The Kingdom of God is like a wedding party. That’s what Jesus says in the story of the Wise and Foolish Bridesmaids: the Kingdom of God is like a wedding party. The kingdom of God is fun and festive, there is food and drink and dancing and flowers … and it is about love, about relationships, about intimacy and promises. That’s how good the kingdom of God is. It is like two people who fall in love. It is like a feast, a party, a celebration. It’s like a holiday.

In Jesus’ day a wedding did, indeed, occasion a holiday … not just for the bride and groom, but for the whole Palestinian village. Everyone stopped working. Everyone was invited. Everyone participated. A village wedding was time off from work and time on for feasting and community, for celebration and playing, for dressing up and going out, for dancing and romancing. The kingdom of God is like that, Jesus says. It is that good. Don’t miss it. Be ready.

Be ready because you don’t know. You never know. You cannot know when it will happen.

Old South did not know when in the world we would get ourselves a new Minister of Music. We did not know the day or the hour. We didn’t even know the year! But I submit to you that we were wise bridesmaids! While we waited we kept our lamps filled with oil. We kept our wicks trimmed. And, we did not twiddle our thumbs while we waited. Like the wise bridesmaids, we were proactive. In our case, we sent out a search party to look for our Minister of Music. Our search party looked high and they looked low. They looked east and they looked west. They looked in Canada and Italy and Australia and England and across the whole United States.

Over time it became apparent that our bridegroom-organist was delayed.  We could have grown lazy and drowsy, but we kept awake. Our lamps were filled, our wicks trimmed. We kept our E. M. Skinner organ tuned and the fingers of our musicians limber and exercised. We kept our lungs and our voices in good practice.

And then, one day, when and where we least expected it – at a day and an hour we had not anticipated – our Minister of Music appeared! It turns out he was nearby all along, just across the river, in Cambridge, at Harvard.

We were ready. We were wise bridesmaids. We got our man!

We welcome Harry Huff our Minister of Music Elect. Harry begins officially in January. Until then he agreed to play this First Sunday of Advent, as well as Christmas Eve and our First Night Concerts.

In the announcement we posted for our Minister of Music search, we wrote that “the ministry of music at Old South seeks to glorify God and mediate the grace and presence of God through creative interpretation of the Church’s musical literature and by fostering community within the church, the city and beyond.”

Another way of putting that would be to say that our Minister of Music is called to help us practice and prepare for the Kingdom of God. Harry is here to help us keep our lamps trimmed and our oil flasks full, to be ready, to prepare, to rehearse … so that when the party comes – or when we are invited to the party – we are ready. Every Sunday as we gather for worship we rehearse the Kingdom of God. We practice it and prepare for it. We make ourselves ready.

Those who built this church considered the parable of the Wise and Foolish Bridesmaids so important they depicted it in one of our English stained glass windows from 1875. The windows above the gallery to your right depict five of the parables of Jesus. The second from the front depicts the parable of the Wise and Foolish Bridesmaids.

This Parable is important to the church and it is beloved of Christians because it tells a hard truth: the truth that you do not know. You never know. You do not know either the day or the hour. So keep awake.

It is not possible to approach this parable today without thinking about the recent and untimely death of a beloved member of Old South: our friend, Marc Gaucher. Marc served on our Membership Committee. He served in a variety of hospitality capacity: greeting, ushering and welcoming. He worked with our other gardeners, his wife Diane and Jim Hood, in preparing and planting the outdoor gardens. On Thursday night, without warning, without previous illness, without preparation, Marc died in his sleep. He was 57 years old. By my calculations, he was not old enough to die.

More than that, Marc wasn’t ready. He wasn’t prepared. He was taken out in mid-stride. He loved this life … really loved it. He was a gourmet cook. He relished the freshest vegetables, the finest cuts of meat, delicate spices, delectable sauces and creative combinations. To watch Marc in a kitchen was to watch a maestro. And Marc was a magnificent gardener. He produced round, heavy tomatoes and crisp green beans.  He and Diane were deeply and profoundly in love.

I am here to tell you that Marc was not ready to die. He wasn’t ready to go to the kingdom of God, party or no party. God knows, Diane wasn’t ready … not even close.

But there are different kinds of readiness, are there not? There are different kinds of preparation. In one sense, Marc wasn’t even close to ready. But in another sense, Marc was absolutely ready.

He was prepared to embrace the kingdom of God, to join the feast. His lamp was full of oil and his wick was trimmed. His life was in good order. He was well loved and he loved well in return. Marc did for others. Cheerfully, easily, selflessly he served, he helped. He enjoyed his life and he delighted in people, places, activities and events. In the words of one of Marc’s brothers, Marc was one of the good guys.

Given a choice, I can’t imagine Marc leaving Diane and this life. But not having been given a choice, he was ready.

The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Bridesmaids is an invitation to be prepared, to get ourselves ready … because we never know. We just never know.

But the parable is also an invitation to be among those who light the way … who bring light to dark places. The bridesmaids were given the responsibility of lighting the way of the bridegroom.

Marc was a part of a trio of co-conspirators who had decided Old South needed a big, cheerful, brightly lit outdoor Christmas tree. Marc was not able to complete this project, but he prepared for it. He imagined it and helped plan it and execute it. The day before he died he was here digging the hole for the Christmas tree.

The lit, outdoor Christmas tree does for this holiday what the bridesmaids did for the holiday of the wedding in the parable. It sheds light. It brightens up a dark night and says to passersby:  God is here. God’s people are here. Come in. Warm up. The table is set. Here, there is food and family. Here, there is love and relationship. Here, we make promises to each other and fashion our lives around stories of celebration and feasting. Here we gather week in and week out to prepare for and rehearse the Kingdom of God. Come in. Join us. Welcome.

This year’s cheerful, round outdoor Christmas tree is a testament to Marc’s readiness. The tree stands as a reminder that the kingdom of God is bright and festive. The Kingdom of God is like a holiday. It is that good.

There is ready and there is ready. Marc was decidedly not ready. Yet Marc was absolutely ready. He was well prepared.

That is what Jesus hopes for us and prays for us.

Be ready. Get ready because death is not the end. A party awaits.