Jesus Does Not Leave Us at the Altar

rethinking the parable of the ten virgins

I’m at the airport now, waiting for my flight home after teaching Friday and Saturday and preaching this morning. I’m still weighing today’s Gospel, the parable of the ten virgins (Mt 25:1-13), which as I said at the beginning of this morning’s sermon was anything but gospel to me when I was young. It was in fact a text of terror, more troubling and threatening even than anything in Joshua or Judges or Kings.

As a child, I was taught—or at least I learned—to be terrified of God. I began to have nightmares about the rapture before I was five years old. I was afraid to take Communion because I feared the Lord might strike me down for secret sins. I was afraid to seek “the baptism of the Holy Ghost” because I reasoned that to sin after having spoken in tongues would mean committing the unpardonable sin. I was afraid to be in the sanctuary alone, especially at night, because I was convinced it was haunted.

In truth, this parable does not mean at all what we took it to mean. Given that Jesus says outright his teachings are hidden from the wise (Mt. 11.25), and given his insistence that our lives are defined by what we do for the poor (Mt 25.31-46), we should’ve known better than to think our reading would hold water.

The enemy’s lie is always everywhere the same: “There will not be enough...” (Mt 25.9a). But the truth is, God supplies all our needs, providing us with everything we need and more. The oil of the Spirit is never in short supply! So, what we need is not to seek out “dealers” (Mt 25.9b) who will peddle the word of God (2 Cor. 2.17), selling us this or that experience or feeling or conviction the “wise” say we must have if we hope to be accepted by God. We need witnesses who announce—with unspeakable joy!—that Christ is here.

Wise and foolish alike are surprised by Christ’s appearing—the wise being much more likely to be fooled (as Paul makes plain to the Corinthians). Remember, neither the sheep nor the goats in Matthew 25 recognize Christ in the hungry, the naked, the stranger. Besides, even if in some sense we are at times “locked out” or “left behind,” he always appears—outside with the outsiders, knocking at the door of our hearts. We may have forgotten him, but he always remembers. We may have been unfaithful, but he remains faithful. He cannot deny us any more than he can deny himself. And unlike the Lord in this parable, Jesus does not send us away but comes to us, especially when we are so lost we cannot find our way to him.

This, then, is what I wish I had known when I was child, what I wish more adults around me had known: Christ is always here. That is why we cannot know the day or the hour. Christ is here, and he is light (1 Jn 1.5)—the light of the world (Jn 9.5), the light that dawned and dawns on those living in darkness (Mt. 4.16), the light the darkness cannot comprehend (Jn 1.5). He is the everlasting flame, the one who keeps our lamps burning (Ps 28.18) and his word alone lights our way to the Father (Ps.119.105). For him, even the night shines like the day (Ps. 139.12). Why, then, would we even need these lamps? We are not merely attendants at this wedding, after all. We’re the bride, not bridesmaids.