October 23: Matthew 25:1-13
 
Key Verse: Matthew 25:10
But while they were on their way to buy the oil, the bridegroom arrived. The virgins who were ready went in with him to the wedding banquet. And the door was shut.
 
Devotion:
This story has always fascinated me because it just seems so far from what I think of Heaven being like. It’s not about the fact these were virgins but half of them were described as being foolish, not because they did not come prepared, but because they were not fully prepared.
 
If we bring this into a more modern setting, we won’t talk of virgins coming to a bridegroom but of people coming to meet a long missing friend who is flying in to meet them; the problem being they are at an airport in the middle of Africa where there are no lights other than torches and battery lamps carried by people (we’ll ignore the fact there must be lights on the runway for the plane to land!)
 
Now each friend brought a torch with them which worked. But half of them did not have spare batteries. The plane was delayed... like really delayed... So they all took a nap while they waited. When they heard the plane arriving, the torches had run out of battery power. The half who had spare batteries simply swapped out the batteries and carried on. Now, we can’t share batteries between torches, so some had to run off to the local shop to try and buy a new set of batteries... but when they returned, they were too late to meet their friend...
 
God wants us to be prepared to try and cope with many circumstances we will encounter while we wait for Jesus to return. If we do not have the wherewithal to cope in some way with what we face, we may well to too tied up in the world to notice when Christ does return. God wants us to be ready – which means being prepared for as much as we can be.
 
Points to Ponder:
Do you wait till you run out of batteries before you get more?
 
Are you running short in spirit because you are not being charged by God’s Word?