Fill Your Lamp

Matthew chapter 25 are some of the last words that Christ spoke while He was a human on earth. And this was a time He set aside to say very important things to us. And Matthew 25 is actually an entire chapter of warnings. An encouragement for you and I to go after that goal that God set before us, to become Christ-like and to pursue that. To never turn back from the plow, never turn back from the pursuit, never give up on the battle, the war, the struggle. Whatever terms you want to put on it. And that Jesus will be coming back with a reward. He said in Matthew chapter 22, I am coming soon and my reward is with me. And we know from several places that that reward is two possibilities. He has to give out either eternal life or eternal death. And so the chapter of Matthew chapter 25, if we just want to turn there, contains three different parables. And each one of them at the end explains to us the situation he is in. He has a door to either open in our face or close in our face. He has a light forever that he and his father will illuminate New Jerusalem or we will be in darkness forever, non-existent. We will either live forever or in the parable of the sheep and the goats, we will be burned up in the lake of fire prepared for the devil and his angels. There will be a termination for sin and those who sin. So in the 25th chapter of Matthew, he begins with the first parable, which reads, Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Now we're familiar with this parable and yet it speaks of us. It's you and me. There's ten representing all of the body of Christ. Which one are you? Which one am I? That's the question we should all be asking ourselves. We want to meet the bridegroom. We want to go out and receive the gift. But which gift is it? You know, depending on what term you use, the gift can be death. That can be what we essentially earn as our wage. The wages of sin is death. Or if we do those things that are pleasing in God's eyes, we can receive a different gift.

And he said in Revelation 22 that those who are sinning, you know, keep sinning essentially, be your real self, and those who are righteous, be self, because I am coming with my reward to give to everyone according to his work. So we're getting a certain amount of buy-in to the reward, to the gift, to the promise, whatever you want to put on it. Paul calls it in one place a prize. So, pick your terminology, but it's coming. Here he says, five of them were wise and five were foolish. Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them. They were going out to meet the bridegroom. So let's pause here and notice a few things.

First of all, ten virgins took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. All of them had lamps. All the lamps had oil. All the lamps had burning flames. Everybody essentially had a light to light their way. They were moving. They were following the light that we know of as Jesus Christ. The lamp had olive oil in it, representing God's Holy Spirit. They were going to meet the bridegroom, called, sealed with the Holy Spirit, as it were, and moving. Something happened along the way. We see in verse 3, those who were foolish took their lamps, but they took notice no oil in their vessels with their lamps.

They were excited to go. They were excited to receive, but they were not enduring. They were not going to reach the end. Somewhere along the way, that Holy Spirit was not being relied upon. Enough to have a lot of it. A jug, a container, a refill. Now, where it says lamps, the Hebrew word can...

I'm sorry, the Greek word can refer to torches. You know, coming out in the dark with these torches, rags on an iron bar is usually what the men would use. Or sometimes moving through the house, it was the little lamp, the little handle on the end of it. You could navigate with whatever form of light you had, but all of these required olive oil. Not the extra virgin first pressing.

That was used either in service at the temple and or for cooking and things like that. But this was the last, you know, rough, crude, getting the last bit of the stinky oil out. And you wrapped it in rags or you put it in your lamp and you moved on with it. Either way, it was all olive oil. Now, at some point here, there are individuals then who are not depending on the light. They're not depending. They're not really looking at the Spirit. They're looking at something else.

They're not being responsible. They're not paying attention. They're not awake. They're not watching to their own state. And so they're heading out, but the wise took oil in their vessels, in their vessels. This correlates over with verse 20 in the next parable, by the way, parable of the talents. In verse 20 it says, so he who had received the five talents came and brought five other talents. These are money. He had received five. He got the original five, just like the people got the lamp with the oil. But this individual had taken the time to get five more.

Another individual got ten more. See? But here's an individual who, in a similar parable, didn't have any more than essentially what came in the lamp itself. And while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept. Now, there's various ways of looking at this. The first thing is, the bridegroom delayed, all slumbered and slept. He came at midnight. What do you do before midnight? It's dark. It's night. That's the time to sleep. There's nothing wrong, really, with them sleeping here.

Right? It's sleep time. Jesus Christ is going to come at a time when you don't expect, and I don't expect, nobody knows. It's kind of like it's going to be a surprise for everybody. Sort of like an alarm goes out at midnight, and you're like, Whoa! What's that noise? Oh! It's time to go meet the bridegroom. He's here, you see. Let's go out to medium. They were all in that boat. Nothing's inherently wrong with five wise or five foolish sleeping at this time. And then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. To trim the lamp from the Greek means to cause it to light, to get it going, to start it up.

So in other words, they had been burning, now they weren't burning. And the foolish go to light theirs, and notice what happens. And the foolish said to the wise, give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out, or they have gone out.

Some translations render that. They had not paid attention. They had not developed. They had not gotten more oil. They had not used the spirit. They had not developed spiritual fruits, etc. The oil supply was out. The United Church of God Bible Commentary says, concerning this verse, In Jesus' parable of the wise and foolish virgins, God's servants are portrayed as carrying lamps.

The wise with sufficient oil to keep their lamps burning, and the foolish lacking oil, so that their lamps are going out. The oil here is the fuel for the flame, and in Christ's parable it represents the Holy Spirit and the lives of God's people. Now, not just the Holy Spirit. It's one thing to have the Holy Spirit, but you've got to do something with the Holy Spirit. It's one thing to have the meaner. You've got to do something with the meaner. You have to develop it. You have to grow it. You have to make more of it.

So these individuals did not treasure the light. It wasn't the lamp they wanted. It was the light they wanted. They didn't treasure the light. They didn't treasure the helper to go a certain way, to reach a certain destination, and treasure it so much that they worked on that to have more light, to have more in the bulk container, you know, a couple of jugs of bulk container, you know, lots of oil, don't know how far we're going to go, but we're going to get there. We're going to endure to the end. We're going to be ready.

So what's the practical application of this parable for you and me? That's the topic of the sermon today, entitled, Fill Your Lamp.

Let's examine some scriptures as to how to do that.

Again, here we see Jesus describes the church. Everybody has oil. Everybody has light. He has had it.

And now there seems to be some issues with it.

Could that implicate you and me in our lives? Some distraction, something getting our mind on something else, neglecting the spirit, neglecting the developing of the fruits, neglecting this journey that we're to be on, of becoming Christ-like, godly children, and getting sort of side-trapped along the way.

Again, it's one thing to be called into the body of Christ.

It's another thing to grow up in the fullness and the stature of Jesus Christ, which is verse 20. I've gained five more talents, you see. Five more talents. And he says, well done, good and faithful servant.

We need to be growing up into the fullness of the stature of Jesus Christ, not just loving Jesus Christ, not just worshiping Him, not praising Him only. Certainly those things. But our purpose here, as he said in Matthew 5, verse 48, is to be you like your Father in Heaven is. Perfect.

That's our goal. And that's what we want to be pursuing in this lifetime.

Consider a couple of scriptures in your mind.

Thy word is a lamp to my feet. What does that mean?

Another scripture is, examine yourself unless Jesus Christ is in you.

See, Jesus Christ and God the Father would dwell in us through the Holy Spirit. There is the resource that we need. There is the light for our path. There is the mental understanding along with the encouragement to go down the right road. But if we don't pay attention to that, if we're lazy with that and we sort of let other things come in and we neglect the gift of God's Holy Spirit, we could very much end up in a situation where, oh, your judgment has come. It's time for you to die. It's time for Christ to return. Whatever the situation is, things can happen very, very quickly. You know how quickly it happened to Fred Richardson just a week or two ago.

Driving home, just getting close to his house, and bam, head-on crushed by a tour bus.

It can happen that fast. And it's time. The bridegroom essentially has come.

Now, what can you and I do about this? Well, if the logos is in you, leading you, and you're following, and you're walking, not just content to have him, but you're actually moving forward, then you are developing your potential as a godly potential God-being, and that is good.

All the ten virgins seem the same. They all seem to be doing that. We all seem like that when we come to church. Hey, we're all dressed up. You know, guys looking sharp. Ladies looking great. Nobody's working today. I don't smell any pork on anybody's breath.

We tend to keep the Holy Days, and I didn't notice any Christmas trees or Easter bunnies in anybody's houses. So, you know, we're all the same. We just are. We're the same, right? Jesus points out here we're not. He's got a warning that it's not the way it looks. On the outside, things can look the same, but here we have a situation.

Ten virgins, all had made a covenant of vow with God. I will obey you. I will put you first in my life. I will put my neighbor equal with myself, and I will take your Holy Spirit and put sin out of my life like the Feast of Unleavened Bread represents. I vow to do that. Kill me if I don't. Resurrect me to eternal life if I do. And that's our covenant in a nutshell. All ten had vowed to do that.

They all had lamps. They all had oil. At least at one time they had plenty of oil. And they all had flings.

The point of the parable is this journey takes us out of the darkness of this evil age.

We walk like Israel walked out of Egypt. We are to be walking away from and out of darkness and becoming light because of the light that's in us. We depend on that light in us, God in us, in order to move forward.

And so David said in Psalm 119 and verse 105, Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. That's where he was traveling.

You know, David wasn't a perfect individual as a young man, and he messed up a whole lot.

And then we see Psalm 51, and then we progress, progress, progress. We get to Psalm 119.

We see a great example of a person moving forward, just like you and me should be moving forward.

And he says, Your word is a lamp to my feet in the darkness and a light to my path.

That means travel moving forward.

Interesting that the word wise in Matthew 25 doesn't just mean wise, like smart.

It means, according to Strongs, prudent and mindful of one's interests.

Focused, prudent, mindful. He's watching. He's watching his interests, which is becoming Christ-like and hoping for the gift of the eternal life in the family of God. He's mindful of that in all situations. And these individuals depended on their lamps. The lamps were sort of, oh, it's a nice thing to have.

No, they depended on them. It was their main tool of navigating in the darkness. You know, when something's your main tool, if you have a business or some of you ladies do some special thing, and you have your tools, these are your tools. And without them, you can't do that. These are important. You clean them, you maintain them, you order supplies and have them stocked. I mean, this is it. Guys, same thing. You know, you've got the bulk, you've got the spare parts, you've got this thing in the shop on a regular maintenance program, because this is your livelihood. You probably have two or three backups in case that one goes down. This is important. And then a person comes along and, oh, yeah, I've got this. My whole life depends on it. Maybe it's a flashlight to move through the darkness. Oh, yeah, here, look. Turns on, I guess we're good to go. And then you get out there a ways in the dark, and the batteries aren't recharged, and they go out. See? That's kind of what happens here. This is a modern-day flashlight. These ten virgins have torches. Torches is the non-U.S. word for a flashlight. It's a torch. It's the electric torch. And yet they don't have, they didn't recharge them. They don't have spare batteries. If your life depends on it, you carry spare batteries, and you carry an extra flashlight with you. These were not in the same league. They weren't serious like this. The five foolish were not. But the five, what we call, wise or prudent, mindful ones, nurtured, maintained, had supplies. We can see the jugs there. Probably had wicks. They could see the difficult path in the dark. They could move towards the goal. David said in 2 Samuel 22 and verse 29, For you are my lamp, O Lord. Just like thy word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. In John 1, the word, the Logos, is Jesus Christ. He is the light. He is the lamp. He is the guide to our path. And David here in 2 Samuel 22 and 29 says, For you are my lamp, O Lord, the Lord shall enlighten my darkness. So we come to depend on Him, to having Him in us, and have Him follow, or have us follow Him. He becomes our lifeline. This is our tool of success, is Jesus Christ and God the Father. And without them we are nothing. And take not your spirit from me, I pray, David said. Right? That's my lifeline. Don't let my light go out. Don't take the oil away.

So there's a real dependence then on God and a relationship that has to develop with God. So just because all ten had burning lamps doesn't mean they were all the same. Doesn't mean the reward they're going to receive, or the gift they're going to receive, is the same.

In Proverbs 13 and verse 9, it says, The light of the righteous rejoices. If you look up the Hebrew word for rejoices, it means brightens. The light of the righteous brightens. It brightens the countenance, the expression. It just brightens those around.

The light of the righteous brightens, but the lamp of the wicked will be put out. And that's exactly what happened to the ten virgins. Their lamps were going out. Something was amiss. They were not focused and pursuing that which they needed to be focusing.

So the parable of the five foolish, and the Greek word for foolish, means morally heedless, according to Strongs. Morally heedless. They were not heeding the morals. They were not heeding the commandments of God. They were thinking about me, and fun, and what I need to do, and what's next, and the cares of this world.

The morally heedless had become somehow in the dark and without light, without fuel oil, without the Holy Spirit producing those fruits, and those fruits kind of ran out. What ended up in the parable is those latter five remained behind in the dark. They stayed back. It shows a striking difference between ten people who are outwardly very similar. Five are led. They're close with God. They're intact. They have lots of fruit, as it were, results from that relationship. And that relationship is strong and continues. It puts them in the right place at the right time. The others are in a different place at a different time, as we'll see. So in Christ's parable, somehow within His Church, He's saying there's an issue. Some are being led successfully. You'll notice they're being led united in a united fashion, unitedly. The five went. They went together. They had plenty of oil, but it would indicate that they went as a group assisting each other, these five ladies. We also see they were able to go right through the dark to the goal, and the goal was what? Jesus Christ, the bridegroom. They journeyed to become like Him, with Him, Christ-like. And when they arrived at the judgment, there was no question in Christ's mind as to who they were. No question in His mind that they were His. He had led them there. Let's look in the parable in verse 10. While they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with Him to the wedding, and the door was shut. They went in with Him to the wedding. Automatic, fully, yes, you're mine. I know you. Come on in with me to the wedding. They entered through the door into the wedding, and then the door was shut.

Jesus said in John 10 verse 7, I am the door of the sheep. There's a lot of parallels here to other parables, to the concepts of who He can allow in, how they are allowed into the kingdom, and those who are left outside. But He said, I am the door of the sheep. You know in Revelation chapter 3 and verse 8, He says, I have set before you an open door, for you have kept My word. In other words, here's your reward, your prize, your gift, whatever you want to call it. This is open to you. I have set before you an open door. You come on in because you have kept My word.

Your word is a lamp to My feet and a light to My path. Your word, the Logos, is what we rely on to live inside us and guide us. And you have kept that. You have reacted. You have interacted with that. But here in Matthew 25 verse 10 at the end, it says, and the door was shut.

Now, when we think about closing a door, we think about opening a door. Every door can be opened. You can get a key if it's locked. If you can't get the key, you can always pop the hinges. You know, doors are just distractions from going through. And that's how we tend to think about doors.

What He's trying to tell us is something very permanent with finality. The door was shut. You know that statement back in Revelation chapter 3 verse 8? The sentence before that. He tells us that He has the key of David. In other words, He has the key to New Jerusalem. Just like David commanded the gates, the doors of the gates of Jerusalem. When those doors shut to an invading army, or when there was any threat, those doors shut, they did not open. If you weren't inside and you didn't get inside when the alarm went out from any of the walled cities, you were out there with the enemy. And that was it. There was no coming inside.

So when the door was shut in David's time, and there were thousands of individuals that were assigned to screen people and not allow unwanted people in, when those doors were shut, they were shut. When we come to Revelation chapter 22, we see a New Jerusalem, don't we? Revelation 21 and 22? With 12 gates. And those gates are like pearls. And those doors get shut.

And what do we find on the outside? Dogs, sorcerers, everyone who loves and tells a lie, they don't get in. And that symbolism. He has the responsibility, he says, I'm the door. And when I shut it, no one opens it. But if I open it to you, no one can shut it. Satan can't come with charges, your friends can't come and talk me out of opening it for you.

But if I shut it, no one can convince me to open it. You can't beg and plead and come up with excuses. It's a done deal, in other words. So, and the door was shut, we need to consider the importance and the finality of those words. Notice in verse 29 of Matthew 25, in the second parable of the chapter, he says, For everyone who has, you got oil, you got jugs of oil with your lamp, I know I'm borrowing from the first parable, but he's talking about talents in this one, which you see the symbolism, I'll just borrow that over. For everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have abundance. But from him who does not have any oil, even what he has will be taken away, and cast the unprofitable servant into outer darkness, and there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. So you don't want to be one of the unconcerned, unprepared, unworking, spiritually working virgins that doesn't have the abundance of the fruits of God's Spirit, that fruit that God wants to harvest. Otherwise, he has to close the door.

The five who were foolish or morally heedless, however, will try to get it open. You know what he says in Matthew 7, 22? Lord, Lord, open to us! And he says, I don't know you. Oh, Lord, Lord, we have, and they go into this tirade, we've preached the Gospel, we've cast out demons, we've done signs and wonders and miracles by your power. Come on, let us in. Does he open the door? No. That's another parable, very similar to the ones we're looking at here. It reminds me of a Tolstoy character in War and Peace who said, I have sins, but I maintain very compelling excuses for them. We might think we have very compelling excuses for our sins. When that door is shut and we start giving the excuses, we can see what Jesus himself says we're up against. So the five morally heedless don't belong there. It's not...they're get-driven, they're me-driven. Hey, I want in, I want the gift. I want the gift. Give me the gift. Down in verse 11, it says afterward, the other virgins came also saying, Lord, Lord, open to us! Open to us! Yep, we all want the gift. They eventually got there, didn't they? To get. But to Jesus Christ, they weren't even a close second. They were not a barely made... Oh, you almost made it! Oh, I just barely closed the door and you showed up. Oh, well, just for you. No. Weren't a close second. Just didn't have to lower the bar just a little bit to get him over the hurdle and get him to qualify. No. Not just a good effort. He indicates in verse 12, Assuredly I say to you, I do not know you. Totally different group of individuals. If you know him, 1 John says, you keep his commandments. You do what he commands us. You see? That's what we have to realize.

He indicates that many in the church sort of pretend their faith or are lacking in reserves. And that's what the seven lessons in Revelation are about. You can go through all seven of those little mini sermons he gave to each of the churches. And you'll find in their lessons that all of us need to be developing and producing and being truly obedient. Now, if we want the solution to all the above, look in Matthew 25 and I'm sorry, Matthew chapter, Revelation, Revelation chapter 3 and verse 18.

Revelation chapter 3 and verse 18. At the end of this, he says, I counsel you to buy from me. Remember how the virgins had to go out and buy oil? Here's the symbolism once again. We have to get this Holy Spirit from God and we have to develop these fruits. You just don't... Oh, can I have the fruits? Can I have now a life full of the fruits of the Holy... Can I buy some holy righteous character? No. That's built over a lifetime of making decisions and trials and errors and being tempted and then learning to resist sin and etc. etc. Choosing righteousness. You can't just buy character. So he says, I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire. Now, let's take a little test here today and see how well all of us are doing with my own little symbolism as to being gold tried in the fire. If you take a ring, if you care to take your ring off and you look at the little number in there, what does it say?

Well, 14 karat. Well, that's pretty good. 14 karat. Yours might say 10, 12, 14. Maybe if it wears really badly and wears out a lot, it's 18. Because the higher the karat, the softer the gold, the softer the metal. Now, we could say, all right, we all have gold. White gold, silver. Maybe your silver is looking at .925. If it left a green ring, after the point, you want to put about six zeros. You got that one on the beach at the feast. But, okay, all of these, in other words, are some points or some karats. Gold, if you took your ring and you melted it, you would find the gold itself is heavy. So it would go to the bottom, and the silver and the brass that makes this a little harder, and maybe a few little drops of other metals that are in there to kind of fill out and dilute it, strengthen it, would rise to the top. And then you scrape them off, and what are you left? You're left with 24 karat gold. That's what Jesus is saying here. I counsel you to buy from me 24 karat gold. Now, we're on our way, but we're not there yet. And he's counseling us that he wants the real thing, that you may be rich. And notice, white garments, that you may be clothed. This is what the bride of Christ in Revelation chapter 19 is, clothed in white garments, fine linen, white and clean, for the white garments are the righteous acts of the saints. God wants us to become perfect and righteous and godly like he and his son are. So that's the solution.

And going on down, he says in verse 19, As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten, therefore be zealous and repent. This is the process to filling our lamp. Repent! Put in righteousness, develop the righteousness, develop jugs of righteousness, backpacks full, lots of righteousness. Keep that lamp burning bright. It's actually not our righteousness, but God working it in us. He says, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come into him and dine with him, and he will overcome with me. To him who overcomes, I will grant to sit with me on my throne, as I also overcame and sat down with my father on his throne. He's giving us the ultimate gift, blessings, reward. All we have to do is pursue that goal, to fill that lamp, to develop more oil. In a Beyond Today article written by Lorelei Nettles, talking about the ten virgins, it said, It talks about how half of the virgins did not take oil with them to meet the bridegroom. They were unprepared. Even when the bridegroom was delayed, they did nothing more.

Deciding instead to sleep when the other slept. They not only had the opportunity to come prepared in the first place, but they also squandered their second chance to prepare. They had unrealistic expectations at every turn. They had fooled themselves into believing them, believing that wanting it would be enough.

They were excited at the prospect of receiving the bridegroom and vice versa. But they took it for granted that the bridegroom would love them, care for them, and save them from it all, even though they hadn't put effort into the relationship. We have to love God with our hearts, soul, and might. We have to put great effort. We have to hunger for righteousness and be filled with it, filled to overflowing. When that happens, then we become a light to the world. We become a reflection of Christ's light. We find that Christ gave commandments, and those commandments sometimes get overlooked. We do what's convenient. We'll say, okay, He told me to do this, but it's more convenient for me to just say, I'm a Sabbath keeper. Keep the Holy Days. Tied. Don't eat pork. And feel comfortable in that. And preach the gospel to other people. Yeah, you guys, repent out there. I'm good. I'm good to go. See, I've done all of this. Lord, open to me. Why aren't you opening to me? I've done all these things.

But remember, we could fail to actually do what He says. It's James that said, it's the hearers that are justified. I'm sorry, it's the doers that are justified. Not the hearers only. Not the hearers only. You have to be a hearer. We all have to be hearers, but not hearers only. We have to be the doers of it. Let's go to John chapter 14 and verse 21. And I'll show you as we wrap up here a big way to fill jugs full of olive oil for your lamp. I'm not going to show you. Jesus Christ will show us. Sorry, didn't mean to get myself in there. Jesus Christ will show us here. John chapter 14 and verse 21. He who has my commandments. Hey, we all have His commandments. We're the true church. I can show you booklets. We have the truth. All ten of us. We have the truth. And He says, He who has my commandments and keeps them. Or does them. It is He who loves me. And He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love Him and manifest myself to Him. Down in verse 23, Jesus said, If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. The lamp to our feet is His word. We will keep it. We will do it. We'll just say, OK, I keep it. I put it in a jar and I charge it. No. It means observe it, to do it. Keep my word. And my Father will love Him, and we will come to Him and make our home with Him. Through the Holy Spirit, they will live in us. We will be the repositories of the Holy Spirit. Each a temple is part of the Body of Christ, and there will be no question as to whose child we are and who we are related to and who we are marrying. And we will be welcomed in to open doors for the wedding feast. Verse 24, He who does not love me does not keep my words. We don't get around to that part. We're not paying attention.

We're so busy, I don't have time to love God. I don't really have the ability or the time or the interest to love my fellow man. But I sure have this great career, or I have this great romance, or I have these kids, or I have this job, or I have all this maintenance to do, or whatever it is. But He who does not love me does not keep my words. And the word which you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me. So we're turning our back on God and we're saying, give me the gift, the reward, whatever you want to call it, give me that end result of my fruits, of my efforts, of my deeds. And that might surprise us as to what it is. We need to love God passionately. We need to fight for our enemies, not against them, for them, to love our neighbors, even if they're a murderer of you. You love them. What did the murderers do when they came for Jesus Christ? Did He defend Himself? A great example, in John 18. Let's just take a moment. John 18, verse 4. Therefore, Jesus, knowing all things that would come upon Him, knowing that He was going to be scourged, then He was going to be humiliated, stripped, and killed through torture, knowing these things, what did He do? Here's a good example for you and me. It takes it out to the extreme, doesn't it? But this is what happened. Knowing that these things, when they came in verse 3 with their lanterns, torches, and weapons... Same word, by the way, lamp, that we're talking about, the 10 virgins, exact same Greek word is there for torches. Lanterns is used. They came with their weapons. Jesus went forward, verse 4. He went to them and said, who are you seeking? Judas was going to betray Him, right? He didn't wait for Judas. Who are you seeking? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. And He said, I'm He. It's me. And they all fell backward.

And then He asked them again, who are you seeking? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. And He said, I have told you that I am He. I am He. Therefore, if you seek Me, let these disciples of Mine, let them go their way. He was thinking of them. He was honest. He was so honest, He went out to meet the ones that were going to kill Him. That's loving your fellow man, according to the Sermon on the Mount, praying for your enemy, helping and blessing them. There's no defense there. There's no counter-attack or whatever.

So to fill your lamp with oil means to fill it with the fruits of God's Spirit, displaying the mindset of the God family, no matter what the consequences are. If you want a lamp filled with the fruits of God's Spirit, then eat the bread of life daily. Hunger and thirst for righteousness. Go after being like the Father, who continually give everything they have for us. Everything. Everything they can possibly give, they give to us and sacrifice for us.

So in conclusion, what can ensure that your lamp develops enough oil, plenty of oil, overflowing with oil, as it were, the fruits of God's Holy Spirit, to help you travel on this journey and endure all the way to the end in great shape and walk straight in through the door?

Let's go to 2 Peter 1, verse 5-11. 2 Peter 1, verse 5. We need to really consider this passage, consider where you are on the trail, because this is the whole trail. This is from the point of maybe being a teen in God's church, all the way to stepping through the door into the kingdom of God.

You can find your point on this trail easy enough, and you know you've got to walk all the way to the end of it.

1 Peter 1, verse 5.

But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue.

Last time, the women's weekend was, I believe, women of worth. A time before that, I believe, was virtuous woman. Is that right? Or was it all the same thing? Oh, I know what it was. Virtuous woman, her worth is that above rubies. It all went together last time. So here we have virtue. And yes, we have to have virtue. We have to, in other words, begin to understand and begin to live and be a virtuous individual.

And we don't let any of these go. We continue them and add to virtue knowledge and to knowledge self-control. At some point, then, you have understanding and you have to receive God's Holy Spirit through baptism.

Now, with self-control, you have God's Holy Spirit. And one of the fruits of God's Holy Spirit is self-control. You can now say no to sin, and you can do a better job of it as you go along.

To self-control perseverance, you can't just say no to sin once. It keeps beating you up, like Paul said. You've got to persevere in godliness and resisting Satan.

To godliness, brotherly kindness. Well, now we start to reach out beyond me and we start to be kind to brothers, love our neighbor as ourself, as it were. Think what we call maturity, emotional maturity.

Emotional maturity is thinking of other people.

Sometimes young people have more emotional maturity than older people have, because they are thinking more of others. They are responsible for others' needs. We have to grow in this responsibility towards others. And stepping up finally to the very mindset of God in a more full fashion to brotherly kindness, we add agape, love.

That's the oil in your lamp. It's the last one.

It's a process. It's a process of building, of growing. Jesus said, it's my father's will that you bear much fruit and that your fruit remains.

That's what he's looking for. Verse 11.

Verse 10, For if you do these things, do them, not just love them, do them. Verse 11. An entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So, brethren, let's all be filling our lamps with the results of God living in us with the Holy Spirit, and us being very attentive to that, very interactive with that, and using that Holy Spirit to produce the righteousness that he wants us to develop.