Six Causes of Oil Leaks
On Sunday we reflected on the parable of the wise and foolish virgins from the beginning of Matthew 25. The great mark of the wise was their readiness with ample oil for their lamps.
What causes the oil to run low? To leak?
1. Assimilation (Ephesus, Pergamum, Thyatira)
The church in Ephesus or here in America is not undiscipled, it is misdiscipled. We are being discipled by consumer culture. We follow what we love. Ephesus had lost their first love, and so have we.
2. Persecution (Smyrna, Philadelphia), also the Thessalonian church
Persecution can push and strengthen the church that has roots, or it can push over the church that is not well rooted.
1 Thess 3.1 Therefore when we could bear it no longer, we were willing to be left behind at Athens alone,
2 and we sent Timothy, our brother and God's coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith,
3 that no one be moved by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we are destined for this.
4 For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know.
5 For this reason, when I could bear it no longer, I sent to learn about your faith, for fear that somehow the tempter had tempted you and our labor would be in vain.
3. Complacency (Sardis, Laodicea)
This is the slow leak of oil. Drip, drip, drip. Before you know it, you ask, "What happened to my oil?" Laodicea was lukewarm.
Darrell Johnson, "You who are married: remember what it felt like to be engaged? Remember who simple life was? The only thing that mattered was being with her or him. Amazing how it worked--we found all kinds of time. Being in live does that--it simplifies things." From "Discipleship On The Edge" Regent College Publishing, 2004.
4. Distraction by less important matters
1 Tim 1.3 As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine,
4 nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith.
5 The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
6 Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion,
7 desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.
5. Legalism
If complacency is the slow drip of oil loss, legalism will dump your oil out. I said legalism will exhaust you, but Deb said, "legalism will kill you." She's right.
Galatians 4.8 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.
9 But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?
10 You observe days and months and seasons and years!
11 I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.
1 Cor 15.1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand,
2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you-unless you believed in vain.
6. Distraction by this present world
2 Tim 4.10 For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.
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