Taking your faith seriously

"At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them. The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps. The bridegroom was a long time in coming, and they all became drowsy and fell asleep.

"At midnight the cry rang out: `Here's the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!'

"Then all the virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps. The foolish ones said to the wise, `Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.'

" `No,' they replied, `there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.'

"But while they were on their way to buy the oil, the bridegroom arrived. The virgins who were ready went in with him to the wedding banquet. And the door was shut.

"Later the others also came. `Sir! Sir!' they said. `Open the door for us!'

"But he replied, `I tell you the truth, I don't know you.'

"Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.

When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, everyone knew that it was coming. Yet in spite of this knowledge, some people were still caught unprepared. They were not prepared for the severity of the wind damage or the storm surge; they were not prepared for the breaching of the levees or the prolonged crippling of city services. The people who chose to ride out the storm thought they were prepared—tragically, they found out that they weren’t.

In today’s Gospel lesson, Jesus warns us to be prepared for His return. There will come a day when the Lord will part the heavens and come down to us in blinding glory, surrounded by the angelic armies of heaven. Every man, woman and child, wherever they are living, will be brought before Him; every person who has died will be raised from the grave to join us before the Throne of Judgment.

For the unbeliever, this will be a time of utter terror—the God who they denied will be proven to be the Ruler of the universe, and an eternity of anguish in hell will be His sentence upon them for rejecting Him. But Christians need not fear His judgement—after all, we bear His name as a badge of honor. Christ’s return will be a time of joyful vindication for us—won’t it?

Jesus speaks of ten virgins—ten people who have kept themselves pure. They have not cheated on their Master by partying with other men. In spiritual terms, they are the faithful, those who have never cheated on Jesus by leaving Him for other religions. The ten virgins represent the Christians of the world.

Do all these Christians get into heaven to spend eternity with their Lord? Regrettably, no. Some of them are unprepared when their Master returns and find themselves locked out of paradise. When they plead to be let in, the Lord gives only this chilling answer: I tell you the truth: I don’t know you.

Not everyone who claims to be a Christian will get to enter heaven. In Matthew chapter 7 verses 21-23 Jesus warned: "Not everyone who says to me, `Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, `Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, `I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'

Sobering, isn’t it, to realize that many people who identify themselves as Christians will not be accepted into eternal peace? How do we know who will be found acceptable and who is in danger of being shut out? Are you a 'wise virgin' who is prepared, or are you 'foolish virgin' who is not ready for Christ’s return?

The problem of a 'foolish virgin' is that such a person does not take things seriously enough. Such a person is not terribly concerned about being absolutely sure they are ready for the Master’s return, nor are they particularly worried about the possibility of being excluded from the celebration to follow. To say it more bluntly, the foolish Christian does not devote much thought or energy to living a Christian life, nor does he take seriously the threat of hell.

The foolish Christian does not worry about his faith life. The possibility that he might stand face to face with Jesus for judgment before this day is over doesn’t occur to him. Because he assumes that his meeting with Christ is years in the future, going to church to worship the King is not a high priority—there’ll be plenty of time for that when he’s older. He doesn’t realize that bad habits are hard to shake. He doesn’t consider the likelihood that if he attends church only occasionally now, he may stop coming altogether over the years to come. He doesn’t see how being a stranger in church could one day result in him hearing the words: I don’t know you.

The foolish Christian is comfortable. She managed to squeak through Confirmation, so she obviously knows everything she needs to get into heaven. She is blind to the fact that every year she is forgetting more of what she learned. She is unaware that Satan is filling her mind with lies and half-truths through the TV shows she watches, the magazines she reads, the unbelieving friends she hangs out with. She does not heed the warning in 2nd Peter chapter 3 where we are told: be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. She does not see how important Bible study is to strengthen her faith and to expose Satan’s lies for what they are.

The foolish Christian focuses his attention in the wrong direction. All around him are people who need his help, because when Judgement Day comes they have nothing to look forward to except the despair of hell. But the foolish Christian does not dwell on the welfare of their souls; he does not want to spoil his time with his drinking buddies by bringing up religion. He has so little joy in his heart over being saved by Jesus that he has no passion for the souls of others. In fact, he is so wrapped up in his own joys and sorrows that he scarcely has time to think about loving anyone besides himself. He has forgotten Christ’s command, Love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:39).

The foolish Christian spends her money on the wrong things. Giving money to God for His use is a way of telling Him ‘thank you’, but the foolish Christian rarely thanks God for anything. For her, money is a way to feel good, so the best way to spend it is upon herself. For such a person there is always more to buy than there is money to spend. Owning your own house is good, owning a big house is better. Having a set of wheels is good, having a luxury vehicle is better. Comfortable clothing is good, designer fashions are better. Generic food is okay, name brands are better, and eating out is the best of all. The foolish Christian is so fixated on shopping that she has nothing but spare change to spend on the upkeep of God’s house or the work of His missionaries; she has forgotten that the Lord says: No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money (Matthew 6:24).

Foolish Christians do not take seriously the reality of hell. They know that God threatens to send unrepentant sinners there, but they are fuzzy on what hell is. They don’t understand that hell is the worst place anyone could possibly go; hell is the place that God designed to incarcerate and torture Satan himself. If the leader of the devils will find hell to be unbearable, what must it be like for mere human beings to endure? The Bible describes it as a place of physical pain and spiritual pain. The physical torment is compared both to being severely burned and to rotting with maggots chewing through your body; mentally, hell is described as a place of despair, regret, frustration and tears. Hell has no love or mercy or hope, and its suffering never ends.

Foolish Christians don’t worry about being sent to hell—they believe that they are bound for heaven because of how they are living their lives. They do good things, but they do them for the wrong reasons. They think that they can impress God by how often they go to church, how much money they put in the collection plate, how many charitable organizations they belong to. Certainly God would not send godly people to hell? They forget that Scripture says: God saved you by His grace through faith [in Him]. And you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it (Ephesians 2:8-9). To foolish Christians Isaiah says, all our righteous acts are like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). Since our good deeds are flawed by the sin that flaws us, they cannot earn our entry into heaven—and so Paul writes: no one can ever be made right in God's sight by doing what his law commands…a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:20, Galatians 2:16).

Through today’s parable, Jesus warns foolish Christians that they may end up locked out of heaven. Christians must take their faith seriously. It is said that ‘if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck’; in other words, a person may claim to be a Christian, but if his daily life looks no different than the life of an unbeliever, then he isn’t really a Christian—he is only pretending to be. James tells us: faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead (James 2:17). James instructs the foolish Christian to look carefully at her life to see how her relationship with Jesus shows itself to others; if there is no outward sign that Christ is truly important to her, then she should be concerned—because her faith, if not already dead, is certainly dying.

Wise Christians views things differently. They take their faith seriously. Wise Christians both fear and love God. They fear the threat of hell, because they know how deeply God hates sin. Sin angers God so much that only the offering of His Son’s life on the cross was enough to exchange our punishment in hell with the opportunity to join our Lord in heaven. Jesus suffered hell on that cross in our place, torment that He did nothing to deserve. Jesus suffered for us because He loves us, and because of that love He was willing to endure anything, even our hellish punishment, that we might be spared the agony that was rightfully ours.

This is why the wise Christian loves the Savior. The heart of the wise Christian is filled with appreciation for what Christ has done. Such a person shares Christ’s concern for keeping people out of hell; he cannot wait to tell everyone he knows about Jesus’ great sacrifice of love that now offers the possibility of heaven. The wise Christian sees God’s church as his first and best investment for money, because through the church the wise Christian can help spread the message of salvation to people he would not otherwise be able to speak with personally.

The wise Christian does not take her relationship with the Lord for granted. She takes every opportunity to worship the Lord in church as a way to show her love and gratitude. She seeks out opportunities to join with fellow Christians in studying God’s Word together, because she knows how easily a person can be tricked by the devil’s lies. She wants to be ready when the Lord returns, and to enter into His eternal kingdom with joy.

Which type of Christian are you? Are you behaving like one of the foolish or one of the wise? If the foolish Christian sounds uncomfortably like you, it is not too late to get ready. Go to Jesus in prayer and tell Him you’re sorry. Ask Him to change your priorities. Depending on Him, make a commitment to regular worship and Bible study. Make a commitment to invite an unbelieving friend to come with you to church. Write a family budget that dedicates your money to God’s use, not Satan’s. Live each day as if your Savior is only hours away from His return; remember Jesus’ words: keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.