Sermon for Proper 27 A
On October the 22nd, 1844, there was a group of people who were expecting something very, very big to happen. They were known as the Millerites, and they believed that they had figured out the exact day of the second coming of Christ.
And so they had prepared themselves in every way conceivable, selling possessions, quitting their jobs, gathering in prayer and waiting for the end of the age to come upon them. And then October the 22nd, 1844, came and went. And October the 23rd dawned like any other day will.
This became known among them as the Great Disappointment. I don’t want to make fun of them too hard, because they were waiting in faith for the fulfillment of all that Christ had promised: for the world to be set right, for every tear and sadness to be wiped away, as it says in the Scripture.
These were people who lived in hope, mistaken though they were about the exact time and date. I think all of us can relate to the Great Disappointment in some way or another. We have experienced disappointments of our own when we’ve been awaiting test results, or when we’ve been faithfully praying through mending a broken relationship that doesn’t work out, or when we’ve been out there doing the hard work of getting an education and looking for a job and it’s not materializing.
Sometimes when we just watch the news and we see this world that is the way it is, rather than the kind and gentle world that Jesus envisions for us, we too can understand disappointment.
And that’s what today’s Gospel brings us into. Jesus tells the story of these ten bridesmaids who have an important job as part of the wedding ceremony: Their job is to carry the light. Back then, if you recall, there were no street lamps or flashlights.
It’s hard to find your way in the dark, so you need people who carry torches, who walk with you and ahead of you to light the way to where the celebration begins. The bridesmaids, in addition helping the couple to celebrate, also serve a practical function in weddings in the ancient world.
On this particular occasion, the bridegroom is late and things are not going according to schedule. All of the bridesmaids fall asleep, which I think is a very interesting detail. No matter how faithful or how wise you are, everybody needs a nap sometime.
In the midst of the waiting, the time stretches on, the light grows dim, and finally, unexpectedly, they hear the shout at midnight that the bridegroom is coming.
The time is at hand. And there’s the five wise bridesmaids who have brought extra oil for their lamps, and the five foolish bridesmaids who did not. And the foolish bridesmaids say to the wise ones, “Give us some of your oil!”
The wise ones say, “No, we can’t. There won’t be enough.”
Jesus tells the story in this way to underscore the seriousness of the commitment that he’s talking about. Symbolically, he is talking about how prepared we are (or not) for the fulfillment of God’s promises in this world. We are still waiting, after 2,000 years.
While the wise bridesmaids were unable to share their oil, there was something else that I think maybe they could have shared: their light. I wonder: what if the foolish bridesmaids had not gone into town to find a late-night oil dealer, what could have happened instead?
If they had stayed with the wise bridesmaids and shared their light, there would not have been the danger of running out of oil. Then everyone would have made it to the celebration on time.
The wise ones couldn’t share their oil, just as we cannot give our personal faith to someone else, but we can share the light that we carry with us.
It makes me think of the pandemic, when we were all locked down, social distancing, and so many things were shut.
My family and I were holed up in our house, like most were. After a while, one of my neighbors had an idea. She said, “Could we gather outside, and social distance, just to be able to see one another’s faces?”
That’s what we ended up doing. On Tuesday night, everyone came over to our backyard. We stayed the six feet apart and ordered pizzas (we socially distanced the pizzas too).
It didn’t make the pandemic go any faster. It didn’t resolve the global crisis we were experiencing, but it helped us to share one another’s lives.
It was a comfort to us. It gave us strength and hope. It was a really sacred time that we had on those Tuesday nights.
There was no church service. It was just pizza and conversation from six feet away. Even in the darkest of times, we were able to share our lives with each other.
We Christians, as people of faith, have an opportunity to share our lives with one another. What that asks of us is that we trim our lamps and keep our oil stocked. That’s an analogy for our spiritual practices and good works. That’s what keeps the light of faith burning within us.
But it’s also true that each of us is only human, so our individual light can’t burn perpetually. Every now and again, the light within us gets a little dim, because we all have tough days.
That’s when we can lean on each other, to borrow some of the light.
We can’t borrow the oil, but we can borrow the light.
If I’m really honest, there’s a little bit of the wise bridesmaid and the foolish bridesmaid in me at all times.
There are some ways in which my oil is fully stocked and my light is burning brightly.
At the same time, there are parts of my life where it’s not burning so brightly, so I need to lean on someone else. I need to ask for help.
That’s okay. Because the good news is that the wedding is not canceled, even though it’s delayed. The celebration is still coming.
If we can do our part to hold on, keep our lamps lit, and ask for help when our lamps grow dim, then we have a better chance of making it through the dark of life’s great disappointments.
This is the gift that God gives us: The gift of each other. The gift of the light that is within us. There are so many ways that we can share gift.
Here in our church, we also have The Book of Common Prayer.
This book is one of the ways that the church is able to carry the light for us when our own hearts grow dim. This collection of prayers and liturgies, some of which are hundreds or even thousands of years old, help us to find the words to pray when we can’t think of the right words.
Some days, I come to church and can pray every single one of those words from the bottom of my heart. Some days, I’m tired and barely making it through. But the words of our liturgy sustain me. It’s a gift that can sustain all of us as well.
The promise holds true: the celebration is still coming. We don’t know how long we have to wait, but we know that the darkness will not have the last word.
So, let’s hold on to the light and hold on to each other.
