1 “Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. 2 Now five of them were wise, and five were foolish. 3 Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, 4 but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. 5 But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.

6 “And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him!’ 7 Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. 8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise answered, saying, ‘No, lest there should not be enough for us and you; but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And 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.

11 “Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ 12 But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’

13 “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.”

Matthew 25:1–13

Have you ever wondered why the five foolish virgins are called foolish? I, too, have often wondered if calling them foolish was a tad too harsh because they had more similarities than differences with the wise virgins. They were all virgins. Both sets of virgins had lamps. They both had oil in their lamps. They all went out of the city. They all came to see the groom. They were all waiting for the groom. Both slept off, both had to be woken up too, and all their lamps had gone dim and needed more oil.

The only difference between the foolish virgins and the wise virgins was that the foolish virgins did not have extra oil. It’s not that they didn’t have any oil at all; they did. They just didn’t have extra. So, I began to wonder: what is it about extra oil that will make one person foolish and another person wise?

We know from the Bible that the lamp represents the Word of God (Jesus Christ), and oil represents the Holy Spirit. This means that they all had the Word and the Spirit. When we get born again, we too get both the Lamp - Jesus dwells in us by His Spirit - and when we are baptized with the Holy Spirit, we get the Oil.

We get the Word and the Spirit simply by believing; there’s nothing we had to do to get it. And though God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6), our salvation, our new life in Christ, and being filled with the Holy Spirit were gifts and not rewards.

But then Jesus told us in Luke 11:9–13:

So, I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”

This means that we are expected to ask and seek for the Holy Spirit. And this is where I come back to the parable of the ten virgins.

All ten virgins had a lamp - they did not need another lamp. This means that they all had decided to follow Jesus, they believed and received the lamp, and were all waiting on His coming. Also, all the lamps had oil in them - this means that they had all been baptized with the Holy Spirit. You cannot be baptized twice, but we are to be continually filled with the Holy Spirit. We are to continually be filled with the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18, Acts 4:31).

When the five foolish virgins realized that they needed oil, the first thing they did was to ask others for it - they looked outwards. And this might just mean that this is the way they knew to acquire oil: not buying it, but just receiving from the overflow/excess of others. And this is a perfect representation of us in the body of Christ today.

We’re always on the lookout for where the Spirit is moving so that we can be a part of it. We’re always looking for someone who is full of the Spirit to lay hands on us so that maybe some of it rubs off on us. We hop from one conference to the next, hoping it’ll fix us. Because outside of others, we do not know how to buy oil for ourselves.

The five virgins had the money they needed to buy oil, but they didn’t buy it. They knew where to buy oil but didn’t bother going. It was easier not to bother. The wise virgins did the work to buy extra oil, but the foolish ones thought they could coast by, doing the bare minimum.

Isn’t this most of us with our walk with God? Doing the bare minimum and consoling ourselves with phrases like, “Jesus understands.” Well, this is Jesus Himself sharing this parable.

Revelation 3:16 says:

“So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.”

In the above verse, Jesus is talking to lukewarm Christians, and He says He’ll spit them out. This means they’re already in His mouth. You can’t be in His mouth if you’re not, in some way, a follower of Christ. But, like the foolish virgins, you will be spat out/not let into the house if you’re not doing the work to be set on fire/acquire new oil.

I have made this mistake too - and I only began to understand this parable when I began to see signs of lukewarmness/foolishness in my life.

I can pray more, but why bother? I can study the Bible better, but that’s too stressful, and I’m only human after all. God understands. Plus, God loves me, and I am following after Him; it should be enough. I didn’t say I wasn’t praying or reading the Bible, but I was doing just enough to get by. Just enough to keep the lamp burning, but absolutely nothing to increase the oil in my lamp. I had learnt how to light the lamp, I had learnt how to use the lamp, and how to manage the oil in the lamp.

But I didn’t know how to buy oil. And if I don’t know how to buy oil, I will always be in danger of running out, and I’ll never have enough to overflow unto others.

A lot of us give our lives to Christ, and we receive the Lamp and Light that is Life, and after a while, it seems like our fire dies out. And we don’t know what to do. The thing is that we are too busy managing the oil we received instead of buying more oil. But no matter how much we manage the oil, it will only last so long before it starts burning out, and we’ll need refilling - and at this phase, we’ll have to do the buying instead of collecting from others. Because if we do not do the work of buying oil, we won’t have any to refill with.

Isaiah 55:1–2 NASB1995