Isaiah 65:17-25; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11; St Matthew 25:1-13
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Philip Nicolai’s parish in Unna, Westphalia was being destroyed. The plague had arrived. Between July of 1597 and January of 1598 Pastor Nicolai had buried no less than 1,400 of his parishioners. During a single week in August 170 of his lambs succumbed to the black death.
He could have fled. But he didn’t. Like the 2nd Century Bishop, Polycarp, disciple of St John, who stayed even when the Roman persecution was at its fiercest, Pastor Nicolai stayed. He preached. He administered the Sacrament. He prayed. He buried. And then he prayed some more.
And he did one more thing. He wrote a book. From the parsonage which overlooked the churchyard, Pastor Nicolai was a sad witness of the burials. On one day thirty graves were dug. In the midst of these days of distress this gifted Lutheran pastor wrote a series of meditations to which he gave the title, “Freuden Spiegel,” or The Mirror of Joy.
His purpose, as he explains in his preface, dated August 10, 1598, was “to leave it behind me (if God should call me from this world) as the token of my peaceful, joyful, Christian departure, or (if God should spare me in health) to comfort other sufferers whom He should also visit with the pestilence.”
“There seemed to me,” he wrote, “nothing more sweet, delightful and agreeable, than the contemplation of the noble, sublime doctrine of Eternal Life obtained through the Blood of Christ. This I allowed to dwell in my heart day and night, and searched the Scriptures as to what they revealed on this matter, read also the sweet treatise of the ancient doctor Saint Augustine (“The City of God”). Then day by day I wrote out my meditations, found myself, thank God, wonderfully well, comforted in heart, joyful in spirit, and truly content.”
At the end of his little book Pastor Nicolai wrote three poems. Two of them he set to music. So powerful and poignant, they became known as the King and Queen of the Lutheran Chorals. “How Lovely Shines the Morning Star,” or, as in the LSB, “O Morning Star How Fair and Bright,” is the Queen. The King you just sang, Wachet Auf, “Wake, Awake, for Night is Flying.”
In the face of unspeakable tragedy, to families where mothers had lost their sons, daughters their fathers, sisters their brothers, brothers their sisters, husbands their wives - with no family untouched by the horror of death, with nearly a third of Europe’s population decimated, Pastor Nicolai sand the hope of heaven into the ears and hearts of his people as they waited for the Day of the Heavenly Bridegroom’s return. They learned, even in the midst of nearly unimaginable heartache and terror, to sing in the joy of sins forgiven and the hope of the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
In the first reading this morning Isaiah speaks of how that Day will be a new creation. Of how all that is awful and broken, all that’s distorted and wrong in our world will be done away. Gone the weeping. Gone the death. Gone the sorrow. Gone the pain. Gone the loss. It will be a world where families are never gathered around a coffin ever again. A new heavens and a new earth where the Lord our God is nearer than our own voices and where is is not more blood stained tooth or claw, for they shall not hurt or destroy in all My Holy Mountain, says the Lord.
It may sound like a fairy tale, but its not. It is the Lord’s promise. It is His evangel, His Gospel good news that His original plan for His beautifully good creation will not be sidetracked forever. What He created it to be, what He intended it to be, it will become again, and more! A world without fear, without sin, without death.
Is it any wonder, then, that the Church prays so often, Come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly. When the sorrows of this world press hard, when you don’t know if you can bear anymore. When you fall to your knees and pray, Come, Lord Jesus! When darkness lurks and the cold steels across your heart, when your eyes from dim and your lamp flickers, you cry out in prayer, Come, Lord Jesus. When change and decay in all around we see, we gather together and cry out to the Help of the helpless, Come, Lord Jesus!
We long for that Day. Not only for ourselves, but for the world. Even as we know that that Day will not be a joy to all. Those who are unprepared, those who don’t welcome it, those who would rather relish this age as it is, for them that Day will come like a thief in the night bringing sudden destruction. As labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, says St Paul. Just as it was in the days of Noah, warns our Lord Christ, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man. They were eating and drink and marrying and being given in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all (Lk 17:26-27).
Then the sheep and the goats shall be separated. And that which distinguishes the wise and the foolish will be made plain: faith. To meet that Day without faith in Jesus Christ is to meet that Day as the Day of Doom, the Day of Irretrievable Loss. Then the lamps will go out. Then the door will be shut. And our Lord shall speak the harshest words ever uttered, Truly, I say to you, I do not know you. Watch, therefore, for you know neither the Day nor the hour.
But faith, beloved. Faith in Christ Jesus, in His atoning sacrifice, in His redemption of all creation, faith is the key. That’s the whole point of why the five wise virgins can’t share the oil with the five foolish. Faith in Christ is something that the Father by His Spirit longs to give to each and every person. For such faith is necessary to escape the destruction that is coming. But faith can only be given by the Blessed Holy Trinity. Even as no one can believe for himself. No one can believe for another. Each must receive the gift of faith for himself.
The five foolish with their lamps going out did not have faith that made it through to the End. They thought “good enough” was good enough. But it never is. The Holy Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, wants you to have faith through to the end. He can and will supply it for you. He is eager to do so. Only, do not despise Him or His means.
After all, there is not one soul for whom the Son did not shed His precious Blood. There is not one human life who sins were not atone for on Golgotha’s wood. There is not one human being whose death was not destroyed by the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. But it is faith which receives all these gifts, which hears and believes, which apprehends the manifold bounty of the Lord. Such faith God reckons as righteousness in His sight. Your heavenly Father longs to give you such faith in Jesus Christ His Son our Lord by His Holy Spirit in His Word. He delights to do so. It is His joy.
Extra oil in the flasks? That means that you live your life on the receiving end of the Lord’s giving. This is true wisdom, as you have learned by heart, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight (Prov 9:10). Those wise virgins showed forth their wisdom by bringing extra oil. They supposed the Bridegroom might be delayed, so they planned ahead.
Dear people loved by God, hear the Word of the Lord: you cannot keep faith going on your own. It was never something you came up with on your own; nor will it last to your last day or to that Day by your own effort or will or strength. Take a closer look, all those verbs in the explanation of the Third Article of the Creed are in the present tense. Not, “I could not believe;” but, “I cannot believe.”
Saving faith is given you through God’s Word and Spirit. Saving faith is sustained and strengthened only through the self-same Word and Spirit.
Is it any wonder that the wise ones tell the others to go to the dealers for oil? Not that faith can be bought, but that the Lord does not despise means. This is what St Paul writes to the Christians in Corinth concerning the dealers of the heavenly oil: This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God (1 Cor 4:1). In order to create such faith which saves, our Lord has given to His Church the Ministry of the Holy Gospel and the blessed Sacraments. Through these, as through means, the Holy Spirit works to create and sustain saving faith.
When St Paul wrote to the Christian church in Thessalonica he told them he catechizes them that God did not destine them for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us. So whether awake or asleep, that is, whether alive or dead, we might live with Him and in Him.
This holds for you too. You are not destined for wrath. Our Lord’s holy Gospel is for the forgiveness of all of your sins. He blessed Sacraments are for your eternal comfort and joy, not for terror or doubt. You are destined for life with Christ. A life that does not end.
The key to living faith, to being strengthened for the Day of His coming, and for it to keep growing ever brighter in the gloom and darkness, is to cling to His Word and promises through which He bestows the oil of His Spirit. Even now the Lord your God uses His steward to bestow unto you the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, for the forgiveness of all your sins, for the strengthening of your faith, and for the gift of life that triumph’s over death.
That is why Pastor Nicolai wrote his little book and composes his hymns - he wanted the people to know that in Christ God the Father has given them a life that no plague could rob from them; a peace that no terror can take from them, a joy that no sorrow can steal from them. Not now. Not ever. And so the Church sings:
Zion hears the watchmen singing
And all her heart with joy is springing;
She wakes, she rises from her gloom.
For her Lord comes down all-glorious,
The strong in grace, in truth victorious.
Her star is ris’n, her light has come.
Now, come, Thou blessed One!
Lord Jesus, God’s own Son!
Hail! Hosanna! We enter all
The wedding hall
To eat the Supper at Thy call (LSB 516:2).
To eat the Supper at Thy call. Here before you is the great joy of the Foretaste of the Feast to Come, the Marriage Feast of the Lamb in His Kingdom which has no end. Where you are not just bridesmaids, but the very Bride of Christ, His Church, holy and blessed, pure and spotless, without stain or blemish. Come, receive the outpouring of His love and mercy, forgiveness and salvation and proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. Come Lord Jesus, come quickly! Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Philip Nicolai’s parish in Unna, Westphalia was being destroyed. The plague had arrived. Between July of 1597 and January of 1598 Pastor Nicolai had buried no less than 1,400 of his parishioners. During a single week in August 170 of his lambs succumbed to the black death.
He could have fled. But he didn’t. Like the 2nd Century Bishop, Polycarp, disciple of St John, who stayed even when the Roman persecution was at its fiercest, Pastor Nicolai stayed. He preached. He administered the Sacrament. He prayed. He buried. And then he prayed some more.
And he did one more thing. He wrote a book. From the parsonage which overlooked the churchyard, Pastor Nicolai was a sad witness of the burials. On one day thirty graves were dug. In the midst of these days of distress this gifted Lutheran pastor wrote a series of meditations to which he gave the title, “Freuden Spiegel,” or The Mirror of Joy.
His purpose, as he explains in his preface, dated August 10, 1598, was “to leave it behind me (if God should call me from this world) as the token of my peaceful, joyful, Christian departure, or (if God should spare me in health) to comfort other sufferers whom He should also visit with the pestilence.”
“There seemed to me,” he wrote, “nothing more sweet, delightful and agreeable, than the contemplation of the noble, sublime doctrine of Eternal Life obtained through the Blood of Christ. This I allowed to dwell in my heart day and night, and searched the Scriptures as to what they revealed on this matter, read also the sweet treatise of the ancient doctor Saint Augustine (“The City of God”). Then day by day I wrote out my meditations, found myself, thank God, wonderfully well, comforted in heart, joyful in spirit, and truly content.”
At the end of his little book Pastor Nicolai wrote three poems. Two of them he set to music. So powerful and poignant, they became known as the King and Queen of the Lutheran Chorals. “How Lovely Shines the Morning Star,” or, as in the LSB, “O Morning Star How Fair and Bright,” is the Queen. The King you just sang, Wachet Auf, “Wake, Awake, for Night is Flying.”
In the face of unspeakable tragedy, to families where mothers had lost their sons, daughters their fathers, sisters their brothers, brothers their sisters, husbands their wives - with no family untouched by the horror of death, with nearly a third of Europe’s population decimated, Pastor Nicolai sand the hope of heaven into the ears and hearts of his people as they waited for the Day of the Heavenly Bridegroom’s return. They learned, even in the midst of nearly unimaginable heartache and terror, to sing in the joy of sins forgiven and the hope of the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
In the first reading this morning Isaiah speaks of how that Day will be a new creation. Of how all that is awful and broken, all that’s distorted and wrong in our world will be done away. Gone the weeping. Gone the death. Gone the sorrow. Gone the pain. Gone the loss. It will be a world where families are never gathered around a coffin ever again. A new heavens and a new earth where the Lord our God is nearer than our own voices and where is is not more blood stained tooth or claw, for they shall not hurt or destroy in all My Holy Mountain, says the Lord.
It may sound like a fairy tale, but its not. It is the Lord’s promise. It is His evangel, His Gospel good news that His original plan for His beautifully good creation will not be sidetracked forever. What He created it to be, what He intended it to be, it will become again, and more! A world without fear, without sin, without death.
Is it any wonder, then, that the Church prays so often, Come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly. When the sorrows of this world press hard, when you don’t know if you can bear anymore. When you fall to your knees and pray, Come, Lord Jesus! When darkness lurks and the cold steels across your heart, when your eyes from dim and your lamp flickers, you cry out in prayer, Come, Lord Jesus. When change and decay in all around we see, we gather together and cry out to the Help of the helpless, Come, Lord Jesus!
We long for that Day. Not only for ourselves, but for the world. Even as we know that that Day will not be a joy to all. Those who are unprepared, those who don’t welcome it, those who would rather relish this age as it is, for them that Day will come like a thief in the night bringing sudden destruction. As labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, says St Paul. Just as it was in the days of Noah, warns our Lord Christ, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man. They were eating and drink and marrying and being given in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all (Lk 17:26-27).
Then the sheep and the goats shall be separated. And that which distinguishes the wise and the foolish will be made plain: faith. To meet that Day without faith in Jesus Christ is to meet that Day as the Day of Doom, the Day of Irretrievable Loss. Then the lamps will go out. Then the door will be shut. And our Lord shall speak the harshest words ever uttered, Truly, I say to you, I do not know you. Watch, therefore, for you know neither the Day nor the hour.
But faith, beloved. Faith in Christ Jesus, in His atoning sacrifice, in His redemption of all creation, faith is the key. That’s the whole point of why the five wise virgins can’t share the oil with the five foolish. Faith in Christ is something that the Father by His Spirit longs to give to each and every person. For such faith is necessary to escape the destruction that is coming. But faith can only be given by the Blessed Holy Trinity. Even as no one can believe for himself. No one can believe for another. Each must receive the gift of faith for himself.
The five foolish with their lamps going out did not have faith that made it through to the End. They thought “good enough” was good enough. But it never is. The Holy Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, wants you to have faith through to the end. He can and will supply it for you. He is eager to do so. Only, do not despise Him or His means.
After all, there is not one soul for whom the Son did not shed His precious Blood. There is not one human life who sins were not atone for on Golgotha’s wood. There is not one human being whose death was not destroyed by the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. But it is faith which receives all these gifts, which hears and believes, which apprehends the manifold bounty of the Lord. Such faith God reckons as righteousness in His sight. Your heavenly Father longs to give you such faith in Jesus Christ His Son our Lord by His Holy Spirit in His Word. He delights to do so. It is His joy.
Extra oil in the flasks? That means that you live your life on the receiving end of the Lord’s giving. This is true wisdom, as you have learned by heart, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight (Prov 9:10). Those wise virgins showed forth their wisdom by bringing extra oil. They supposed the Bridegroom might be delayed, so they planned ahead.
Dear people loved by God, hear the Word of the Lord: you cannot keep faith going on your own. It was never something you came up with on your own; nor will it last to your last day or to that Day by your own effort or will or strength. Take a closer look, all those verbs in the explanation of the Third Article of the Creed are in the present tense. Not, “I could not believe;” but, “I cannot believe.”
Saving faith is given you through God’s Word and Spirit. Saving faith is sustained and strengthened only through the self-same Word and Spirit.
Is it any wonder that the wise ones tell the others to go to the dealers for oil? Not that faith can be bought, but that the Lord does not despise means. This is what St Paul writes to the Christians in Corinth concerning the dealers of the heavenly oil: This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God (1 Cor 4:1). In order to create such faith which saves, our Lord has given to His Church the Ministry of the Holy Gospel and the blessed Sacraments. Through these, as through means, the Holy Spirit works to create and sustain saving faith.
When St Paul wrote to the Christian church in Thessalonica he told them he catechizes them that God did not destine them for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us. So whether awake or asleep, that is, whether alive or dead, we might live with Him and in Him.
This holds for you too. You are not destined for wrath. Our Lord’s holy Gospel is for the forgiveness of all of your sins. He blessed Sacraments are for your eternal comfort and joy, not for terror or doubt. You are destined for life with Christ. A life that does not end.
The key to living faith, to being strengthened for the Day of His coming, and for it to keep growing ever brighter in the gloom and darkness, is to cling to His Word and promises through which He bestows the oil of His Spirit. Even now the Lord your God uses His steward to bestow unto you the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, for the forgiveness of all your sins, for the strengthening of your faith, and for the gift of life that triumph’s over death.
That is why Pastor Nicolai wrote his little book and composes his hymns - he wanted the people to know that in Christ God the Father has given them a life that no plague could rob from them; a peace that no terror can take from them, a joy that no sorrow can steal from them. Not now. Not ever. And so the Church sings:
Zion hears the watchmen singing
And all her heart with joy is springing;
She wakes, she rises from her gloom.
For her Lord comes down all-glorious,
The strong in grace, in truth victorious.
Her star is ris’n, her light has come.
Now, come, Thou blessed One!
Lord Jesus, God’s own Son!
Hail! Hosanna! We enter all
The wedding hall
To eat the Supper at Thy call (LSB 516:2).
To eat the Supper at Thy call. Here before you is the great joy of the Foretaste of the Feast to Come, the Marriage Feast of the Lamb in His Kingdom which has no end. Where you are not just bridesmaids, but the very Bride of Christ, His Church, holy and blessed, pure and spotless, without stain or blemish. Come, receive the outpouring of His love and mercy, forgiveness and salvation and proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. Come Lord Jesus, come quickly! Amen.
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