I dutifully surfed the entire internet in the night hours and found exactly nothing of interest. There was nothing new and shiny enough to catch my eye. Not a glance past the Huffington Post, which waxed lyrical about Female Muslim Modesty on the Runway could push back the malaise. I even watched that video of the person who ground up pasta in order to…um…make pasta. And then there is this poor person who seems a living illustration of this Tweet Thread.
The problem is that we aren’t meant to come to the end of the internet. If you scroll for an hour—cough—you are supposed to discover something sparkly to be upset about, or interested in, or amused by. It is a real failure of human imagination if, after fifteen panda videos, all you can do is sigh.
The gospel reading for this morning—if you’re following along in Morning Prayer—seems as pertinent as anything to the crushing sense of ennui that isn’t just my problem, but is the useless condition of almost everyone caught in the internet age. There are two stories for us today, the Wise and Foolish Virgins, and the tale of that wretched man who buries his talent in the ground.
“The kingdom of heaven,” splains Jesus in Matthew,
will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.
And, a paragraph later,
For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master's money.
In the first parable, we may see, unless we decide, in boredom, to scroll away, that the Lord has given us two types of people. One kind of person is prepper adjacent—a gift beyond my own capabilities, except when I am taking all the children ice-skating, in which case I do always remember to bring a large shopping bag of sandwiches—and the other kind of person has blithely trusted that the Universe has her back and gone dumbly to the feast.
Why doesn’t the foolish one bother to lug along her jug of oil? Jesus doesn’t say. Maybe she believes the waiting time won’t be that long. Maybe she thinks there will be some way to buy oil once she gets there. Maybe she hasn’t thought about it at all. Jesus, though, isn’t talking about ordinary human forgetfulness, else we would all be jumbled in the group of foolish young ladies, of which there are so many examples today.
Jesus deepens the chasm between these two kinds of people in the next parable. There are those who, when entrusted with the Master’s money, use it to make more, and there is the one who, out of fear, decides to do nothing at all. What on earth is Jesus talking about?
It’s actually not that hard. The two different kinds of people are about who knows and who doesn’t know the Bridegroom—the Master. Some know, though we aren’t told why or how they know, that the Bridegroom will eventually show up, that the Master will suddenly reappear. These ones who know desperately want to be ready for him when he gets there. All their decisions in the present are based on true knowledge of this real person whose opinions and judgments and timing determine their destiny. The other ones both haven’t thought about him and what they have thought has been untrue.
Still, when there is all the internet to scroll through for something, anything to be interested in, it is very easy to become muddled about the existence of this person—the Bridegroom, the Master. The clarity with which he has described himself and what he thinks about you might get lost among the pandas.
In order to forestall such a terrible fate, look at the two big errors of the foolish people. The first error is that of not being relentlessly present among those who are waiting for the Bridegroom. Having taken no oil of their own, and having no anxiety about the possible return of the Bridegroom, the foolish virgins wander off to ponder the market stalls. When he comes, they aren’t even there with those who can go into the feast. They are left banging on the door outside. The second error—the one of the man who buries his talent—is that he believes a lie about the Master. The servant believes the Master is “a hard man,” reaping where he did not sow, and gathering where he had scattered no seed. That is a curious thing to believe, given that the Master gave ample information to the servant, and the resources to do what he was asking. It is a tragic thing to have someone put something in your hand and say, “do this,” but then conclude that the giver is insane, or capricious, or has no real thoughts and expectations of his own.
In both cases, the foolish virgin and the wicked servant have not taken the trouble to know to whom they owe their lives and their happiness. Instead, they project onto him who they are. They are capricious, unprepared, thoughtless, and, as Jesus himself points out, wicked.
Summing up the human condition, the Psalmist quotes God: “These things you have done, and I held my tongue, and you thought wickedly that I am such a one as yourself.”
What is he like, then, if he is not like you and me? He is good. He doesn’t scroll through Twitter all night. He doesn’t lie. He gives you everything you need—including the occasional Panda video. All you have to do to find out who he is is to crack open his lovely book and ask him for help, and then go find people who are waiting for him with all their hearts.
Well, if that doesn’t demotivate your internet habit I don’t know what will. Have a nice day!
This is very relevant to a book I am writing/procrastinating. Thanks!
I just finished chapter 1 of a new book called "Wolf in their Pockets." Chapter 1 is called Dethroning Entertainment, so your post is very timely! Thanks for this!