Jesus at My Door
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Jesus at My Door
(The Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time)
I don’t know if it’s just me, but everywhere I go lately, and in almost every conversation I have with people, I hear 2 things said: “I’m tired, and we’re all so busy.” I hear this in most conversations with people of all ages. And, while pretty much everyone in some way acknowledges that they need to let go of something, many seem unwilling or unable to do so. Ask yourself if this touches your life or challenges you at all.
Every year at this time, as we near the holidays and come close to the end of what we call the liturgical year, in the church, the scriptures take on a very focused and specific tone; namely; “Be prepared…stay awake!” This Sunday’s Gospel parable is about exactly this. It’s commonly called the Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids or the Parable of the Ten Virgins. A simple summary would be this: an event, with which the people of Jesus’ day would be very familiar, was about to take place. Looking back, we simply call it a village wedding. The bride would ask ten bridesmaids to wait with her for the groom. The problem was, they did not exactly when the groom would arrive. In case the waiting would carry over into the evening, they would each need 2 items: a lamp, and, perhaps more importantly, enough oil. As we near the end of the parable, we hear the statement, “Five were foolish, and five were wise.” The moral of the story is: be prepared and stay awake, for you know not the day or the hour. In looking at our own lives, particularly, our time with Christ daily, we could borrow from that verse and ask ourselves the very pointed question, “Am I foolish—or wise?”
It is possible that we may very well need to redefine what we mean by “being prepared and staying awake.” The worldly definition would lead us to, perhaps, fall into the trap of thinking that being prepared means always doing something, that staying awake means remaining connected and on-alert with our devices, planners, schedules, and so on. In the biblical sense, however, it actually means doing less. This might involve a change in our routine, not just weekly, but daily.
This parable is not intended to frighten us or move us to worry about the end times or even the end of our personal time here on earth. It is intended to motivate us to spend each day in the company of Christ, answering when he knocks, so that we can hear his voice and do what he needs us to do.
Today and every day, Jesus will knock on our door, trying to break through the busyness and the noise. The question for us is, when he knocks, will we be in?