God's Glory Church

As we begin this new year, I would like to especially emphasize what the Lord has prepared for you and for me as His church. I believe that this year will be the year when our potential is revealed and the year when everyone responds to God’s call to work in His vineyard. After all, the fields have turned white, and there are few workers.

But the best endeavor always requires preparation on our part. We know from scripture that in order to be invited to go to work in a vineyard, you need to go to the market square and wait for an invitation to work. But it’s not enough to just go out and wait, it’s important, when you are called, to be ready to go and work – this is what today’s parable is about:

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins, who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom.” (Matthew 25:1)

If you read the parable through the eyes of a modern person, it may seem unnatural. But in fact, it describes an incident that could have happened in a Palestinian village at any time, even before recently.

The wedding was a big event. The whole village came out to accompany the newlyweds to their new home, and they walked along the longest road to receive friendly wishes for good from as many people as possible. A Jewish proverb says: “Every person from six to sixty will follow the wedding drum.” The rabbis agreed that a person could even leave the study of the law to take part in the joy of the wedding feast.

The essence of this story lies in a Jewish custom, which is very different from everything that we know. The newlyweds did not go on their honeymoon: they stayed at home and kept an open house for one week. They were treated like a prince and princess and even addressed as such – it was the happiest week of their lives. Their closest friends celebrated this week with them, and the foolish virgins missed not only the wedding ceremony, but also this entire joyful week.

The story of how they missed the entire wedding celebration is completely realistic. The traveler Dr. Alexander Findlay describes what he saw in Palestine: “As we approached the gates of the Galilean city,” he writes, “I saw ten smartly dressed virgins playing some musical instruments and dancing on the road in front of our car. When I asked what they were doing, the interpreter told me that they were keeping the bride company in anticipation of the groom. I asked the interpreter if it was possible to see the wedding itself, but he shook his head and said: “Maybe it will be tonight, or tomorrow evening, or in two weeks, no one ever knows for sure.” Then he began to explain that it is very interesting to visit a middle-class family at a wedding feast, the groom arrives unexpectedly, sometimes in the middle of the night; The groom is coming! “, but it could be at any time, and therefore everyone had to be ready at any time to go out into the street to meet him whenever he wanted to come… It is also important to note that after dark no one could go out into the street without a lighted lamp, and that if the groom arrived, the doors were closed behind him, latecomers were no longer allowed to enter.” This is the whole drama of Jesus’ parable, repeated in the twentieth century. This is not a made-up story, but a piece of life in a Palestinian village.

Like many of Jesus’ parables, this one has both local and universal significance.

Its specific meaning exposes the Jews. They were God’s chosen people; their whole history was to be a preparation for the coming of the Son of God; they should have been ready when He came, but instead they were completely unprepared and left behind. Here the tragic unpreparedness of the Jews is presented in dramatic form.

But the parable contains at least two universal truths.

1. She warns us that some things cannot be obtained or can be done at the last minute. It is too late to start preparing for the exam when the exam day has already arrived. It is too late for a person to begin to acquire skill or skill when he has already been offered a task. You can also be busy with different things for so long that you no longer have time to prepare for a meeting with God.

2. She warns us that there are some things that cannot be borrowed from others. The foolish virgins were unable to borrow oil when they urgently needed it. A person cannot borrow a relationship with God – he must have this relationship himself. A person cannot borrow character – he must have it himself. We cannot live off the spiritual capital accumulated by others all the time. Some things we must obtain ourselves because they cannot be borrowed from others.

God has given us another year of life and this is an opportunity for us to prepare for His coming and, while preparing ourselves, not to forget about others – all those who have not yet responded to God’s call to enter His kingdom and work in His vineyard. Let us not be unreasonable, but, realizing the proximity of the coming of the Bridegroom, let us make even more efforts not to oversleep, to be ready to meet Him ourselves and to prepare others!

The article uses an excerpt from Barclay’s commentary on the 25th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew