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Last week I compared Christian culture to the clear biblical revelation. Jesus gave his disciples a play-by-play of the coming tribulation and his return, explicitly stating the tribulation was localized to the Roman Empire (oikouméne and Matthew 24:16), and that it would happen in their lifetime (Matthew 23:36, 24:34), and that Jesus return (parousia) will take place (v.14) immediately after these local events, and that is precisely when the ecclesia (church) is established.
In Matthew 25, Jesus gives parables (metaphors) which are never taught at Easter. These parables regarding the Kingdom of God, represent a new way to live in faith, rather than in religion. Jesus’ Heaven is presently here, now, in the midst of us, just behind the physical realm. Unlike Evangelicalism’s “one-day after you die” version. Jesus’ Heaven isn’t an earth evacuation strategy or a post death destination hope. Instead, God is our hope.
I have taught on these parables in the past and I’ve include links as a reference.
I won”t read these stories now, because I want you to access the bigger teaching.
We must remember these are Easter parables, not out of context “end times” parables. These teachings are metaphors to teach his disciples how to receive and not miss the Kingdom here and now, NOT proof texts for who goes to a future heaven. They teach the disciples how to live here and now, in faith rather than by way of religion.
Jesus uses two parables to tell his disciples about knowing themselves, and knowing god. Jesus uses both positive and negative examples to make his point.
- Positively: Experiencing Heaven requires a diligent and consistent effort, continual investment. Though God and Heaven are eminent, joining them takes effort. We must be (ètoimos-prepared, ready) in order to be “good (agathe)and faithful (piste)” bondservants.
- Negatively: foolish (morai–fem-plrl moron, not having sense) and wicked (poneroi-worthless, stingy), and lazy (òkenrós-shrinking back, lacking ambition, bothersome), and unprepared, are the traits and behaviors that prevent our entry and participation God’s Kingdom (here).
When these parables are taught through a binary lens, the teaching forces us to see ourselves as either the wise virgins and investors, or the fools. When the foolish are locked out of the banquet it’s because Bridegroom says “I don’t know you.” (v.12), The servant thrown into outer darkness is one who doesn’t really know his master, thinking him to be a “hard man.” (v.24). These parables aren’t about a rapture taking us to heaven, but knowing ourselves and God.
The lamp in the darkness are to illuminate not only our path, but our face. Jesus is telling his disciples to be prepared so they can always shine a light on themselves (unlike the religious leaders) during this time before he comes back as the Church. Religion, then and now, makes access to God contingent on behavior, Jesus says we join God with a diligent, honest, self-critical oil that humbles us.
Nowhere in these parables does Jesus teach that death is the point of missing out. By following the Easter narrative we discover how we are playing both parts, going in and locked out, good and wicked. All the disciples will flee, Judas will betray him, Peter will deny him. None were ready, all were foolish and unprepared, they didn’t see themselves, and the door to God will close on everyone, but Easter says it reopens, the temple veil is torn, God gets out. Our diligent investments will pay off in joy, but our worthlessness will be sent to outer darkness. The Gospel for the disciples who lived both, is the same now for us as we continue to live both.
Context matters.
We must retrain ourselves to see Jesus’ teaching as both/and instead of either/or. Jesus cannot be known in a binary way, for he would need to be either God or a man. But the ternary view can know him as both God and a man. We are each the morons, the wicked, the lazy, and we are also the prepared, diligent, investor who is good and faithful. We both enter into joy and rest, and we are relegated to the outer darkness. Once we are honest enough with ourselves to see both within, then the Kingdom of God has come upon us, and we can extend grace and forgiveness to others.
The religious remain incapable of such thinking. They remain the most lost of all souls.
Try and find a single teaching of Jesus which defies his own Kingdom framework. You’ll discover, just as I have, that “both/and” is always the case when we view the entire arch of our redemptive story. It’s only when viewed within the confines of time (this worldly system) that we are either in or out. Heaven is beyond time. Do you see now? The foolish five are the wise five at differing points in the redemptive arch, compared in time, but revealed in the Kingdom.
This “peek a boo”, “on/off”, “in/out” theology is so disappointing, unbiblical, and has created tiny demigod idols that we’re supposed to worship and fear. Not to mention absurd theologies and practices which fill us with tribal pride, and don’t lead us toward loving ourselves or others. Show me one believer who after making a decision for the Kingdom of God, successfully for the rest of his/her days, never once becomes the foolish five, or the single talent slave. Failing to read ourselves into one half of the story means we don’t know the Gospel. We will never know joy and rest apart from outer darkness. This isn’t a choice, it’s the framework of spiritual reality and God is the architect behind them both.
“I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things.” (Isaiah 45:7)
If Jesus is to take upon his shoulders the sin of the world, then he’s introducing the end of appeasement, the end of religion, ritual and all stairways to Heaven. Following Jesus is to follow the third way who hangs between the binaries of our life, between our two thieves of belief and unbelief. By apprehending the Gospel of both now, we can join paradise today, rewriting in conformity to God’s word, an alternative orthodoxy, and orthopraxy, that finally repatriates the power and love of God.
Faith in God is not limited to our best days, when we are strong and make the right choices, but necessarily includes our worst days, when we are weakest…“where he becomes strong.” Belief and unbelief are both required or he’d make us sinless. Like breathing, faith and non-faith are two diametrically opposed realities that comprise a life far better than each of them. The Spirit invites us to live over and over again.
These parables teach that the Kingdom of God works like this, possessing within us two radically different identities, one part of us which closes us off, and the other part is the faith to keep knocking on this closed door, where we are still unknown. Religion taught us this is the end, but Jesus’ taught that despite our foolishness, and the closed door, we are promised that if we keep knocking, the door will be opened to us. (Matthew 7:7)
Thrive in Exile 