Golden Moments Report: "Out of Oil — A Spiritual Lesson from a Fool"

Preached by Elizabeth Lutter | Franklin Avenue Baptist Church | Women's Day 2026

Golden Moment #1: The Fool's Theology Is Closer Than We Think

"We're upset with this fool. However, listen — the things we do and the things we say. Cuz when we say and do things, we say that this God is not omnipresent, that he cannot see us. We say there's no God by what we say and do. And then for two weeks I wrestled. Lord, what was it about those shirts? He said, 'Was it the shirt? Was it the mall?' And he said, 'No, it's the message.' And I said, 'Well, what does that look like, God?' He says, 'They were out of oil and out of order.' Out of oil and out of order."

Why this moment works: Elizabeth takes a seemingly absurd premise — that believers might be functionally saying "there is no God" — and makes it land with convicting force. The transition from the Bestie T-shirts illustration into divine revelation is seamless: a mundane object becomes a prophetic mirror. She builds suspense by wrestling publicly with the question before delivering the answer.

Theologically sound: The theological move here is sophisticated without being academic. By connecting Psalm 14's "fool" not to atheism but to practical functional unbelief, she does what the best expository preaching does — she closes the escape hatch. Listeners cannot dismiss the text as being about someone else. The categories of "out of oil and out of order" become the sermon's interpretive lens and they are biblically grounded in the parable itself.

Why congregants will share it: "Out of oil and out of order" is a phrase that will travel. It is short, rhythmic, and self-explanatory. People will use it this week to describe situations in their own lives and in conversations with friends — which means the theology travels with the phrase.

Golden Moment #2: The Five Ways We Say "There Is No God"

"We all say there's no God by what we say and what we do. Number two, how do we say that God does not exist — by where we go and what we participate in. We say God is not omniscient, that he does not know. Number three, we say it by how we react in a crisis. We say our God is not omnipotent. Number four, how we respond when God says no to our prayer. We say that God is not sovereign. And finally, we say there's no God by how we are living. When we live a certain way, we say to the rest of the world and our family, he's not coming back."

Why this moment works: This is the structural backbone of the sermon delivered with precision and pastoral clarity. Each of the five points maps a behavioral pattern to a theological denial — and each denial corresponds to a divine attribute: omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence, sovereignty, and the promise of Christ's return. The architecture is elegant, and the delivery is cumulative, building weight with each addition.

Rhetorically effective: The parallel construction — "we say there is no God by..." — creates a rhetorical drumbeat that drives the sermon forward. More importantly, it transforms abstract theological categories into lived, recognizable behaviors. Every person in the room can locate themselves in at least one of these five patterns, which is exactly what a convicting sermon requires.

Why congregants will share it: This is the kind of list people write down and photograph. It is teachable, memorable, and transferable. The five-point structure gives listeners a framework they can return to throughout the week when they catch themselves reacting in fear or grumbling at God's no — and recognize what they are actually saying.

Golden Moment #3: Ninety Days Under Conviction

"For 90 days, the spirit of the Lord said to me, as my thoughts were not correct on times — fear, fret, worry, doubt, and negative thinking. Every time I did something, every day, the spirit of the Lord said, 'You're acting like the fool.' For 90 days. The day it stopped was Thursday when I finished the message. But every day, one day six times in a day, the spirit says, 'You're acting like the fool.' So I was so under conviction about it, and that's when he said, 'The fool said there's no God. But the things you say and do or think, you're saying to the people around you, there's no God.'"

Why this moment works: This is the sermon's most vulnerable and therefore most powerful moment. Elizabeth is not preaching from a position of arrival — she is preaching from the middle of a process. Ninety days of conviction is not a quick illustration; it is a sustained testimony of spiritual formation, and that duration gives it weight. The detail that the conviction stopped Thursday when she finished the message is the kind of specific, unpolished detail that only genuine testimony carries.

Pastorally wise: There is profound pastoral wisdom in a preacher confessing that the very message they are delivering was the instrument of their own correction. It dismantles the unspoken assumption that the preacher is exempt from the text. When Elizabeth says "I was so under conviction," she earns the right to call her congregation to the same reckoning. She is not pointing a finger; she is extending a hand.

Why congregants will share it: People are hungry for preachers who have been through something. This moment will be repeated because it gives permission — permission to admit that fear and doubt are not disqualifying, and permission to trust that God is patient enough to spend 90 days making one point until it lands.

Golden Moment #4: You Cannot Borrow Salvation

"They tell them, 'Give us some of your oil.' Verse 1-2, Jesus says, 'In my kingdom, this is what it looks like. There's going to be some who are wise and some who are foolish. And the foolish are going to go and ask the wise for oil. Let me tell you — you cannot borrow salvation. And you want to know about a real fool from the Bible? There were more words about fools in the Bible than there were wise. He did not say you were acting like a fool. He said you were acting like one of the foolish women. He did not call her a fool. Wise man, take note today. He says you're acting like it.'"

Why this moment works: "You cannot borrow salvation" is the sermon's sharpest theological declaration, and it lands like a gavel. Elizabeth moves from exegesis to proclamation in a single sentence. The surrounding context — the foolish virgins asking the wise for oil — makes the declaration exegetically earned rather than merely rhetorical. She then immediately pivots to Job's wife, adding a layer of nuance that demonstrates genuine biblical range.

Theologically sound: The distinction between being a fool and acting like one is quietly profound. It protects the dignity of the person while confronting the behavior — a distinction with deep pastoral and even missiological implications. The point about Job not calling his wife a fool is careful, compassionate exegesis that rewards attentive listeners.

Why congregants will share it: "You cannot borrow salvation" will be quoted in conversations, especially in families where one member is leaning on another's faith. It is the kind of sentence that sticks because it is simultaneously obvious and startling — something everyone knows but rarely hears stated so plainly.

Golden Moment #5: Dr. Graham Knew My Name

"Dr. Graham had been introduced to me for just that short time, but he knew my name. He knew my name. 50 years ago, I walked up the aisle the year I just surrendered my whole life to the Lord. I walked that aisle three times that year. I wanted to be certain that when Jesus came back that I was going with him — three times that year. And the Lord said to me, 'Don't you come up this aisle one more time. You sit down and you study my word, and you will know me and I will know you.' The last part we said — why do we assume that just because we say we know God that it means that God knows us?"

Why this moment works: This is the sermon's emotional and theological apex. Elizabeth weaves together three strands — the Billy Graham breakfast, her own conversion story, and the parable's haunting "I don't know you" — into a single, luminous moment. The movement from a five-year-old watching a small TV to sitting at Graham's table is itself a testimony of God's faithfulness. But the pivot to God's word to her at the altar — you will know me and I will know you — is where the illustration becomes revelation.

Theologically sound: The question "why do we assume that just because we say we know God it means that God knows us?" is the most searching theological question in the sermon. It reframes the parable's closing line — "I don't know you" — not as divine rejection but as divine honesty, and it calls the congregation to examine the mutuality of their relationship with God. This is careful, courageous theology.

Why congregants will share it: The Graham story is memorable on its own, but the theological payload — God knowing us, not just us knowing God — is what people will carry home. It reframes how listeners think about assurance, about spiritual intimacy, and about what it means to truly be known by the Lord they claim to serve.

Golden Moment #6: The Altar Call as Covenant

"Officially, I am surrendering my place. And Jasmine and I are sitting here because we're committing to live out loud for Jesus. We're making sure that with our lives today, we are saying there is a God in heaven. There is a God in heaven. And we're going to say it by what we say. We're going to say it by what we do. We're going to say it by how we react. We're going to say it by how we respond. We're going to say it by how we're living. So no family, no friend, no church member, and no neighbor will get there and the doors are shut."

Why this moment works: Elizabeth does not merely invite people to an altar — she goes first, and she goes with her daughter-in-law, making the moment simultaneously personal, ecclesial, and generational. The structure of the response mirrors the structure of the sermon: the five ways we say "there is no God" become five ways we will now say "there is a God." It is one of the most organically unified sermon conclusions in recent memory.

Rhetorically effective: The callback to the sermon's five-point structure in the invitation is masterful. It transforms the altar call from an emotional appeal into a theological covenant. Each "we're going to say it by..." is not a repetition — it is a reversal, a direct answer to each of the five convictions the sermon surfaced. The congregation hears the structure close and it satisfies at a deep level.

Why congregants will share it: The image of a first lady publicly surrendering her place and walking to the altar with the incoming first lady is the kind of moment people describe to those who weren't there. But the words she spoke while doing it — "no family, no friend, no church member, and no neighbor will get there and the doors are shut" — give the image its lasting theological meaning.

A Final Word to the Pastor

Elizabeth, your greatest strength in this sermon is your theological courage paired with personal transparency. You did not preach a comfortable Women's Day message. You preached a searching, convicting sermon that held up a mirror to the congregation — and to yourself — and refused to let anyone off the hook. That takes a particular kind of preaching confidence that is rare and deeply needed.

The thread that ties every golden moment together is the theme of testimony as theology. In this sermon, you did not separate your personal experience from the biblical text — you wove them together so that your ninety days of conviction, your three trips down the aisle, and the Billy Graham breakfast all became exegetical evidence for what the parable is actually teaching. That instinct — to let your life illuminate the text — is a genuine preaching gift. Lean into it.

The structural instinct you demonstrated — building a five-point framework and then reversing it in the altar call — is the kind of craft that separates good preachers from great ones. You may not have named it that way, but you did it intuitively. Trust that instinct. Your mind organizes truth in ways that listeners can carry with them, and that is a mercy to your congregation.

Preach with this same fearlessness. The willingness to say "for 90 days I was acting like the fool" is what made the room lean in. People do not need a preacher who has arrived — they need one who is honest about the journey. You gave them that, and they will not forget it.