Great and Holy Tuesday is the second day of Holy Week. It’s when the Church remembers Christ as the Bridegroom who comes at midnight, and we hear two parables He taught on His way to the Cross: the Ten Virgins and the Talents.
This isn’t a day about a single event in Jesus’ life like Palm Sunday or Good Friday. Instead, it’s about His teaching. On the Tuesday of His final week, Jesus told stories about being ready, about watching, about not wasting what God gives you. The Church takes those parables and makes them the heart of this day’s services.
The Bridegroom Services
Great Tuesday is one of three “Bridegroom days” at the start of Holy Week. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday all share the same basic structure. We call the main service the Bridegroom Matins, though most parishes serve it the evening before (so Monday night for Tuesday’s observance). If you work the night shift at one of the plants around Beaumont, you might catch it before your rotation starts.
The service centers on a troparion we sing over and over: “Behold, the Bridegroom comes at midnight, and blessed is the servant whom He shall find watching.” It’s haunting. Short. Direct. Many parishes place an icon of Christ the Bridegroom in the center of the church during these services. He’s shown wearing the crown of thorns, hands bound, looking at you with eyes that know exactly what’s coming.
The imagery is bridal. Christ is the Bridegroom. The Church is His Bride. But He’s a Bridegroom walking toward His death, and we’re supposed to be awake when He arrives.
The Parable of the Ten Virgins
The Gospel reading for Great Tuesday is Matthew 25:1-13. Ten bridesmaids waiting for the groom to show up. Five brought extra oil for their lamps. Five didn’t. The groom came late, at midnight, and the five without oil missed the wedding feast entirely.
It’s a story about being prepared. Not in a frantic, anxious way, but in a way that takes the spiritual life seriously. You can’t borrow someone else’s oil at the last minute. You can’t fake readiness. Either you’ve been filling your lamp through prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and repentance, or you haven’t.
The Church reads this parable on Great Tuesday because Holy Week itself is that midnight hour. Christ is coming. Are we ready?
The Parable of the Talents
The second parable is Matthew 25:14-30. A master gives three servants different amounts of money (talents) and goes away. Two invest and double what they were given. One buries his in the ground out of fear. When the master returns, he rewards the faithful servants and condemns the one who did nothing.
This isn’t about your job or your bank account. It’s about what you do with what God gives you: your time, your abilities, your life itself. We’re stewards, not owners. And stewardship means using these gifts, not hiding them because we’re scared or lazy or convinced we’ll fail.
The parables fit together. The Ten Virgins says watch and be ready. The Talents says work while you wait. Both point to the Second Coming, to judgment, to the reality that how we live matters.
Why This Matters Now
If you’re coming from a Baptist or non-denominational background, you might be used to thinking about salvation as a one-time decision. You prayed the prayer, you’re saved, it’s done. Orthodoxy doesn’t work that way. Salvation is a process. We’re being saved. That means today matters. Tomorrow matters. What you do with your life between now and when Christ comes (either at the end of history or at the end of your own life) actually matters.
Great Tuesday puts that reality right in front of us. The services aren’t trying to scare you. They’re trying to wake you up. There’s a difference.
The hymns and readings don’t just talk about the Second Coming as some distant event. They connect it to the Passion. Christ’s death and resurrection are the hinge of history. Everything before pointed to them. Everything after flows from them. And we’re living in that “after,” waiting for Him to return, called to be faithful with what He’s given us.
What Happens at the Service
Most parishes serve Bridegroom Matins on Monday evening for Great Tuesday. You’ll hear the troparion about the Bridegroom at midnight. The Gospel reading will be Matthew 25, those two parables. There’s usually no Divine Liturgy on Great Tuesday itself. The focus is on the hymns, the readings, the slow movement through Holy Week toward Friday and Pascha.
If you’ve never been to a Bridegroom service, go. The church is often darker than usual. The hymns are somber but not depressing. There’s a weight to them. You’re standing there hearing about lamps and talents and a Bridegroom who’s about to die, and it does something to you. It’s supposed to.
Fr. Alexander Schmemann wrote that Holy Week isn’t just about remembering what happened two thousand years ago. It’s about entering into those events now, letting them shape us, being changed by them. Great Tuesday is part of that. You hear the parables, you look at the icon of Christ bound and crowned with thorns, and you ask yourself: Am I ready? Am I using what He’s given me? Or am I asleep?
The Church gives us this day every year because we need it. We forget. We drift. We bury our talents and let our lamps go out. Great Tuesday calls us back. Not with guilt, but with the truth. The Bridegroom is coming. Keep watch.
