Kenneth L. Nelson - "Ready or Not..." (November 7, 1999)
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| - | The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, | 0:08 |
| as it is recorded in the Gospel according to St. Matthew, | 0:10 | |
| the 25th chapter, listen now for the word of the Lord. | 0:13 | |
| "Then the Kingdom of Heaven will be like this, | 0:19 | |
| "10 bridesmaids took their lamps | 0:23 | |
| "and went to meet the bridegroom. | 0:25 | |
| "Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. | 0:27 | |
| "When the foolish took their lamps, | 0:32 | |
| "they took no oil with them. | 0:33 | |
| "But the wise took flask of oil with their lamps. | 0:36 | |
| "As the bridegroom was delayed, | 0:39 | |
| "all of them became drowsy and slept. | 0:41 | |
| "But at midnight, there was a shout, | 0:44 | |
| "'Look, here is the bridegroom come out to meet him.' | 0:47 | |
| "Then all those bridesmaids got up and trimmed their lamps. | 0:52 | |
| "The foolish said to the wise, | 0:56 | |
| "'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' | 0:59 | |
| "But the wise replied, | 1:03 | |
| "'No, there will not be enough for you and for us. | 1:05 | |
| "'You had better go to the dealers | 1:09 | |
| "'and buy some for yourselves.' | 1:11 | |
| "And while they went to buy it, | 1:13 | |
| "the bridegroom came, and those who were ready | 1:15 | |
| went with him into the wedding banquet, | 1:18 | |
| "and the door was shut. | 1:20 | |
| "Later the other bridesmaids came also saying, | 1:23 | |
| "'Lord, Lord, open to us.' | 1:25 | |
| "But he replied, "Truly I tell you, | 1:30 | |
| "'I do not know you.' | 1:32 | |
| "Keep awake therefore, | 1:35 | |
| "for you know neither the day nor the hour." | 1:37 | |
| This is the word of the Lord. | 1:42 | |
| (congregation responds) | 1:46 | |
| Let us pray, | 1:48 | |
| may the words of my mouth, | 1:58 | |
| and the meditations of our hearts. | 1:59 | |
| O Lord be acceptable in your sight. | 2:00 | |
| For You are our rock and our redeemer, Amen. | 2:03 | |
| Recently, I was interviewed by phone for a local talk show. | 2:11 | |
| The occasion was the apparent crescendo | 2:17 | |
| of the catastrophes in recent months, | 2:19 | |
| hurricanes, floods, earthquakes. | 2:21 | |
| The leading question was, are these the end times? | 2:24 | |
| Are these the final disasters | 2:30 | |
| predicted in the book of Revelation? | 2:32 | |
| Now, being from South Carolina, | 2:35 | |
| there's an expression that I learned as a child | 2:36 | |
| that says, "When you get what you asked for, | 2:39 | |
| "then you ought to sit down, and be satisfied." | 2:42 | |
| Boy with this guy asking for it, for just a fleeting moment, | 2:46 | |
| I thought to myself, "Answer yes, the end is in sight, | 2:51 | |
| "it's going to happen in about an hour. | 2:55 | |
| "And furthermore, I understand that | 2:57 | |
| "it's going to begin at your house." | 3:00 | |
| (congregation laughs) | 3:02 | |
| Now let him chew on that for a moment. | 3:03 | |
| But then I thought Will and the folks | 3:07 | |
| at Duke Chapel will kill me if I say that. | 3:08 | |
| My answer, according to the New Testament writers, | 3:13 | |
| "The end times commenced with the advent of Jesus, | 3:17 | |
| "especially after his death and resurrection." | 3:21 | |
| So we have been in the end times | 3:25 | |
| for nearly 2000 years. | 3:28 | |
| As for the end of the end times, | 3:31 | |
| the Bible gives us no clues for calculating that. | 3:33 | |
| The author of Revelation is more interested | 3:38 | |
| in the how we face the future, in light of a past event, | 3:40 | |
| the Easter victory of the Lamb who was slain. | 3:46 | |
| The interview was enough to remind me | 3:52 | |
| that both Jesus, and his New Testament interpreters | 3:54 | |
| are quite clear, that the times and seasons | 3:57 | |
| of God's future end-time activity is none of our business. | 4:01 | |
| Mark 13:32 should be enough to make that clear, | 4:07 | |
| "But of that day or hour, | 4:10 | |
| "no one knows, neither the angels in heaven nor the Son, | 4:12 | |
| "but the Father alone." | 4:16 | |
| The verse that follows tells us | 4:18 | |
| where our concerns should be focused. | 4:20 | |
| "Be watchful, be alert, | 4:23 | |
| "you do not know when the time will come." | 4:27 | |
| All of which should help us to appreciate | 4:30 | |
| the import of this Sunday's gospel. | 4:33 | |
| Regarding the end, be it our own death | 4:37 | |
| or the end of the world. | 4:40 | |
| The point is not the knowledge of when, | 4:42 | |
| but the wisdom of our readiness. | 4:45 | |
| The Gospel lesson is a warning, a warning to be prepared | 4:48 | |
| for Christ's coming. | 4:52 | |
| The scene is an ordinary wedding celebration, | 4:54 | |
| a time for joy for the whole community. | 4:57 | |
| Everyone is waiting in anticipation, | 5:00 | |
| Ten bridesmaids are ready. They have lamps lit | 5:04 | |
| so that they can lead the way for the bridegroom | 5:07 | |
| as he goes to the wedding feast. | 5:09 | |
| Then the bridegroom is delayed, | 5:12 | |
| the word is that he is still coming, | 5:14 | |
| be patient, just wait, | 5:17 | |
| so the bridesmaids begin to wait. | 5:20 | |
| The hours pass by slowly, and the waiting is hard, | 5:23 | |
| and eventually the bridesmaids fall asleep. | 5:26 | |
| Then suddenly at midnight, | 5:29 | |
| a cry in the street wakes them up. | 5:30 | |
| "'Look, here comes the bridegroom.'" | 5:33 | |
| As the bridesmaids get their lamps, | 5:37 | |
| five of them notice that their lamps are going out, | 5:40 | |
| and that they don't have any extra oil. | 5:43 | |
| They ask the other five bridesmaids, | 5:46 | |
| who brought extra oil for some of the oil | 5:48 | |
| but the answer is no, | 5:51 | |
| so the five foolish bridesmaids go off to find some oil. | 5:54 | |
| Isn't that always the way it is? | 6:00 | |
| The unexpected return, | 6:03 | |
| while they're searching for a shopkeeper, | 6:08 | |
| who will sell them some oil, the bridegroom comes. | 6:10 | |
| And when the five foolish maidens arrive at the feast, | 6:14 | |
| they bang on the door, "'Lord, Lord, open to us.'" | 6:17 | |
| But the bridegroom would not open the door, | 6:23 | |
| he says, "'Truly I tell you, | 6:26 | |
| I do not know you.'" | 6:30 | |
| There is a harshness to this parable | 6:33 | |
| that doesn't sit well with us modern folk. | 6:35 | |
| We wonder why five wise bridesmaids | 6:39 | |
| couldn't share a bit of their oil? | 6:41 | |
| And what did the five foolish bridesmaids do | 6:43 | |
| that was so bad that they were not allowed into the feast? | 6:45 | |
| All of the bridesmaids fell asleep, | 6:49 | |
| no one stayed alert. | 6:52 | |
| The worst fault of the five foolish bridesmaids | 6:54 | |
| is that they didn't plan ahead. | 6:57 | |
| Now, I'm not sure that I'm a person | 7:00 | |
| who can fault them for that, | 7:02 | |
| but then on the other hand, maybe. | 7:04 | |
| This is a parable | 7:08 | |
| about readiness for the final coming of Christ. | 7:09 | |
| Matthew tells us that "Christ's coming will be unexpected, | 7:13 | |
| "like a bridegroom delayed." | 7:17 | |
| Luke says that, "He will come like a thief in the night." | 7:19 | |
| The parable warns us that we must be prepared. | 7:23 | |
| We must be ready for Christ coming into our world | 7:26 | |
| and into our lives. | 7:30 | |
| We prepare for God's presence in that future. | 7:32 | |
| As we wait for God's presence, even in the present. | 7:36 | |
| Being unprepared can lead to disastrous consequences. | 7:42 | |
| What good is the forgotten life jacket | 7:47 | |
| when the boat is sinking? | 7:48 | |
| What good is a spare tire without a jack? | 7:51 | |
| Which student can adequately prepare for an exam | 7:54 | |
| if he or she starts to study on the day of the exam? | 7:57 | |
| Don't answer that, Duke students. | 8:01 | |
| Isn't it true that there will come a time | 8:05 | |
| when the door to the kingdom is closed, | 8:07 | |
| and one is no longer able to enter all of our days, | 8:10 | |
| all of our days are meant to be a season of preparation | 8:16 | |
| for the sharing in the kingdom of God | 8:20 | |
| which Matthew equates to a great wedding banquet. | 8:22 | |
| A Christian's duty is to live one's entire life, | 8:26 | |
| prepared to give an accounting to Christ, | 8:29 | |
| it is both doing and being. | 8:32 | |
| Being prepared doesn't happen at the last second, | 8:35 | |
| it is a way of life. | 8:38 | |
| We prepare for God's presence | 8:42 | |
| in that future as we anticipate and look for signs | 8:44 | |
| of that reality of God's presence even now. | 8:47 | |
| I was intrigued the other day. I was in the library | 8:54 | |
| and noticed that there in Perkins, | 8:57 | |
| there is this display case which asks, | 8:59 | |
| "Are you optimistic about the coming of the millennium? | 9:02 | |
| "Or are you troubled?" | 9:06 | |
| Such madness worries each of us, but let me be clear, | 9:09 | |
| there is nothing at stake for Christians | 9:14 | |
| in this new millennium. | 9:17 | |
| Being a Christian is not following a set of rules | 9:18 | |
| so that someday you get to live forever | 9:21 | |
| in angel-soft eternity. | 9:23 | |
| If you want angel-soft eternity, call Mr. Whipple, | 9:25 | |
| he's back in business these days. | 9:29 | |
| We pray thy kingdom come, | 9:32 | |
| this is about Christ's coming, not our going. | 9:35 | |
| And when Christ does come, there will be joy | 9:40 | |
| and love, and peace and celebration. | 9:44 | |
| God's grace and presence happens | 9:50 | |
| whether or not we are aware of it. | 9:52 | |
| Frederick Buechner borrowing a phrase from Paul Tillich, | 9:54 | |
| tells us, "We only want to show you something we have seen | 9:57 | |
| "and tell you something we have heard | 10:01 | |
| "here and there in the world, | 10:04 | |
| "now and then in ourselves is a new creation." | 10:06 | |
| God speaks to us, | 10:12 | |
| "God calls," Buechner tells us | 10:16 | |
| through the events of our lives, | 10:19 | |
| we see and hear God faintly, | 10:21 | |
| we catch a glimpse of God here and there. | 10:24 | |
| Now and then, | 10:27 | |
| sometimes it is a kind word from a friend, | 10:29 | |
| or coming through a complicated surgery, | 10:32 | |
| or even enduring a failure in our life. | 10:35 | |
| Or maybe it's a word of forgiveness | 10:38 | |
| from someone you care about, very deeply, | 10:40 | |
| whom you have hurt very deeply. | 10:43 | |
| Or it is in the hearing a friend | 10:46 | |
| or a spouse say to us for the 40th time, | 10:48 | |
| Why don't you come to church with me on this Sunday? | 10:52 | |
| These moments of life are transformative | 10:56 | |
| to be aware of these moments | 11:00 | |
| when God comes into our lives here and there | 11:02 | |
| now and then requires preparation, | 11:06 | |
| and readiness on our part. | 11:09 | |
| What was the difference between the five foolish, | 11:12 | |
| and the five wise bridesmaids? | 11:15 | |
| Both fell asleep, | 11:17 | |
| both had lamps, both let their lamps go out. | 11:19 | |
| The only difference | 11:24 | |
| is that five wise bridesmaids | 11:25 | |
| brought along an extra flask of oil. | 11:27 | |
| The five foolish bridesmaids | 11:30 | |
| prepared for the wedding procession only. | 11:32 | |
| But the five wise bridesmaids | 11:35 | |
| prepared not only for the wedding procession, | 11:38 | |
| but also for the time of waiting, the in-between time. | 11:41 | |
| The interpretation of today's Gospel | 11:46 | |
| depends a great deal on what we make of the word wise. | 11:49 | |
| The wise bridesmaids | 11:54 | |
| are ready for the bridegroom when he comes. | 11:55 | |
| The others are not. | 11:58 | |
| The word in Greek means to think, | 12:00 | |
| to set one's heart | 12:03 | |
| to set one's heart, | 12:06 | |
| what a wonderful phrase. | 12:09 | |
| Have you ever set your heart on something? | 12:11 | |
| Buying or building a house, | 12:15 | |
| the birth of a child, | 12:17 | |
| graduation from high school or college, | 12:20 | |
| retirement and the freedom to travel | 12:23 | |
| or the arrival of the end of the semester. | 12:26 | |
| Set our hearts on we say, | 12:30 | |
| the phrase means | 12:32 | |
| that we order our lives around some expected event, | 12:33 | |
| some promise, someone's arrival. | 12:36 | |
| "I had my heart set on it," we say. | 12:40 | |
| a couple wants to build their first house, | 12:43 | |
| they begin looking for the land, making and drawing plans. | 12:45 | |
| They might imagine what each room in their house | 12:50 | |
| will look like, | 12:52 | |
| what the view will be from the master bedroom, | 12:53 | |
| how the dining room will be furnished, | 12:56 | |
| what kinds of plants will be placed around the yard. | 12:59 | |
| And then they start to work and to save, | 13:04 | |
| and all of their life revolves around the fact that one day, | 13:07 | |
| one day they will live in a house, | 13:12 | |
| designed and built for their purpose. | 13:15 | |
| That's what it means to set one's heart on something, | 13:19 | |
| we care so much about a future event | 13:22 | |
| that we order our lives around it. | 13:25 | |
| Now, this parable | 13:28 | |
| calls on the people of God, | 13:31 | |
| to live now as if it were all true. | 13:33 | |
| What is true you ask? | 13:38 | |
| That which we affirm every time | 13:40 | |
| we come to the table of the Lord, | 13:41 | |
| the great mystery of faith, | 13:43 | |
| Christ has died, Christ is risen. | 13:46 | |
| Christ will come again. | 13:50 | |
| That in Christ, our beginning is our end. | 13:54 | |
| And while we may not know what the future holds, | 13:59 | |
| we know who holds the future. | 14:01 | |
| In Christ, all of time and eternity have become one. | 14:05 | |
| To be ready for His coming is to set our hearts | 14:10 | |
| on the good news that in Christ through the Holy Spirit, | 14:12 | |
| God shall finally, and most completely | 14:16 | |
| have what God wants with all of creation. | 14:19 | |
| Even now, even now the kingdom of God comes | 14:23 | |
| and is coming. | 14:28 | |
| The parable reminds us of a game | 14:31 | |
| that we played in childhood, | 14:32 | |
| it was called hide and seek. | 14:34 | |
| You'll remember, a child with closed eyes | 14:37 | |
| counted up to 100 doing, while his playmates hid. | 14:39 | |
| At the end of the count, the seeker would call out, | 14:43 | |
| "ready or not, here I come." | 14:46 | |
| Did you ever really count up to 100? | 14:51 | |
| I mean, if you're really like me, | 14:54 | |
| you never really made it past 10 | 14:55 | |
| curious till to this day | 14:58 | |
| I always hid where I could be found. | 15:00 | |
| Where's the fun in never being found? | 15:03 | |
| The when is not ours to know. | 15:07 | |
| Jesus is saying to us through this parable, however, | 15:10 | |
| that God's kingdom is sure, | 15:13 | |
| and even Bill Gates and all of his Y2K savvy can't stop it. | 15:16 | |
| The best news is yet to come, | 15:23 | |
| we already know the end of the story. | 15:26 | |
| Read the book, God wins. | 15:29 | |
| Final score, God one, | 15:33 | |
| the kingdom of darkness destroyed. | 15:36 | |
| As we come to God's table this day, | 15:41 | |
| we will again get a taste of that victory. | 15:43 | |
| Come to the table of the Lord, | 15:47 | |
| and be nourished with that which will help us to stay awake. | 15:50 | |
| In the breaking of the bread, | 15:54 | |
| and the pouring of the cup, | 15:56 | |
| we will be given a foretaste of the celebration | 15:58 | |
| that is the great wedding banquet, | 16:01 | |
| when at last the bridegroom, | 16:03 | |
| and his church shall most joyously | 16:05 | |
| and fully be one | 16:07 | |
| ready or not, here God comes. | 16:11 | |
| Hear the good news and believe. | 16:17 | |
| Thanks be to God, Amen | 16:23 |
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