Fourteenth Sunday After Pentecost August 24-25, 2024
“Wide or Narrow?” Luke 13:22-30
Rev. John R. Larson Ascension Lutheran Church Littleton, Colorado
When I was a freshman in college my Advisor was Professor John Saleska. In those initial days of college I went to his office to talk about my schedule for the first semester. It gave him an opportunity to meet one of his overwhelmed students living in Kansas for the first time, 1,000 miles from home. We spoke about life in college, about classes and probably a few other things. And when I walked out of his office he shook my hand and said, “John, keep the Faith.”
Maybe he was warning me. Some young people when they go to college, away from the guiding hand of mom and dad, can lose their faith. Maybe he was telling me that the reality of throwing away my faith was a possibility in my life. “John, keep the Faith.”
Or maybe it was an encouragement. It was the gracious word of one believer speaking to another believer to let God take my soul and let the faith in Him become deeper and greater. “Keep the Faith!!
Keeping the faith is not such an easy thing. There are many obstacles to keeping faith and living in faithfulness. The writer to the Hebrews speaks a warning when they say, “Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” (Hebrews 12:1b)
Jesus acknowledges that keeping faith is not such an easy thing when He gives us 2 petitions in the Lord’s Prayer that speak about the opposition that we will face while we seek to live in God’s will. We pray, “Lead us not into temptation” and “Deliver us from evil (or the evil one)”. The devil, the evil one, is deceptive and lying. He promises that sin will make our life better but it never does. The devil and the sin he promotes will rob us of peace and joy, sleep and rest.
Jesus is asked a question about faith and life, about eternity and damnation. The question is asked rather academically, as if it were another theological question to be debated but Jesus makes it personal. “Someone asked Him, ‘Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?’ He said to them, ‘Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.’” (Luke 13:23-24) Jesus said something very similar to this in the Sermon on the Mount, “Enter through the narrow door. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road to leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)
There are only two paths in life – life or death; heaven or hell. And the road to hell is broad, wide and inviting. It seems to be a road that is easy to find. That road has sin but no repentance. That road may have religion but no true faith. Jesus scorned an empty faith with this dialogue, “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ But he will answer, I don’t know you or where you come from.’ Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers.’” (Luke 13:25-27) Jesus would fail as a politician. He would never get elected for anything. Jesus spoke words that was pointed and hard… and truthful. “Do you think that I have come to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division.” (Luke 12:51) As hard as those words were, these are harder and more bitter. These are words of judgment. These are the words when the door is shut and you’re on the wrong side. It is the word spoken for all those spending their eternity in hell. “’I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers’. There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.” (Luke 13:25b-28)
The wide path will take us there. The way of sin and evil and darkness will take us there. A life where God plays no part in our heart or mind or life will take us there.
But God wants no one there. God wants no one in hell. He wants no one to hear those awful words that say, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers.” John 3:16 is followed by John 3:17, “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.” After Peter preached his first sermon, on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit had convicted his hearers of their sin. “When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’ Peter replied, ‘Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and all who are far off – for all whom the Lord our God will call.’” (Acts 2:38-39)
The path to receive new life and eternal life, the way to have the forgiveness of sins and the joy of heaven is narrow. Jesus says, “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door”, and that door is Christ. Faith in Jesus is the way. Jesus said, “I am the gate; whoever enters through Me will be saved. He will come in and go out and find pasture.” (John 10:9) A few chapters later Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6) The early Christian church would take those words of Jesus and speak them in this manner, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
This way of full salvation is open for us and for all who seek the face of God. The One that was First, who is preeminent over all things, Christ, willingly became last so that we, who are last, would become first. A grand reversal has occurred because that is what God wanted to do for all of us!!
There is a sense of urgency that Jesus places with all of this. In the very next paragraph after our text we read of the heart Jesus has for the lost, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” (Luke 13:34)
Jesus is calling for true repentance and faith in Him. At an orchard and nursery in London, Ontario, Canada, there is a huge sign that reads, “The Best Time to Plant a Tree was 25 Years Ago.” But then they added another sentence to their sign, “The Second Best Time is Today.” Those Canadians are pretty smart, ehh? Jesus speaks inviting words of grace and life to us, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” (Revelation 3:20)
Jesus’ message contains a similar second half – the door is still open and the time to enter is now. If we find ourselves not knowing the One who wants to know us, the time for a new beginning is now. If we find ourselves going through the motions of church or faith but not really being real with God, the time for honesty and integrity with God is now. If we really don’t know Jesus and have no confidence that our last day, as sudden and unexpected as that may be, will be the best day of our life, the beginning of life with our Creator and Redeemer in heaven, then the time to treasure the salvation of Jesus and the welcoming hands of the Father is now. God loves us dearly and wants to bring us eternal joy.
It is time to know that there is a clear path to heaven – it is through the person and work of Jesus Christ. That clear way, that straight way, that narrow way, is not shallow. That way is inviting and open to you, and me, and all. It is the way of His great love that allowed Him to be offered up as our substitute, carrying every sin of indifference, apathy or going through the motions of faith in order that we might be claimed as His own, living as new people, washed in Holy Baptism and fed with a divine meal.
It has been nearly 50 years since Professor Saleska spoke those words to me, “Keep the Faith, John.” I want those to be my words to you. Keep the Faith!! In the midst of great challenges and some difficulties along the way, Keep the Faith. Don’t walk the path that leads to death but take the way that leads to life. Amen!!
(This sermon was originally preached to the saints at Ascension on August 25, 2013.)
