothing in here saying that any of this is rules or judgments by God or Jesus or anything. We have the wise bridesmaids and the thoughtless bridesmaids. And the thoughtless ones are the ones who said, yeahyeahyeah, oil, let’s take care of what I’m interested in first. And we reach the critical point in the story, and these thoughtless girls suddenly realize they need more oil and they turn to their friends: “Oh poor me, give me some oil.” What do you think the thoughtful girls are going to say? Of course they are going to say—“uh uh. No way. Go get your own oil.” What were these foolish bridesmaids thinking? Oh yeah, they were foolish, they weren’t thinking.
The kingdom of God is here and is coming, we do not know the hour when we need to be ready. At every hour we need to be thoughtful, ready to celebrate with the joyful and ready to mourn with those who mourn. This living business, especially abundant and joyful living, is not about us, it is about reaching out and respecting others, realizing the possibilities of loving for God’s sake in our lives. We might get frustrated, when the things we hope for don’t happen on our schedule, or when the things that happen are not what we wanted at all. But God has great things for us, we just make sure that we remember to keep a supply of oil for our lamps at hand.