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Kingdom Choice: Enter by the Narrow Gate
Matt 7:13-14
I love maps. I always have. I remember being in kindergarten, sitting at my kitchen table tracing a map of Texas, then labelling it. I remember being in elementary school, sitting in the passenger seat of our family car looking at a roadmap trying to figure out what town was next on our family road trip. I loved looking at an atlas trying to plot the best route. Before google maps, people consulted atlases to try to find the best route. There even used to be roads that had green dots along them that indicated that highway as a “scenic route.” Such routes might take longer, but the beautiful drive might make up for the slight detour.
Whether you choose to take the most direct route and get there as fast as possible with the fewest stops, or you decide to take a more scenic route and make a few stops along the way, the most important factor in route planning is the destination. Easy, comfortable, or enjoyable routes are only good things if they still get you to the destination. Hard, difficult, or dull roads are endurable as long as they do get you to where you want to go.
When it comes to the destination of life, many in our society don’t think there is one. They say things like “life is about the journey” and “enjoy the ride.” But just like a good road trip, it’s hard to enjoy your life if you don’t know where you are headed. “Where you are headed” means more than just what happens to you when you die. It means, what kind of life will you have? No matter how much fun you try to pack into life, unless you have a clear picture of where you are trying to get to, you will ultimately end in heartache.
Life is about choice. Learning to choose well is essential. Many people feel lost and don’t know which way
to go. In today’s passage, Jesus shows His followers the right way to take. He is coming to the end of His Sermon. It has been full of teaching that ran contrary to many people’s expectations. Now He issues a challenge. The last few verses of the Sermon on the Mount point us in the right direction and tell us we have a choice to make.
Following Jesus Leads to Life – “the way...that leads to life”
Jesus presents His followers a choice between two paths. The first question of any path should be not how comfortable or easy it is, but where does it go? Jesus says that these two paths lead to opposite destinations. One leads to life, the other to destruction.
Sometimes we focus too much on the path that leads to destruction and misunderstand what Jesus is saying. He isn’t saying that He will punish everyone that takes the wrong path. He is saying that path naturally heads towards destruction. Destruction and Death are not an external and arbitrary decree of God imposed on people who mistakenly make a poor choice. Jesus said in John 3:17, “For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” God didn’t send Jesus to judge to world. He doesn’t have to judge sin because sin judges itself. Paul wrote in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God gives life, not death. It is sin that gives death. Death is the wages that sin pays out.
Jesus isn’t threatening hell in His choice of two paths. He is offering life. We need to realize that Hell is not an evangelism strategy. Yes, Hell exists. But Jesus doesn’t use it to persuade people to follow Him. To people whose lives are broken by sin, He offers to point them towards the path to life. That is what He is saying in this passage.
We are all looking for the path that will lead us to life. Most of us are just mistaken about what actually brings life. Jesus isn’t trying to scare you. He is trying to show you the way. The way out of the mess you have
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