Sermon: St. Martin Chemnitz, Nov 9, 2022 - Wittenberg Academy Matins

November 9, 2022 – St. Martin Chemnitz

Text: Matt 25:1-13

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

When our Lord wants to teach us about the kingdom, he doesn’t lay out a series of theses for debate, the way our great saints and theologians, like Martin Chemnitz did.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that!  But our Lord teaches by means of narrative, and does so in a way that leaves us with no logical twists and turns, no room for escape, no way to impose our own laws and rules, whether of the made-up kind of the Pharisees, or of the logical ways that we would run the kingdom if we were God.

Dear friends, please pay heed to the parable of our Lord.  For it involves your salvation, your eternal destiny in paradise, or in suffering.  The ten young women are attending a wedding, and they are waiting for their ride to the wedding hall, where there is feasting and joy.  Five of the girls have their things in order, as they are wise.  Five are in a state of disarray, as they are foolish.  In their waiting, they fall asleep.

When the bridegroom is near, they are awakened.  The time is short.  The foolish girls are unprepared.  They are out of lamp oil for the journey.  They ask to borrow some from their wise sisters.  But there is not enough.  The only solution is to go to the dealers and buy the oil that they should have already had.  While they are gone, the bridegroom comes.  He will not wait for the foolish virgins to return.  He leaves with the virgins who are prepared.  The fate of the foolish, who arrived at the wedding hall after the door has been closed, is terrifying.  “I do not know you,” says the bridegroom.  And the bridegroom, dear friends, is Jesus.

“Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” 

We are tempted to focus and fixate on the foolishness of this world: things that are transitory and just unimportant.  Our gaze is turned inward on ourselves, on our desire to do what we want to do, to slumber, to join in the world’s revelry rather than keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, “the author and perfecter of our faith” (Heb 12:2).  And in so doing, dear friends, we put our salvation in peril.  This parable is a warning.  But it is also a gracious invitation!  For the invitation to the feast is not earned.  It is given by grace.  And if we believe the invitation, we will be watchful and mindful, vigilant, and ready! 

For the Bridegroom is Jesus, our Savior, our Redeemer, our Master, and our God in the flesh who endured this fallen world so that we might enjoy the eternal feast in paradise!  “Watch, therefore.”  It is an invitation to watch with joyful expectation of a feast that will never end! 

The Bridegroom comes, awake!
Your lamps with gladness take! 
Alleluia!
With bridal care
Yourselves prepare
To meet the Bridegroom, who is near.

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.