Your Faith is Your Fuel
The Venerable Joan Clark
Matthew 25:1-13
Ever have one of those days when things are hectic, you haven’t had time to think ahead to what’s needed for the day, and simply had to carry on with what you had?
Maybe you forgot to finish your homework and just had to go with the minimum of what you’d done, which you knew wasn’t going to be sufficient.
Maybe you forgot to do a needed report for work that was due that morning and were rushing to get to work only to forget your lunch and the gym clothes you needed afterward.
Maybe you procrastinated on a project and now you’re destined to do it at the last minute, lacking some of the material you really needed to make it work.
Maybe you forgot about a large bill and didn’t have the resources to cover it.
Maybe you stayed up late the night before a breakfast celebration and ended up sleeping right over it.
If any of these scenarios make you cringe, you’re not alone. All of us at one time or another have let busyness, procrastination, or simple lack of preparation foil us up and bring us down.
In fact, this has become the our way. We frequently run on empty, forgetting to fill our tank. We venture into the pathways of our lives, rolling over stones, into bushes, and over potholes with no spare tire in the trunk, just hoping nothing will happen to jar our plan or mess with our day.
Often, we get away with it. But sooner or later, we are going to hit a nail, and our best laid plans will become void.
It’s kind of funny really that we can be such risk-averse people when it comes to change, and yet such risky, bet-happy folk when it comes to our long-term well-being. But we do this in all aspects of our lives.
One of the most glaring ways we sabotage ourselves is by ignoring our spiritual well-being. Some of us are pretty good at taking care of our physical needs. We eat well, sleep well, make sure we have proper exercise.
In our culture today, taking care of our emotional health has become an important way to show we care about our relationships and our inner feelings which affect our behavior.
But what about our spiritual wellness. We don’t often talk about spiritual wellness, do we? And yet, our spiritual well-being is intricately tied up with our physical and emotional health and wellness.
When we feel spiritually fulfilled, awake to the world around us, our relationship with God, our recognition of the Holy Spirit’s divine presence in our lives, when we nurture our faith and take time for prayer, we feel, we can face anything that comes our way –any adversity, trouble, surprise, or disaster.
Nurturing our spiritual life is like putting fuel in our tank. Our faith is our back-up resource in the event that none of our plans work out or all of our tires blow out.
Faith and spiritual wellness is the fuel that lights us up and keeps us going when things get tough, our vision gets murky, and life gets rough. It keeps us steady. It gives us clarity. It provides us assurance. It allows us to keep seeing ahead through the muck and the mire, so that we can keep going, even when others stop.
Without it, we are always driving on half empty.
Jesus understood this about the human condition. We see this in his parable of the ten bridesmaids. Jesus knew that many would get excited about their faith initially, would maybe like the novelty of his message, would engage with him in discipleship initially, but then they simply would peter out. Like a flash in the pan, they would burn out and fall away, for they had nothing real inside to sustain them. No true faith to keep their commitment going. Their lives were not truly committed to a relationship with God, but to their own plans and agendas. When the initial excitement dwindled, and life set in, they simply were not prepared for the long haul that a life of discipleship can sometimes require. Their tanks were empty and devoid of commitment-sustaining faith.
But Jesus also knew that some would understand. Some would take to heart his message to turn to God and to commit fully to following him. He knew that some had the kind of faith that would burn brightly for a long, long time and would sustain them through any adversity or time of waiting. These folk were not planners. They didn’t bet their lives upon their own timetables, strategic plans, or methods. But they prepared for Jesus’ coming with their hearts –through a willingness to pray, wait, and count on God’s presence and power with a faith that would never run dry.
Jesus tells us in this parable today what it means to keep our tanks filled with life-sustaining faith, what it means to be ready for anything that life could throw our way. “Keep awake,” Jesus says, encouraging us to be faithful and urgent in our prayers, in our worship, in our discipleship, and in our trust in God and in him. Your faith will keep you ready for anything you need to face, and especially for Jesus’ appearance in your life and in the world.
For you never know when Jesus is going to appear.
Today, the world continues to surprise us with occurrences that challenge us and challenge our church and our faith. Jesus invites us to face it with him.
It is always a pleasure to officiate at a wedding. A wedding, it is a celebratory time! Everyone dresses for the part. They put on their best clothing and faces. They decorate the venue. They plan for every detail, so as to make the occasion perfect.
The bride and groom look beautiful and dapper. They look into each other’s eyes with love and the thrill of the day.
But it will only be in the long term that we can know the commitment and the love in their hearts.
Every couple (at least most let’s say) are happy on their wedding day. Only some are still happy or in some cases more happy at their 25th or their 50th anniversary.
As Paul writes (1 Cor 13), faith, hope, and love, these three abide to make what could be a simple flash in the pan infatuation of love into a lasting, beautiful, exquisite, committed marriage between two flawed yet exquisite individuals.
Paul also reminds us that our marriage vows are based in the relationship we all have with Jesus Christ. Our faith, our love, our hope in Jesus cannot be a simple mountaintop moment, or an initial excitement for the novelty of a new church or a new kind of worship. But our relationship with Jesus needs to be a deep discipling experience with devotion, commitment, and faith that keeps re-fuelling our tank for the long haul.
For having a strong faith does not mean we will not face adversity, or will not disagree, or will not get angry, or will not feel sometimes that we are failing. But a strong faith means, we will get through it all together with Jesus and with each other.
In this time in which we are living, it’s more important than ever to rely on our faith, our discipleship, our spiritual strength, to get us through.
But I have faith in you that you will put your faith in Jesus.
Stay strong. Stay the course. Your faith is your fuel