The Narrow Gate

Sam Powell

Luke • Sermon • Submitted 2 years ago

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The gate to eternal life doesn't look like me. It looks like Jesus. This is why so many can't find it.

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Prayer

O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

The hills and mountains burst with your praise; the sun, moon and stars dance at your command

The inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers in your sight, and yet you love us.

We are your people, your sheep, the work of your hands. It is you that have made us, and not we ourselves.

Our personalities, our talents, our hands and our feet, our tongues, were all fashioned by you in our mother’s wombs and there is not a word on our tongue that you do not know altogether.

And yet we are often distrustful of that goodness and power. We still live and move as if we have our being in ourselves, as if we have come from chance, rather than designed by your powerful hand.

And so this morning we again offer ourselves to you.

Take these hands and make them instruments of righteousness. Take these feet and make them beautiful on the mountains – bringing tidings of peace and hope to the world. Take these lips and let our words be as nuggets of gold and rare jewels falling from our tongues. May our words breath life and hope and peace.

Forgive us our many sins against you, and cause us again to walk uprightly before you. Fill us with your spirit and we will shout your praises. Give us clean hearts and we will serve you in sincerity and truth.

For how can we live unless you give us life? How can we love unless you give us your spirit? How can we speak unless you give us breath?

Breath in us new life, Father.

Deliver us from the rage and despair of the evil one. Take away the evil doer from our sight and destroy the works of iniquity. Protect us from the lawless and unjust man.

Bless our governor and our president. Bless our assemblymen and our national leaders. Give a spirit of wisdom and justice and sound thinking. May sobriety reign and foolishness be torn down.

We pray for peace – give us peace in our bodies; peace in our souls; peace with one another; peace with creation. And give us peace going forward. Deliver us from both tyranny and from anarchy, and may order and justice flow as rivers of water.

May our lives and our words magnify your name and bring peace in whatever circles you have placed us and may your kingdom come – grant that we submit ourselves always more and more to you and to your word until Jesus comes again.

Father we are dependent upon you for our life and breath, and we acknowledge that, and we praise your goodness to us. Create in us hearts that trust and rely on you, and give us our food today. Give us the portion that is fitting for us and give us contented hearts that rest in you.

And father, we pray that you would protect us from wildfires, from drought and from heat. We pray that you would be merciful to us. You can bring water from the rock and so we wait on you for every good thing. Bless the crops. Provide our needs. Send rain in due season.

Bless those fighting cancer. Be merciful to those who are sick. Bring the wandering ones home.

Bless the preaching of your word wherever it takes place today. Bless my lips in the reading and preaching of your word. Guide my tongue.

And give us hearts ready to hear and to obey,

(and together)

And may the words of our mouths and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.

In Jesus’ name,

Amen

Scripture

Luke 13:22–30 NKJV

22 And He went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem. 23 Then one said to Him, “Lord, are there few who are saved?” And He said to them, 24 “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able. 25 When once the Master of the house has risen up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open for us,’ and He will answer and say to you, ‘I do not know you, where you are from,’ 26 then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets.’ 27 But He will say, ‘I tell you I do not know you, where you are from. Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity.’ 28 There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and yourselves thrust out. 29 They will come from the east and the west, from the north and the south, and sit down in the kingdom of God. 30 And indeed there are last who will be first, and there are first who will be last.”

Sermon

As image bearers of God, we have a sense of personhood. We want to know who we are. We have a concept of ourselves as opposed to others.

I am me - not you. I am this, not that. In order to have any concept of myself, I have to be able to discern between this and that.

This is why the term “color blind” is so offensive to people of color. Who really wants to have their identity erased? I was born white. I was born male. I was born at the tail end of the boomers, but I’m really an honorary gen-xer.

All of this plays an important part of my own self-consciousness. I am not black. I am not a woman. I am not a teenager anymore. Age, skin color, cultural expectations, sex, relationship with parents and siblings - all play vital roles in who we are as individuals.

I grew up with the Kent State riots, Watergate, hippies, the aftermath of the civil rights movement, All in the Family and Happy Days were on the TV. We weren’t allowed to watch All in the Family because it was too liberal. Norman Lear was a communist out to destroy America. All of these cultural things affected me.

I attended Reagan rallies, wore members-only jackets and dressed like Sonny on Miami Vice. I was raising kids during the grunge era and missed it entirely.

All of these are facts. All of these shaped who I am - as well as many other factors. My knowledge of my personhood is “I am this. not that.”

I was born an individual, but also with a need for relationship. This is where talking and listening come in.

If I want to understand women, I need to listen to women. Their experiences are different than mine.

A black man’s experience will be different than mine. If I want to know if there is a justifiable fear of the police among the black citizens, I cannot go by my own experience, because I am not black and have never been followed by a security guard in a store. I’ve never been pursued and question because of the color of my skin. I have never been pulled over by the police just to see if I was up to no good.

I also am not a woman. I have never thought about an escape plan while entering into a restaurant on a blind date. I have never had to think through safety rules when I walk through a garage. I have never hesitated walking out of Winco after the sun has gone down. No one has ever stared at my chest while talking to me and I have never had anyone bounce their eyes.

I was too fearful in high school to have ever tried marijuana or alcohol, and no one ever offered it. I have no idea what I would have done if they had.

The height of wickedness in the culture I grew up in was to be caught listening to rock and roll music, and for the most part I was too fearful of my father’s rejection and anger to have attempted it.

So when I bought my first recording at the age of 13, it was John Denver.

So I also have no concept of what it is to be a rebel. To be skirting danger all the time. I have never been arrested. Never been in jail. I’ve always paid my tickets. Never got a parking ticket. Never attracted the attention of the dean of students in school.

For most of my life, I’ve been poor. White. Law abiding. Republican. I’ve paid my taxes without grumbling and I’ve done everything right. This is me and it in some ways is the same as you, and in other ways it is different than you.

And one of the biggest wake up calls I’ve ever had was when I realized that the door to heaven isn’t shaped like me.

wrath and pride

Our longing for identity and knowledge of who we are is given to us by God. We all, as human beings, are persons in his image and therefore we long to know ourselves and to be known by others.

But there are two other unwelcome intruders into our hearts:

One, there is the knowledge of the wrath of God that is written in all of us. We all have the concept that some are righteous and acceptable, and others are not and worthy of being cast out and rejected. But because we are fallen, we twist that view of God’s wrath into something more tolerable for the human heart.

The second idea is pride.

All of us naturally believe in our hearts that the door to heaven looks just like us and fits us perfectly.

Cain wanted to door to be shaped like him. Esau was angry that it wasn’t shaped like him.

Today, hearing how many in the church talk to people, the door to heaven is shaped - white, male, middle class, American, manly, hairy - but not too much, bearded… 40 years ago, the beard was the mark of a hippie and no respectable minister would ever wear a beard. Now it is the mark of a Reformed man. And no respectable minister would ever NOT have a beard.

Those are my circles. In other circles, perhaps the door is something else.

We who are reformed want a door that is shaped like John Calvin, or John Knox, if that is your bent. Or Zwingli. Or Luther. We cannot bear the fact that Calvin was a sinner too, or that perhaps he was wrong about something.

In the modern day, the door might look like John Piper, or John MacArthur, or Doug Wilson. When one critiques the theology of one of the doorkeepers, you haven’t just attacked a system of thought, you have waged war on identity. This is why the is such tremendous pushback. You can say whatever you want about the local pastor, but the celebrity pastor is linked to my identity!

Few are saved

But here is what our flesh knows for sure. There are a few that are saved, and they all look like me, talk like me, have my experiences and my interpretation of those experiences.

There are few that are saved, and they all go through the door that is shaped like me.

A black man might enter into heaven, but only if he thinks like I do. A woman might enter into heaven, but only if she keeps her mouth shut and lets me do the talking.

A rebel, maybe, but only if he’s cleaned up his act. Definitely not those whose sins I deem to be too icky to make it through.

They must be happy, well-adjusted, know how to discipline children my way, and know how to keep their women in line.

They have to know how to keep the Sabbath, which sacrifices are appropriate to offer and be as well-versed in the law as I am.

A baptist, perhaps, but only by the skin of his teeth

I once heard a man say, “A catholic might be saved, but it would be only by the grace of God...” and then he got a funny look, as if he just heard what he said…as if there were any other way.

The door looks like me and anyone who enters must look like me to get in. This is why it is so easy to find.

This is the question Jesus was asked. Are there few that are saved?

This was the argument among all the schools of thought in Jesus’ time. There are only a few who will make it to heaven - and they are all like us.

“Are there few who are saved?”

Jesus doesn’t answer the question fully, here. He simply turns the question on the individual - strive to enter the narrow gate.

The point is not that it is restricted - although it is. The point is that it is hidden and hard to see. And the reason it is hard to see is because

The narrow gate looks like Jesus

John 14:6 NKJV

6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

The Jews believed it was in their heritage as children of Abraham. The rich believed they were entitled to it.

The righteous ones believe that the entrance is for those who have slaved hard enough for the master.

I’ve done everything right - and Jesus said, “I never knew you.”

Our pride convinces us that we will know exactly what the door looks like. It looks like me.

It fits my righteousness, my experience, my identity, my friends, my family upbringing, my culture, my generation, my theology, my church affiliation...

And that is why we miss the door. We sit week after week in the pews listening to Christ alone, received by faith alone, by grace alone...

And then we put our trust in our theological acumen, our style of dress, our bank accounts, our covenant faithfulness, our conference attendance, our works of charity - or our culture and our identity. My pride smiles at the garments I sewed over the years of my experiences, and says, “Back in my day we did it like this, and we turned out just fine."

And we miss the door, because we cannot accept the fact that maybe we didn’t turn out just fine. Maybe we needed a savior, just like everyone else did. Maybe we still do.

And this is why we miss it. Because Jesus said, “No one comes to the father, except by me.”

This can’t possibly be right. One commentary that I read on the narrow gate wrote this:

Luke & Acts (Commentary)

A long, steady, unrelenting obedience in the same direction that Jesus was taking was called for on the part of his true disciples.

Wow.

But Jesus said, “my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

And then here is says, “Strive to enter the narrow gate.” How do we put these together?

If Jesus meant by this that it is hard work and if we apply enough effort we just might make it through - they never would have crucified him.

That is exactly what the Pharisees taught.

Paul wrote

Galatians 5:11 NKJV

11 And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased.

In our text, Jesus is saying exactly what he said in John. I am the way. No one comes to the father except by me.

And that is why we miss it. In fact, Jesus said

John 6:44–45 NKJV

44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. 45 It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me.

And again in John 3

John 3:3 NKJV

3 Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Jesus is freely offered to all - there is no catch, no price, no demands, and nothing that we need to do to prepare ourselves. We simply come. Just as I am without one plea. But we won’t even see the door unless we are taught by God.

Many might accept him into their hearts, build an entire system of ethics based on his words. Listen to him preach in their streets and maybe even eat and drink saying, “Bless this food, in Jesus name, amen.”

But unless they are taught by God, they will walk right past the gate that leads to eternal life over and over and over again.

Because the gate that leads to eternal life is Jesus.

And if that is true, then the Gentiles can also enter. And Abel. And Rahab - the harlot! And that infernal woman that drives you crazy.

And those people who wrestled with same sex attraction their whole lives.

And that guy who always knows the wrong thing to say and says it.

The guy with anxiety; the introvert, the extrovert. The social butterfly and the one whose worst nightmare is a wedding reception. The rich man. The poor man.

The guy with the BLM hat on. And the guy with the “all lives matter” hat on. Jesus had every political extreme in his 12 disciples - but they left it all behind to follow HIM.

That guy can come? Really??

Even those who never heard the word “reformed”; who haven’t read the Westminster divines in the original Latin.

Who have felt outcast and alone their whole lives, and who just aren’t our kind of people.

They are like Abel - that guy. Whatever..

The entrance looks like Jesus. Not like me.

And who does Jesus invite? All who come to him.

So why does he say “strive”

We get our English word “Agonize” from this Greek word. It seems to imply hard labor. If the door is Jesus, and the invitation is free and we buy the living water without money, without price - what is the striving?

Matthew 13:18–23 NKJV

18 “Therefore hear the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside. 20 But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. 22 Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. 23 But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”

The invitation of the gospel is exactly as Jesus said it is.

But the devil never quits. The attack is real. The curse is real. The fear is real.

In Jesus day and in the days of the apostles, as soon as anyone confessed Christ, they would frequently lose their family, their community, their homes, their jobs. The sun would get hot quickly.

The cross is a great offence - it does two things.

First - it declares to the world that there is no hope in anything in the flesh. All of your philosophy, your religion, your views on gender roles, your sense of morality, your sabbath keeping, your culture and your identity are all born of Adam - and that which is born of the flesh is flesh.

And second, it declares to the world that you are also redeemable, but not by anything in yourself.

“The justice and truth of God required that satisfaction for our sins could be made in no other way than by the death of the Son of God.”

And the world hates that.

The devil hates that.

And my own flesh hates that.

And so to keep the cross before our eyes, we strive. And often times, that striving looks a lot like wrestling with God. We wrestle to rest. We strive to cease from our striving. We labor to enter the Sabbath of God.

When our families abandon us. When illness attacks.

When the thorn in the flesh assaults us. When our friends revile us. When those we broke bread with want us dead.

At those times it is easy to say, “I’m done. I want a wider gate.”

But there isn’t one. Its the death and resurrection of Jesus alone, or it isn’t anything.

And so we strive, and in that striving we leave bits of ourselves behind. It is the nature of the narrow gate.

We leave behind our prejudices, we leave behind our trust in our culture and our trust in our works and our wisdom and our beauty.

And we look square at our ugly mugs - full of fear and anxiety and sorrow and anger - and we say again, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

What does wrestling with God look like?

Psalm 42:1–5 NKJV

1 As the deer pants for the water brooks, So pants my soul for You, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, While they continually say to me, “Where is your God?” 4 When I remember these things, I pour out my soul within me. For I used to go with the multitude; I went with them to the house of God, With the voice of joy and praise, With a multitude that kept a pilgrim feast. 5 Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him For the help of His countenance.

Jacob wrestled with God all night long - and he prevailed. He won, because God upheld him with one hand, even while God was trying to cast him down with the other hand.

Instead of saying, “I’m done. this is too hard.”

Say with Jacob, “I will not let go until you bless me”. And God blessed him. He walked with a limp the rest of his life because God also wounded him. So he leaned on the top of his staff - but that’s another story.

The devil assails us for evil, but God is purifying us. God is taking our affections off of the things that we put so much pride in so that we will have only one object in our sight, one heart, one goal - Christ, and him crucified.

Philippians 3:7–11 NKJV

7 But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, 11 if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

This is what agonizing to enter the narrow gate looks like.

The agonizing isn’t over meeting the requirements for entering, for there are none.

It is learning to count everything else as dung. That is a process. It is called “Repentance”. And there is no option. If we are His, the wrestling will come. Jacob didn’t have a choice. Job didn’t have a choice. David didn’t have a choice. We wrestle, because we are his. Wrestle to enter the narrow God. Strive to come by Christ alone.

And here is the beautiful thing - when we have found Christ, he doesn’t throw away all of our culture and distinctions. He redeems them. He could have just cast the whole human race into hell and started over.

But he didn’t. He redeems us as he made us. In all of our glorious differences and experiences and voices, so that we might learn to listen to one another, love one another, validate each others voices, and learn and grow together.

If we miss Christ, though - there is no eternal life. Jesus describes hell as a place of conscious, eternal torment. It is a dire warning to his generation, plus every generation.

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are at the table for only one reason. They came by the door. They came by Christ. They were all such different personalities, with different experiences. All of them weighed down by sin and misery - but all of them found Christ. And when the weight of life crushed down on them, they held fast.

That is the warning. What happens when the sun gets hot? Do you run? do you erect an idol that fits your personality better?

What if God brings into the fold people who aren’t like you? Then what? Do you run? Do you try to build another doorway that looks like you?

Relationships

If the door to heaven doesn’t look like me, but looks like Jesus - then our relationships with one another changes - for I no longer have to look like you and you no longer have to look like me. All of us together strive to look like Jesus.

Ephesians 4:11–16 NKJV

11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.

This is why we come together. This is why we meet together. Not to validate our own cultural experiences, but to grow together into him who is the head, even Christ, and do it with our wonderful diversity and humanity and personhood intact.

If the door looks like Jesus and he is the only way, then we can - indeed must - look like him. Lay aside hatred and wrath and malice. And learn to love, as he loved.