You Don’t Have Time
Peyton Johnston
June 29th, 2018
Matthew 25:1-13
Just imagine this…
You’re a bride-to-be, engaged to your greatest love. And today is the big day: your wedding day. After much anticipation, the time for a grand celebration of uniting your life with your soon to be husband has finally arrived. But of course, the festivities can’t begin without the groom and the rest of the processional. So you and your bridesmaids start on the journey to meet with the rest of the wedding party. You’re anxiously waiting for your groom to whisk you away, but the day goes on and the Sun grows darker without any sign or word from the him. Where was he? Had he forgotten about you? Had he changed his mind?
After what feels like a lifetime, you at last see the bridegroom approaching in the distance. You jump up in excitement and start to run toward them… Only to realize the path is rough and you can’t make it to your destination without your own light. You have an oil lamp, but because you left it burning without more oil to keep it lit, the fuel is running out. You never expected to be waiting this long! You ask your friends to give you some of their oil, but they don’t have enough to give you without running out themselves. Your only option is to part with the others and go into town in search of some oil. You start to panic for a moment, knowing if you’re not back in time you will have broken the sacred laws of the marriage process and the wedding will be off. But then you convince yourself that you have time… right?
You do find more oil for your lamp, but by the time you return, they’re all gone. You cry out, desperate for a response from the bridegroom. But they’re not there. You missed your one shot to be with the love of your life. Now all you can think is: “Why didn’t I take this more seriously? Why didn’t I prepare myself for this moment?”
God is our greatest love and He calls the church His bride. He has promised to return for us in order to bring us to our true home in Heaven. During your lifetime, you can choose to continuously fuel the fire in you to live for the Lord, or you can let it go out with the weight that waiting brings. If you let it dwindle, you’re risking a great loss… An eternal loss. Your fire – your passion, anointing, commitment, and salvation – is not something you can borrow from a friend when the time draws near. It’s something you have to have cultivated over time yourself to light your way to your ultimate destination.
This world will try to convince you that you don’t have to prepare yourself for God’s return, and that you can leave the church and live however you please – because you have time. But that’s a lie. You don’t have time. You only get one fragile, unpredictable life. And God will likely come back when you least expect Him to. And if you’re not careful, you’ll find that when He comes searching for you, you’ve missed Him simply because you were too careless to prepare. Make
sure you’re living your life in such a way that you don’t find yourself asking, “Why didn’t I take this more seriously? Why didn’t I prepare myself for this moment?”
Pray: “Lord, You are my greatest love and are worthy of all my praise, all my thanks, and all my life. Keep me from the false temptations that lead me away from the Truth, and from believing that I can live a reckless life because I have time. Please help me to recognize the reality and severity of how my actions impact my eternity.”