Now let's have a look, and go into Matthew 25. Now in order to understand Matthew 25, you do need to understand a little bit about what this would have meant to those who heard it. Now for us, we look and it's a strange story; lamps and oil, and shout of a bridegroom coming, and people going out in the middle of the night; and doors shut and all that kind of thing. It means very little to any of us, because we have a different concept of a wedding. We think: you come to the church, the groom's here, and the bride comes down. There's music, and we all go to the party afterwards. We think that - but the Jewish wedding was completely different.
What would happen is, the son would - either his father would arrange the marriage for him; or they would send a servant to arrange a marriage for him, so they had arranged marriages in the Bible. They worked quite well apparently - or the son himself would go, and he would seek out a bride that he would marry; so the son would come, and when he came he would carry with him an immense amount of money, which was the dowry. He had a purchase price. The second thing he would carry with him, was the wedding contract; and the third thing he'd have with him was wine; and what he would do is, he would go and he would meet with the bride and with her family, and present out the proposal of a wedding.
And there was a price to pay; and then the bride, then they would sit down and they would have a meal together; and the cup of wine would be passed around, and if the bride accepted the cup of wine, and drank the cup of wine, then that means she was accepting engagement. She was now considered, from a Jewish point of view, she is now married to him; even though the wedding's not consummated, the marriage is not consummated, she is now legally married to this man - and yet the wedding doesn't take place fully until a season later.
So at that point they're betrothed. Mary was betrothed to Joseph. That's how it happened. So a woman who was betrothed had to remain faithful in the period of time of preparation; so the man would then go back to his father's house and prepare the bridal chamber, and that may take a while; prepare a dwelling place. Now that you begin to understand what Jesus meant when He said: I go to my Father's house to prepare a place for you, this is all wedding language. They understood what that meant.
When Jesus said: I've longed to drink this cup with you, and they drank the cup at communion, now you understand what He was talking about. He was proposing in marriage. He was setting forth a new covenant. This is what He said: this is the new covenant. He's talking about marriage, and what He's saying is: I've come, and I'm presenting a new covenant. Drink this with me, and this will bind together God and man in a marriage covenant. Then He says: now I'll be leaving. I'll be going to my Father, and I'll be preparing a place for you, and then I will come again.
Then what would happen was, the bride had no idea when the groom would come. The groom came when the father said it was time to come, and he would determine whether everything was ready. Then he'd say: it's time to come, and the groom and his friends would come, and they would come at night, and they would come with lamps burning; and then the shout, the bridegrooms best man would shout: the bridegroom is coming! Now the bride had to be awake, so she'd have a lamp, and she needed to have oil in the lamp to keep the lamp alight. She would wake when she heard - because you never know what night he's coming - you can imagine the anticipation; and then suddenly the shout goes up, and quickly she'd rise up, and she's been spending her time preparing how to be a great wife, how to be a great mother. She's all ready, and she goes out to meet; and there it is. It's a wonderful thing. There it is - there's lights and torches, the groom, his friends, his party is with him. The bride comes out. She has her lamp, and then she goes with the groom, and they go back to the father's house where there's a wedding chamber; and they go in, and the door is shut, and no one can go in there.