Olivet Discourse Part 3
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Chapter 24
Signs, and cosmic wonders
Return of the King after 1290 days of Great tribulation
Parable of two servants, faithful and wise, who will be rewarded, and the wicked servant.
Parable of 10 Virgins
Parable of 10 Virgins
Jesus now continues with his parables about what he desires in servants that will be ready but also not just be ready. Jesus is looking for servants who are ready and willing to invest their lives not just spend their lives.
Three Stages of a Jewish Wedding:
Engagement - Father comes and agrees on a dowry price for the bride. It’s a formal agreement, the kind that would have been made in the city gates.
Betrothal - This would have been a ceremony where mutual promises are made and then the bridegroom would leave to go build a house for his new family.
Marriage - usually around a year later. I say usually because the bridegroom’s return was at an unknown time. She never knew exactly when he was coming. Neither did He. He waited for the Father to tell him to go get His bride.
1 “Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. 2 Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. 3 For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, 4 but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. 5 As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. 6 But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ 7 Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps.
When the bridegroom came, the bride-maids, who were attending the bride, went out to meet the bridegroom, with lamps lit, to lead him and his companions into the house, and to the bride.
Jesus Claims to be God once again:
I think it’s quite clear here that Jesus is the bridegroom in this parable. The fact that Jesus would describe himself that way is yet another bold statement here due to the fact that OT prophets state that God, not the Messiah is the bridegroom and Israel as the bride.
“It is apparently a torchlight procession, the lamps probably being ‘torches’ (of oil-soaked rags wrapped on a stick) rather than standing lamps, which are described by a different word in Matthew 5:15 and 6:22; the word used here regularly means ‘torch’.” (France)
Seems there are two groups mentioned here once again. The foolish and the wise. 5 were foolish in that they didn’t take oil for their lamps. They seem to only have the oil that was already in their lamps. There is also the appearance of readiness in these 5 foolish virgins. They had their lamps ready to go, seemingly anyway.
The wise on the other hand took extra flasks of oil so their flame would be ready when the bridegroom’s arrival was announced.
In many Biblical passages oil, is an emblem of the Holy Spirit. Without oil the wedding party was not ready for the bridegroom. This issue here is that they didn’t know when the bridegroom would return, so they needed to be ready with plenty of oil. Without the Holy Spirit, no one is ready for the return of Jesus.
9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
A key to any Christian being ready for not only Christ’s return but for every day life is being filled with the Holy Spirit.
Like with the wicked servant at the end of 24, the bridegroom here was delayed but here they all fell asleep. All of them, the foolish and the wise.
8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise answered, saying, ‘Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. 11 Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ 12 But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ 13 Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
This is an echo of Matthew chapter 7.
22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
The foolish virgins that are in this parable, I believe, represent those that think they have it all together, have done enough good deeds to off set their bad ones, and even look forward to the arrival of the bridegroom, but ultimately, they’ve never accepted Jesus gift of salvation for their sins, and haven’t been born again.
Jesus did for us what we could never do for ourselves.
No amount of good deeds will offset any of the debt we owe. Only the blood of Jesus Christ can cover our sins. We either have the oil, or Holy Spirit because we’ve been sealed by Him when we were spiritually born again, or we don’t.
The wise virgins can’t give the Holy Spirit to the other virgins, they can only go tell them where they can obtain it. For the person who sits here today and has heard the gospel and yet hasn’t responded as of yet, we don’t know the day or the hour when Jesus will return. Come to Him, and cry out to Him and He will give you eternal life.
Parable of the Talents
Parable of the Talents
This is not the Hebrew’s Got Talent! We aren’t talking about being talented here, this parable speaks of whether we will spend our lives for our own gain or invest our lives for the kingdom. This parable points to the question, “what does readiness look like?”
A talent was not a coin, it was a weight. That means different amounts depending on what the material was, be it copper, gold, or silver. One talent was about 20 years of wages for a normal blue collar construction worker, or in their terms, a day laborer.
14 “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. 15 To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.
This was not a strange idea in the ancient world, where servants (slaves) were often given great responsibility. This was often the safest and smartest thing a man could do with his money.
Ability: The servants were given different amounts of money according to their ability. One servant only received one talent, yet we should see that this was not an insignificant amount. Some received more; but everyone received something and everyone received a large amount. Five talents would be too much for some men: one talent would be too little.”
We aren’t told how they traded with their talents. The point is that they used what they had and gained more by using. They were active and prompt with what they were given, not putting off the work that needed to be done. Ultimately they were successful in what the master gave them to do with what He intrusted them with.
The third servant did almost nothing with his master’s money. He took some care that it would not be lost (by hiding it), but he did nothing positive with his master’s money, in contrast to the first two servants.
16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. 17 So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. 18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money. 19 Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. 20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ 21 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ 23 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’
We see this picture once again of the long delay in time for the master’s return.
Each of the first two servant did equally with what they were given and the Master rewarded them equally with the statement “well done good and faithful servant.” Becasue of their faithfulness with what they’d been given. In the grand scheme of things in God’s economy it was a little, they were given stewardship over MUCH. Best of all, they were invited to “enter into the joy of your master”.
“It is not ‘Well done, thou good and brilliant servant;’ for perhaps the man never shone at all in the eyes of those who appreciate glare and glitter. It is not, ‘Well done, thou great and distinguished servant;’ for it is possible that he was never known beyond his native village.” (Spurgeon)
“This is not the servant’s portion, but the Master’s portion shared with his faithful servants…not so much that we shall have a joy of our own as that we shall enter into the joy of our Lord.” (Spurgeon)
24 He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’
The Master judged each servant individually, not as a collective. This drives home the fact that we can’t make it in clenching on to someone else’s coat tails, or performance record.
“Remember, my hearer, that in the day of judgment thy account must be personal; God will not ask you what your church did — he will ask you what you did yourself.” (Spurgeon)
26 But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? 27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. 28 So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. 29 For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. 30 And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
This third servant not only did nothing with what the Master had entrusted to him, think about what excuses he gave.
The charge against this servant who merely buried his talent was that he was wicked and lazy. We rarely see laziness as a real sin, something that must be repented of before the Lord. If laziness were a calling or a spiritual gift, this man would have been excellent.
How many employees gripe about the owner never doing anything or profiting off of their hard work. This servant was afraid. Afraid of what? Seems he was afraid of loosing any of the money the Master had given him. He saw the Master as a “Hard Man” who makes unfair gains by working his servants hard and expects a lot out of them.
Everything we do in life will be based on what we believe about God. Do we believe that He is faithful, trustworthy, a provider, personal, caring, forgiving, steadfast, or do we believe that he’s harsh, judgmental, uncaring, untrustworthy, unfaithful, unfair? If we believe the latter, maybe we will lives lives of unhealthy fear where we are just glad we didn’t loose what he gave us and make excuses as to why we didn’t do anything with what we were given. I guess that’s one option.
The other option is that we live our lives, trusting that He is who He says he is and believe that so much that we tell others about Him because we just can’t stand not to!
In light of this parable, we must ask ourselves: What have we done with our knowledge? Our time? Our money? Our abilities? What have we not done that we knew to do?
Are you ready?
Are you spending your life, doing and seeking what you want, or are you investing your life in others for the Kingdom?
35 “Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning, 36 and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks.