“To Meet the Bridegroom”
263
While they went to buy, the procession moved on, and left them
behind. The five with lighted lamps joined the throng and entered the
house with the bridal train, and the door was shut. When the foolish
virgins reached the banqueting hall, they received an unexpected denial.
The master of the feast declared, “I know you not.” They were left
standing without, in the empty street, in the blackness of the night.
As Christ sat looking upon the party that waited for the bridegroom,
He told His disciples the story of the ten virgins, by their experience
illustrating the experience of the church that shall live just before His
second coming.
The two classes of watchers represent the two classes who profess
to be waiting for their Lord. They are called virgins because they
profess a pure faith. By the lamps is represented the word of God. The
psalmist says, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto may
path.”
Psalm 119:105
. The oil is a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Thus
[407]
the Spirit is represented in the prophecy of Zechariah. “The angel that
talked with me came again,” he says, “and waked me, as a man that is
wakened out of his sleep, and said unto me, What seest thou? And I
said, I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of gold, with a bowl
upon the top of it, and his seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to
the seven lamps, which are upon the top thereof; and two olive trees
by it, one upon the right side of the bowl, and the other upon the left
side thereof. So I answered and spake to the angel that talked with me,
saying, What are these, my lord? ... Then he answered and spake unto
me, saying, This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not
by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts....
And I answered again, and said unto him, What be these two olive
branches which
[408]
through the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves?
... Then said he, These are the two anointed ones, that stand by the
Lord of the whole earth.”
Zechariah 4:1-14
.
From the two olive trees the golden oil was emptied through the
golden pipes into the bowl of the candlestick, and thence into the
golden lamps that gave light to the sanctuary. So from the holy ones
that stand in God’s presence His Spirit is imparted to the human
instrumentalities who are consecrated to His service. The mission of
the two anointed ones is to communicate to God’s people that heavenly
grace which alone can make His word a lamp to the feet and a light