“Common sense,” said Benjamin Franklin, “is something that everyone needs, few have, and none think they lack.” Franklin’s view of religion is more nuanced than I could possibly outline here. But will it suffice to say that he was in favor of a reasonable Christian faith - that is to say, a Christian faith that was not at odds with common sense? A reasonable faith, a reasonable religion would eschew superstition, and would promote morality, good health, and good citizenship, I assume. To the best of my knowledge, Franklin was in favor of all that, even if he was not in favor of much of the standard theological fare of the Presbyterians with whom he associated. (I know: Presbyterians!) Franklin, shaped by the Enlightenment, thought that faith is just fine, religion is OK, as long as they lead to some happy piece of common sense, like, to the Golden Rule.
“Common sense without education is better than education without common sense,” Franklin said. I suppose he’d have said that common sense without religion is better than religion without common sense, too.
It can be tempting to frame religion as a kind of expression of common sense. I remember hearing an explanation once about how the rules of Orthodox Jews for keeping kosher have roots in good sanitary practice that modern refrigeration has now rendered mostly obsolete. This explanation is ridiculous nonsense. But if you are trying to defend religious practice that others perceive as ridiculous nonsense, then you can find the strength in such an appeal to common sense.
I think we sometimes have to fight the urge to try to see Jesus as a dispenser of common sense. And the parable of the wise and foolish virgins (which was what these bridesmaids started out as, in earlier versions of the Gospel) is a case in point. I mean, I suppose you could say that at the heart of the parable there is a message of common sense: if you are unprepared and without supplies, you will be caught wanting when you least expect it. This message is only half a step away from the Boy Scouts’ motto. But why come to church to hear the Boy Scouts’ motto? If the Gospel provides us with nothing but such practical common sense, why don’t we all just go to brunch?
“The problem with common sense is, it isn’t,” said Benjamin Franklin.
Well, the Gospel of Jesus Christ isn’t common sense either. If anything, we have to keep repeating the Gospel to one another over and over in order to override the temptation to just use common sense, instead.
“Keep awake, therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” This is the moral of the parable of the wise and foolish virgins. Common sense would suggest that such a message has, perhaps, outlived its usefulness after two thousand years. How can we keep awake after all this time? What are we waiting for and why? Common sense dictates, I think, that after a few hundred years you’d reevaluate how long you are willing to wait.
Sound Christian faith, real Christian religion try to counteract such common sense in order to keep us vigilant and willing to wait, no matter how long that wait may be. A thousand ages in God’s sight are like an evening gone, to borrow a nice turn of phrase. Real religion sometimes bolsters real faith by pushing back against the common sense that might undermine that faith. I know I’m not supposed to admit that sort of thing out loud, but I am afraid it’s true. Common sense will not keep us believing in Jesus Christ. Common sense would not have kept us waiting all this time. Common sense would have dictated that we move on to something else. And many people have.
Faith is not about common sense. And religion is seldom about common sense. Common sense provided no insight to Moses as he stood before the burning bush. And taking off his shoes was not an act of common sense. And the difference between the wise and foolish virgins was not that the wise virgins had common sense and the foolish virgins didn’t. It was that the wise virgins were prepared for something big to happen when they did not expect it, and the foolish virgins were prepared for no such thing.
Whose idea was it to assign this Gospel reading for Commitment Sunday? Not mine! But faced with the challenge, I’ll take it.
You know what else doesn’t fall under the category of common sense? Giving your money away to the church. Ask almost anyone: you’ll see. But you have come here, and most of you, I think, are ready to make a promise to do just that: to give some of your hard-earned money to the church for her work and ministry… which is what we do while we are waiting for the bridegroom.
If you are prepared to do that this morning - to promise to give some of your money to the church - is it too cheeky of me to suggest that you are like wise virgins? (I said, you are like wise virgins.) How are you like wise virgins? Somewhere in your heart, you believe that something big is going to happen, and you believe that God is going to do it. By this, I do not mean that the rapture is going to happen. As a matter of fact, I don’t believe that there is any such thing as the rapture, which has never been a part of traditional Christian theology. I do not believe that we are called to be holy preppers, and that oil for our lamps is but one item among many that we need to start stockpiling.
To focus on the specific preparation of the wise virgins is to miss the point of the parable. And the oil for their lamps was not what the wise virgins were focused on, anyway. Their minds and their hearts were focused not on their lamps, but on the bridegroom. It was “to meet the bridegroom” that all ten virgins had bothered to go out in the first place. And it was joining the bridegroom at the wedding banquet that the five wise virgins were able to do. The lamps were a tool, a necessary amenity to serve the purpose of meeting the bridegroom, and to light the way to the banquet! It was never about the lamps or the oil; it was always about the bridegroom, always about the banquet!
Something big is going to happen, and God is going to do it. And when it happens, it is going to feel as though the thing we have been waiting for has finally arrived. That something big might only be big to you. It might be that you fall in love. Or it might be that you are healed or made well from an illness. It might be that you are forgiven for something that has weighed heavily on your heart. It might be that you are sober another day, or another week, or another year. It might be a reunion that you feared would never occur. Or it might, frankly, be death: that the angel of death finally comes to one who had waited too long, and in too much pain.
Or it might be that that something big will be big across the globe. It might be that peace comes at last to every place and every people who are waiting and working and fighting for it. Oh how I pray it will be peace! It might be that some day soon, God’s kingdom will come, that the new Jerusalem, with peace within her walls, comes down from heaven to replace every other expectation we have. And God will wipe away every tear from our eyes. God could do this, you know. God could fulfill his promises at any moment. In another dimension, God has already fulfilled his promises, and the big thing that God is going to do has already been done. Peace has already been established. Such is eternity.
Something big is going to happen and God is going to do it. There is a bridegroom coming! And there is a banquet that he wants to take us to!
I know it can feel kind of kooky to wait, after all this time, for whatever big thing it is that God is going to do. I know it seems like a weak argument to say that the big thing God is going to do could be global, cosmic, or it could be highly specific and personal. It defies common sense. But, you see, there’s so much I don’t know. I only know the promise that the bridegroom is coming. I’m not privy to the details.
But hope is not built on common sense. Hope is built on the promises of God. And the church is where we come to remind ourselves of those promises, and to reassure ourselves of the potency of those promises.
The church is where we come to refresh the supply of oil for our lamps. We do it by enacting small occasions of hope in song and in service. And we do it by coming into the living Presence of the One who made the promise of un-common sense that he would be with us always, until he comes again. Those promises do not make common sense! And the willingness to wait for the bridegroom is not a function of common sense; it is a function of hope.
“The problem with common sense is, it isn’t.”
There are many things that common sense is not. Faith is not common sense; and religion isn’t either. Faith and religion seek to establish in us hope, and hope is not built on common sense. Hope is built on promises that defy common sense, that are better than common sense, that look far beyond common sense, because, to start with, common sense isn’t. And because peace and love and mercy are not the fruits of common sense, but they are thee fruits of faith; they are what hope looks forward to. Hope is built on promises that are worth waiting for!
God is going to do something big, he is doing it now, and it’s already been done!
The bridegroom is coming; let’s not settle for common sense! Let’s be awake, and ready for the bridegroom, so that we can rejoice with him when he comes!
Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen
12 November 2023
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia
