Ready For The Wedding? - Matthew 25:1-13
It
is the season. How many of you have
attended or been invited to a wedding over the course of the last month, or
have one in the new few weeks. Over the
last three weekends, I have known five couples that decided to tie the
knot. It is not simply a recent
trend. More than half of the weddings I
have performed in the last eighteen years have taken place in the months of May
and June. If you look at the anniversary
celebrations in the newsletter, this congregation celebrates twice as many
marriages in June than any other month.
I began wondering if there was a reason for the popularity of May and
June weddings. I thought maybe it had to
do with their being the months with the least chance of unsettled weather, then
I realized that I was thinking regionally, I mean, it was only a couple of
weeks ago that Colorado was still dealing with a snowstorm, and we’ve had
weekends full of unsettled weather recently.
That regional thinking also had me considering it was because all the
flowers, particularly roses, would be in full bloom, but again, that is
regional, not national or worldwide thinking.
I
decided to do a little research. The
three most common reasons I found online were:
1) June gained its popularity because it took its
name from the Roman goddess Juno, who was known as the goddess of
marriage—getting married in June was a tribute to her and a means of seeking
her blessing upon the nuptials.
2) Getting
married in May and June is connected to an agrarian lifestyle. If a couple were to wed in May or June, and
immediately conceive, the mom-to-be would not be too far along in her pregnancy
to be unable to help come harvest time.
The child would be born and the wife recovered, barring another pregnancy,
in time to be ready and strong for the next harvest.
3) Finally,
several sources cited, possibly the most romantic of the reasons, in May and
June, the bride would be the “freshest.”
With the arrival of May, Lent and come and gone, Easter was past, warmer
weather (again a Northern Hemisphere thing), was here, the winter clothes could
be put away, and it was time, you’re going to love this, for a person’s annual
bath.
How
many of you here were married in May or June?
Which of these applied to your reason for choosing May or June? Did you simply choose the time because it was
“traditional”? If so, now you know what
lies behind the tradition.
Whether
you or someone you know was married in May, June, or any of the other ten
months, you know that timing is important.
Whether it is the timing of planning out vacation time for the wedding
or the honeymoon (I actually had to work the morning of day Anita and I married
so that I could have the following weekend off), to the purchase of the
marriage license (it has to be purchased before the wedding, and is only valid
for 60 days from the date of purchase), to the timing (at least in weddings
where folks are particular about this sort of thing, and I’ve officiated some
of them), of the entrance of the grandmothers, mothers, and then the bride
herself.
If
the timing gets off, it can cause problems.
I remember the first wedding I officiated back when I was a student
pastor in Oxford. Everything and
everyone was in place. I had prayed with
the bride and groom in their respective waiting areas. The music was playing. Everyone was in place. The groom and I took our spots in the front
of the sanctuary. The bridal march
began. I prepared to raise the
congregation. The groom turned in
anticipation of seeing his bride for the first time that day. The doors remained closed. The music continued. The doors remained closed. The groom looked at me, tears forming in his
eyes. The doors remained closed. Suddenly the doors opened, and in walked the
bride. None of us had taken into account
the delay that would occur when, because of the logics of that particular
building, the bride would have to wait until after the groom and I entered the
sanctuary to come out, then walk from the educational wing of the building, the
entire length of the sanctuary, get her dress and train and everything in
place, and then open the doors to come in.
That delay in timing though made so many folks, especially the groom,
very uneasy.
Imagine
yourself one of the ten bridesmaids in the parable that Jesus told. The ten bridesmaids all had their lamps. They had known that at some point they would
need the lamps—possibly to see their way home from the wedding banquet. However, the bridegroom was delayed in his arrival. The timing was thrown off. Darkness came, they had to light their lamps
while they waited. The bridegroom didn’t
show up until midnight. Five of the
bridesmaids (their dads were probably Boy Scouts—or maybe they were kin to our
favorite “bag lady”) were prepared. They
had extra oil, and they were ready. The
other five were not—they had to go in search of some oil for their dimming
lamps—and by the time they purchased their extra fuel and arrived at the
wedding banquet, the doors had been shut, and they were not allowed to
enter—the bridegroom even denied knowing them.
Timing
is important—if we have been in or attended a wedding, we knew what time it was
supposed to start and we made sure to be there in place and ready. One, of a couple of, reasons that Anita and I
didn’t attend one wedding that we were invited to over the last month is that
while I received an invitation to the wedding via Facebook from the bride, the
daughter of a longtime friend, we were never told what time the wedding was to
take place. Unless you are going to sit
at the church, or other locale, all day, knowing the time and arriving in time
is important.
However,
there is a wedding that we have been invited to, that like the one from a
couple of weeks ago, we don’t know the time of the event. In fact, we do not even know the day of the
event. How are we supposed to get there
on time? The truth of the matter is that
we cannot get there on our own. We are
like the bridesmaids of Jesus’ parable.
We are completely dependent upon the groom to get us to the banquet on
time.
This
is Ascension Sunday. This is the final
Sunday of Easter which marks the departure of the resurrected Jesus from the
gathered disciples. The first chapter of
Acts offers us this depiction:
So when
they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will
restore the kingdom to Israel?” He replied, “It is not for you to know the
times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will
receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my
witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the
earth.” When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a
cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up
toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men
of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been
taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into
heaven.”[i]
We find ourselves living now between the
Ascension of Jesus and that trumpet call when Jesus will return to, as
Revelation depicts, gather up His Bride, the Church, and bring her to the Great
Wedding Banquet. The question is, my
brothers and sisters, will we be ready to be members of the wedding party. That is what the parable of Jesus asks us
this morning. Will we be prepared for
the bridegrooms return?
How
do we prepare for His return? The same
way that any bride prepares for her wedding.
I’m not talking about selecting the location or the caterers. The Groom has taken care of that—it’ll be the
New Jerusalem and His Father is fixing the meal. I’m not talking about picking out the
dress. The Groom has done that—it will
be the white robe washed in His blood.
I’m not talking about sending out the invitations, the Groom has already
done that—though outpouring of His Holy Spirit and the words of everyone from
the Apostles who walked with Him to the evangelists (not televangelists, but
everyone who shares the good news of the gospel) who move among us today. I’m not talking about the something borrowed,
something blue, and all those other things—that’s all superstition and the
Groom has no room for that, in fact giving in to superstitions are the exact
opposite of being prepared. What we have
to do to be prepared for the wedding and its subsequent banquet is to do the
most important thing that every bride must do.
It is to decide if we are prepared to be 100% committed to the Groom. Every bride, who is truly ready to be
married, must decide that she is ready to commit to the groom…that she is ready
to give herself completely over to him.
To
ask if we are ready for the wedding is to ask if we are ready to give ourselves
100% over to the groom. Are we ready to
give ourselves completely over to Christ, to not only accept Him as our Savior,
but to call Him Lord…to give Him complete access to our lives?
We
shouldn’t just say “yes” and think we are ready. That’s why too many of today’s marriages end
in divorce. Are we truly ready? Are we ready to commit our lives completely
to the Groom—to give control of our lives totally to Christ—to let Jesus be
Lord over not just one or two hours on Sunday morning, but to let Him be in
control of our watches and our calendars; to not only let Jesus be in control
of the little bit of our income we put in the collection plate, but to be in
complete control of all our finances; to not only be in control of our church
work, but in charge of all of our labor; to be not only in control of who we
are in worship with, but in charge of all our relationships; to be not only in
control what we eat and drink during Holy Communion or covered-dish lunches,
but to be in charge of everything we put into our bodies. The Groom who has
already given Himself 100% to us for all the world to see on the hilltop called
Calvary wants nothing less from His Bride.
We
don’t know when the wedding day will be here, so we need to be ready.
Are
we ready?
Are
we truly ready?
Are
we 100% ready?
In
the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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