Grantsdale Community Church
2026-04-19-Eyes-Open-Heart-Ready
  • Introduction
    I’m going to begin this morning with a confession. I’m really not a morning person. I know some of you are.
    Some of you wake up at 5 a.m. without an alarm, already cheerful, already grateful, and, I say this one with a mixture of admiration and deep suspicion, already coherent. You are who the Bible is written for. The rest of us are just trying to catch up.
    Most of us have, what can only be described as, an adversarial relationship with our alarm clock. The alarm goes off. We hit snooze. The alarm goes off again. We hit snooze again, this time with genuine resentment.
    The third time, we have a little negotiation with ourselves: “If I skip breakfast and shower in four minutes, I can sleep eleven more minutes.” We are masters at convincing ourselves that we are almost awake when we are, in fact, almost entirely asleep.
    Which is why, when I come to Matthew 24:42, I feel quite convicted. Because, Jesus doesn’t say, “Hit snooze if you need to.” He doesn’t say, “Five more minutes.” He says, with a directness that marks every single one of his commands,
    Matthew 24:42 NIV
    42 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.
    Keep watch. Be ready. Eyes open. Heart ready. That’s the command!
    As we continue our series this morning, I want to do something that the church hasn’t done often enough:
    Actually define what “watch” means. Because “watch” is a word we use in church all the time, without ever stopping to ask, “what are we supposed to be watching for?”
    Much less what watching actually looks like, in our life, on a Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon.
    So that’s what we’re doing today. We are going to walk through Matthew 24:42–44 carefully, and we’re going to let the text, along with some supporting passages, teach us what “watch” actually means and looks like in our daily lives.
    By the end, my hope is that we will leave here, not with just a feeling, but a rebuilt foundation, for actually living as someone who is awake.

    The Context of the Command

    (Matthew 24:42–44)
    Let’s start with the context of the command in Matthew 24:42–44:
    Matthew 24:42–43 NIV
    42 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. 43 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into.
    Matthew 24:44 NIV
    44 So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.
    Whenever we see the word therefore, we must ask what the therefore is there for. What came before it?
    In verses 36-41, Jesus has been very explicit that no one, not the angels, not even the Son, knows the day or the hour of his return. Only the Father alone knows.
    This is crucial to understand, because a great deal of Christian energy across the centuries has been spent trying to figure out exactly when Jesus will return. Very often with spectacular confidence and equally spectacular inaccuracy and failure.
    People have done calculations, made prophetic declarations from headlines, built timelines on whiteboards, and wrote books full of ominous warnings that sold very well. The track record, as a whole, is zip, zero, nada.
    Jesus is not asking us to calculate the exact moment. He is asking us to watch. The reason we watch, and this is the “therefore,” is precisely because we cannot calculate the exact time.
    If you knew the exact date and time of a surprise party, it wouldn’t be a surprise party. It would just be a party. The uncertainty is not a problem to be solved, it is the whole point of the command.
    Notice the image Jesus uses to explain this. He talks about a homeowner and a thief. Jesus tells an astonishing parable. At first glance it seems to cast the Son of Man in the role of the thief.
    That is quite theologically alarming. But the point is not about the character of the thief, it’s about the unpredictability of the timing.
    A thief doesn’t call ahead. A thief doesn’t make an appointment. A thief comes when the household is off-guard, when the lights are out, when everyone has decided that tonight is completely safe.
    The homeowner who knew the thief was coming would have watched. He would not have gone to bed. He would have stayed alert, stayed ready, not let the thief break in.
    Jesus says: That’s how we are to live in relation to His return. Not paranoid. Not frantic. Not methodically calculating the time. Just genuinely, consistently, and deliberately being awake.
    Verse 44 is the key: “So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”
    The Greek word translated “be ready,” simultaneously implies both the active sense “making ready” and the passive sense of “readiness.” It’s not merely aware. But actively preparing while simultaneously being in a state of readiness.
    In order to grasp how that works we must understand what “watch” actually means.

    What “Watch” Actually Means

    Here is where we need to slow down and do some careful work. “Watchfulness” has not been defined well by the church for a very long time.
    Let me start by telling you what it does not mean. Then we’ll look at how it’s fully defined by Scripture.

    What biblical watchfulness is NOT:

    First, it is not anxious vigilance:

    Some people hear “watch and be ready” and immediately begin to feel spiritual anxiety.
    They anxiously scan the horizon for signs, always a little worried they missed something. They’re always second-guessing whether they’re ready enough.
    That is not what Jesus demands of us. In fact, if we read just a few verses further into
    Matthew 25:4–5 CSB
    4 but the wise ones took oil in their flasks with their lamps. 5 When the groom was delayed, they all became drowsy and fell asleep.
    The wise virgins aren’t pacing nervously, they’re sleeping, just like everyone else.
    The difference is not that they stayed up all night in a state of spiritual anxiety. The difference is that when the moment came, they had what they needed.
    Watchfulness is not the absence of rest. It is the presence of readiness.

    Second, it is not withdrawal from the world:

    Another common misreading of this passage is that being ready for Christ’s return means holding the world at arm’s length.
    Saying we could care less about this life, because the next one is coming. That produces Christians who are so focused on heaven that they are of no earthly good.
    Again that is not the picture Jesus paints. At the end of Matthew 25, the people who are praised at the final judgment, are not the ones who disengaged from the world.
    They are the ones who fed the hungry, welcomed the stranger, and visited the prisoner. Watchfulness, is turned outward, not inward. It’s not just passively waiting in preparedness.
    Yet, we tend to imagine “watching” as sitting still, doing nothing, just staring at the horizon. But look at how the parallel text in Luke 12 pictures it.
    In Luke 12:35–37, Jesus says:
    Luke 12:35–37 NIV
    35 “Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, 36 like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet.
    Notice, dressed for service. Lamps burning. These are images of active readiness, of someone who is engaged and prepared, not someone who has made some preparations and sat down to wait.

    What biblical watchfulness “IS”

    Now let’s look at how Scripture fully defines “watchfulness.”

    Watchfulness is attentiveness to what God is doing

    To watch, in the biblical sense, is to be genuinely paying attention, to our own life, to the people around us, to the world, and to what God is doing within all of it at the same time.
    The opposite of watchfulness, in this sense, isn’t sleep, it’s distraction. It’s the condition of being so absorbed in the chaos of our daily lives that we miss what’s actually happening.
    We are very good at this today. We have more information at our fingertips than at any other time in history. But we understand that information far less than at any other time in history.
    We are flooded with data, but we see none of it. We live in a state of perpetual information overload. We are starving for comprehension. Watchfulness is the discipline of actually seeing.

    Watchfulness is alignment between belief and behavior

    In 1 Thessalonians 5:4–6, Paul picks up the watch/sleep language and gives it a very specific application. He writes:
    1 Thessalonians 5:4–6 NIV
    4 But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. 5 You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. 6 So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober.
    For Paul, being asleep means living as though God does not exist, as though there will be no reckoning, as though this life is all there is.
    Being awake means living in a way that’s consistent with what we say we believe. It is the refusal to let our Monday thru Saturday look any different than our Sunday.

    Watchfulness is active love for neighbor

    This one tends to surprise people, but I think, practically, it’s the most important of all. Throughout Matthew Chapters 24 and 25, the measure by which people are shown to be “ready,” IS NOT theological precision or the correct prediction of end-times events.
    It’s whether they saw and responded to human need. The servant who is found “working” when the master returns is the one who was “caring” for the household.
    The wise virgins are those who had prepared, not just for their own needs, but to light the way for all, when the bridegroom appeared.
    And in the stunning climax of Matthew 25, it turns out, that the ones who were truly awake were the ones who COULD NOT walk past a hungry person, a stranger, or a prisoner, without stopping to help.
    Watchfulness isn’t just a posture of prepared readiness for the future. It’s also an actively preparing posture toward the person right in front of you.
    We are given a perfect example of this in the parable of the ten virgins.

    The Parable of the Ten Virgins as Commentary

    (Matthew 25:1–13)
    Jesus immediately follows his command to “watch” with a parable, that functions as an extended commentary, on what watching looks like, and what it doesn’t look like.
    First a little background is needed: In a first-century Jewish wedding, the bridegroom would come to escort the bride and her party to the wedding feast.
    The time of his arrival was never known by anyone except the bridegroom’s father who, at his decided time, sent the bridegroom to get his bride.
    The bridesmaids, these ten virgins, were responsible for lighting the way to the wedding feast, with their oil lamps, when he arrived, whenever that was. It could be evening, it could be midnight, it could be anytime on any day, even a year later.
    Once the bridegroom, the bride and her party were inside the place where the wedding feast would be held the door was closed. Once the door closed nobody else was allowed inside.
    We are told five of the virgins bring extra oil. Five of them do not. All ten fall asleep while they wait, and this is important, because Jesus isn’t condemning falling asleep itself.
    He isn’t saying the foolish virgins’ sin was that they got drowsy and fell asleep. He’s saying their sinfulness happened much earlier: They came to be waiting without being prepared.
    Notice, that they needed to actively prepare for passive waiting. Then, at midnight, the cry goes out, the bridegroom is coming.
    All ten wake up. All ten trim their lamps. And at that moment, the difference becomes visible. Five lamps are burning, five are going out.
    The five with empty flasks ask the five with full ones to share. And here is the moment in the parable that makes us a little uncomfortable, the wise virgins say no.
    Now, before we decide they are being uncharitable, we need to hear what they actually say, “No, there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.”
    They’re not being selfish, they’re being honest. They’re saying: “What you need right now is something I can’t give you. It has to come from somewhere else.”
    What IS the oil?
    Commentators have suggested many things over the centuries, the Holy Spirit, faith, good works, the Word of God.
    I believe it represents our spiritual transformation that comes from the Holy Spirit. That CANNOT be transferred from person to person at the last moment.
    It is the accumulated result of showing up, paying attention, praying when we don’t feel like it, and just remaining faithful, even when no one is watching.
    We can’t borrow character the night before we need it. We can’t download spiritual depth when the crisis arrives. It has to already be in us because it was put in us. Slowly, over time, through the necessary disciplines of an awake Christian life.
    The bridegroom comes. The five who are ready go in. The door closes. The five who went to buy oil arrive too late and find the door shut.
    And the bridegroom from the other side of the door, says, probably the most chilling words in all of Scripture: “Truly I tell you, I don’t know you.”
    The parable ends where it began: “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.” With intentional bookends.
    Jesus is illustrating, exactly what He commanded in Matthew 24:42. Watch. Be ready. Have our oil already purchased.

    What It Costs to Stay Awake

    We must be honest, staying awake costs something. It is not the path of least resistance. It requires strength, endurance, and patience to always give God our full attention.
    Being our Sunday best, Monday-Saturday, seems to dwindle, day-by-day, until there is nothing left. Every one of us has a version of the five foolish virgins in us.
    Every one of us has stood, at some moment, holding an empty lamp, and felt the panic of realizing our lamps are going out.
    Maybe it was a season of grief, our faith wasn’t making sense and prayer felt like we were talking to the ceiling. Maybe it was a stretch of busyness so relentless that church became just another item on the list, instead of the source of life.
    Maybe it was an, almost imperceptible, slow drift on the inside. The person we are today, though physically recognizable, is far less spiritually awake, far less recognizable in God, than the one five years ago.
    That’s not a condemnation. That’s a description of our human experience in faith. We drift. We get tired. We hit snooze.
    The question is whether we hear the alarm or sleep through it. Jesus says, “Keep watch, because you do not know when I am coming.”
    Our lamp is our faith in Jesus Christ. We must have oil for our lamp so we can “keep watch.” The oil comes from the Holy Spirit. Every time we surrender a piece of our soul, every time we allow Him to transform our character.
    Our lamp burns when our character reflects the character of Christ. The oil must be purchased, the cost is surrendering our soul to God.
    Losing our selfishness, our anxiety, fears, hate, and doubts. Losing our sense of self-identity is the cost. It’s wonderfully replaced with an identity far more priceless. Our identity in Christ.
    Can you hear the gospel? The bridegroom has not arrived yet. Yes, the door will close. But it has not closed yet. The invitation to wake up IS NOT a threat, it’s an act of amazing grace.
    Conclusion: Three Questions to Carry This Week
    I want all of us to stay awake. That requires transformation. Transformation requires deep, honest self-reflection. These questions are designed to prompt that self-reflection. I printed them out so you can hang them up somewhere to be a daily reminder.
    On your bathroom mirror, your refrigerator door, the windshield of your car, wherever you will see them everyday!!

    Question one: What am I actually paying attention to?

    Watchfulness begins with attention. In the noise of our daily lives, the meetings, the notifications, the news, the family logistics, what am I genuinely, and intentionally attending to?
    Am I attending to God? To the people around me? To the areas of grace and need that are happening around me?
    We can’t watch what we are not looking at.

    Question two: Does my Monday-Saturday match my Sunday?

    This is Paul’s question from 1 Thessalonians 5.
    Do I live like a child of the day?
    The definition of spiritual sleepiness is not that we struggle, doubt or fail.
    It is living as though none of this is real, putting God in a compartment labeled “Sunday” and “Monday-Saturday” in different compartments I call reality.
    Watchfulness is integration!! It is decompartmentalizing and putting God first in every part of my life.

    Question three: Am I tending the oil?

    This is the deepest question. What are the practices, the habits, the rhythms that keep our lamp burning?
    Not the dramatic ones, not the once-a-year retreats or the seasons of crisis that drive us to our knees.
    Rather, the ordinary ones. The daily ones. The ones that feel small and unremarkable but are, in fact, what slowly fills our flask.
    Prayer. Scripture. Fellowship. Service. Sabbath. These are not optional accessories to a transformed Christian life. They are the oil that we cannot borrow at midnight.
    Jesus says, “keep watch. Eyes open. Heart ready.”
    Not because life is full of threats to be survived, but because God is at work and we don’t want to miss it. The invitation to wake up is still open and the invitation to stay awake is still ringing the alarm.
    Wake up. Stay awake. Tend our oil. Because, the bridegroom is coming, the lamps are needed, and the oil, our transformation, it matters.

      • Matthew 24:42ESV

      • Matthew 24:42–43ESV

      • Matthew 24:44ESV

      • Matthew 25:4–5ESV

      • Luke 12:35–37ESV

      • 1 Thessalonians 5:4–6ESV

Grantsdale Community Church
bklapwyk@grantsdaleccmt.org
4063666883
https://grantsdaleccmt.org/
2 members