Two Ways to Live
Matthew 7:13-14
December 8, 2002

            What are you going to do with the Sermon on the Mount? That question lingers on the mind as all of us face the Lord's contrast of two gates and two roads - two ways to live. There are two ways, and only two ways to live. Jesus Christ describes both. The narrow way of the kingdom is life. The popular way of the masses is destruction. Try as you please, you cannot find a middle road to travel through life. That is the point that Jesus makes by repetitive images: two ways, two trees, two fruits, and two foundations.

            I realize that such language is very discomforting for the modern mind. We want some of the benefits of kingdom life, e.g., forgiveness, peace, God's provisions, and eternal hope. But kingdom benefits belong only to those that have entered the narrow gate described by Christ. A few weeks ago when I was returning from visiting with my father-in-law in Colorado, I sat next to a forty-year old lady on the flight. We engaged in talk on spiritual issues. She lived in Salt Lake City. Of course, my first thought was that she was a Mormon; but that proved a wrong conclusion. She was originally from Chile, raised a nominal Roman Catholic, and had tried various churches since living in Salt Lake City, including a Baptist Church. But she asserted, "I cannot believe in God." At that very moment we passed over the snow-covered Rockies in its entire splendor. I directed her attention out the small window. "How can you look at that sight and not believe in the God that created it?"

            Our discussion continued. She said that she believed in Jesus Christ and that he died for us. I thought that to be quite interesting when she did not even believe in God. So I continued to probe concerning her understanding, and to point her to the teaching of God's Word. And then the real issue came to the surface. After explaining the gospel, and exhorting her to consider the gospel and believe, she admitted, "I don't want to change." Though she had confessed her misery in life and even bitterness over a number of circumstances, and though she expressed her admiration of those that walked with Christ, she admitted that she would like the benefits of kingdom life but not the way of kingdom life. Her situation is not unusual. It takes a serious mind, and changed affections to desire the narrow way of kingdom life described by our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount.

The narrow way stays in the shadow of the cross, and brings with it the reproach of the cross in this life. And that is the way Jesus Christ commands. You must enter the narrow gate to know kingdom life. Have you entered the narrow gate?

 

I. The call for decision

            Our Lord begins with a command, and then explains why He makes such a command. "Enter through the narrow gate." There is no hesitation by Christ, in light of our spiritual plight as sinners and in light of the effectiveness of His redemptive work, to call for each of us to enter the narrow gate of relationship to Christ. Outside of the narrow gate there is no hope for eternity. Outside of the narrow gate there is no pleasing God. After explaining the narrow way of life in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus Christ calls for decisiveness in each one of us to become kingdom citizens - followers of Christ.

 

            1. Christ commands

            "Enter through the narrow gate." There are no voices in the world calling for such decisiveness. That comes from Christ alone. But perhaps you think Christ to be presumptuous, and even disruptive to dare and command you to enter through the narrow gate. How can He make such a command? It is one thing for Him to make a suggestion, "Will you please consider the idea of entering through the narrow gate?" But He does not suggest or offer an opinion or give us several options. He commands that we enter through the narrow gate to know kingdom life.

            Jesus Christ has the right to make such a command. He is the Creator and Sovereign over all creation. "All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being" (John 1:3). "For by Him al things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities - all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together" (Col 1:16-17). The only reason that you exist this day is due to the pleasure of the Creator - Christ the Lord. Have you come to terms with this reality? It is arrogant to think that you exist by your own doing and for your own pleasure. Yet multitudes live in such a way by denying the command of Christ to enter the narrow gate.

            But we must be quite clear at this point. Jesus Christ being your Creator is not enough. For the condition of your heart apart from divine grace is one of spiritual deadness and darkness. You stand at enmity against Him. You have nothing to offer the Creator to assuage His anger against you for your sin. Yet the command to "enter through the narrow gate" is not a cruel trick, demanding something of you that is impossible, though indeed, it is impossible on your part. You have nothing to commend yourself to God so that you might enter the narrow gate. But that which is impossible with men is possible with God! The Creator has become your Redeemer so that you might obey His command to enter through the narrow gate. As Paul records, "And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach" (Col 1:21-22). The narrow gate is none other than the way of the cross. Christ Himself has become the door - the narrow gate to life. "I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture" (John 10:9).

            The question that each of us must face this day is clear: have we entered through the narrow gate? Have you considered the high honor that is yours to have heard the gospel many times, and heard the call of Christ to "enter through the narrow gate?" Millions of people have never heard the name of Jesus Christ in their language or the offer of the gospel. They have no copy of the Scriptures. They have no missionaries or gospel preachers or Christian witnesses among them. They are taught to worship stone or wooden images, or to worship ancestors or the sun. Hundreds of millions are forced to follow the teachings of Islam or Hinduism or Buddhism or animistic religions. To do differently would mean ostracizing by their families and communities, or imprisonment or even death. Yet today you have the rare privilege of hearing the command of Jesus Christ, "Enter through the narrow gate."  To defy obedience to this command is to deny Jesus Christ. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones expressed it, "Some of us suffer so much from the tendency just to contemplate the Christian life without doing anything about it" [The Sermon on the Mount, II, 230]. Is that what you have been doing, just contemplating the Christian life - maybe for months or years - but still you have done nothing to obey Christ's command?

 

            2. Christ commands specifically

            But notice that Christ's command is quite specific: "Enter through the narrow gate." He sets both the meaning and parameters of what He commands. The narrow gate gives us a vivid picture of someone before a small opening in the wall, perhaps one that is not easily noticed unless one looks for it diligently. There it is - small, narrow, constricting. To pass through this gate means that you cannot carry any baggage with you nor can you carry another person with you. It is an uncomfortable gate -- one that claims everything in your life. You must go through alone, empty-handed. On your hands and knees, stripped of your baggage, your grip loosened from all other things, you make your way through the gate. You feel it gripping your sides. You wonder if you can even make it through, as though a grown man attempts to go through the miniature opening of a child's playhouse. Or better yet, a camel attempts to go through the eye of a needle. The narrow gate squeezes you, constricts you, and virtually crushes you as you enter. All that you were before the gate, you are no more. The narrow gate has taken that from you. All the sin that you carried, bearing it as a great burden like Bunyan's Pilgrim, is stripped from you so that you bear that sin no more. You do not enter this gate unwillingly because it is too constricting to just happen through. Nor do you enter the gate as an experiment as though you will try out the narrow gate and the narrow way of life for a while to see what it is like. Once you enter the narrow gate there is no returning to the life of enmity and rebellion that you had known before, indeed there is no desire to return to such a way of life. Have you entered through the narrow gate?

            It is obvious that Jesus Christ did not study marketing strategy. The narrow gate is unpopular, costly, constricting, demanding, and often lonely. It is the call to die to yourself, and to follow Jesus Christ, bearing your cross daily. It is the demand to have no other master or lord. Jesus does not give options on several different ways to enter into kingdom life; if one does not suite you then choose another. Jesus Christ demands of each of us a choice - enter through the narrow gate, or continue on the broad way of destruction. "Everybody resents being forced with the necessity of a choice," writes John Stott. "But Jesus will not allow us to escape it" [Christian Counter- Culture, 196]. He does not hesitate to demand that you turn from your idols and careless affections, and set your whole heart upon Him by entering through the narrow gate of faith in Him alone. Such narrowness does not allow for the "easy-going syncretism" [Stott, 193] that combines Christian belief with homespun religion, or a little gospel with cultural morality, or a little religion with living however you please. Christ demands that we go His way - the way of the cross - or we will not enter through the narrow gate into life.

            Christ commands us to enter through the narrow gate because the natural course of life is to resist the narrow, constricting way of the kingdom. "Indecision is fatal because it means wrong decision," writes Lloyd-Jones. "Passive resistance is resistance; if we are not for Him we are against Him" [235]. And so Jesus Christ sets forth kingdom life to us in the Sermon on the Mount, and in light of this tells us, "Enter through the narrow gate." Have you entered through the narrow gate?

 

            3. Christ explains

            So that we do not misunderstand, Jesus explains what He means by the narrow gate command. "For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it." He uses two different words to describe the kind of life that the Christian enters. The "small" gate is the same term used earlier and is rightly translated as narrow, small, or little. The word translated as "narrow" that describes the "way" or road that leads to life, is better expressed as restrictive, tight, pressing. What Jesus means is that the way to life is not the easy road, but it will be demanding, and may have with it various levels of persecution and affliction and opposition. I am trying to be as honest as I can with this text. The more I contemplate it the more deficient I find much of popular Christianity to be in light of the narrow gate and narrow way leading to life. In fact, Jesus Christ has just described the narrow way leading to life in the Sermon on the Mount. Kingdom life is unlike anything the world has to offer. It is as though He says, "There it is. There is kingdom life. You must enter the narrow gate to go the way of kingdom life. How narrow the gate and restrictive the way that leads to life, and few are the ones finding it."

            The small gate implies restricted entry into the kingdom. There are not multiple gates but one, solitary, small gate. It is the way of repentance and faith in Christ. "There are few who find it," Jesus tells us, because it is small and restrictive. Most look for a type of Christianity that is not too demanding or costly in terms of personal sacrifice or obedience. I'm afraid that such Christianity is being offered far too often, and it is not the type that Christ refers to in our text. The small gate is difficult to locate because it is not understood with mere human intellect. It can only be found by revelation - that is by the revealing work of the Holy Spirit through the gospel. The small gate also implies there are no group entries. Tour buses are not welcome. We come to faith in Christ one by one. Constantine's command for mass conversion to Christianity is not entering through the narrow gate, as Christ demanded. A government cannot make Christianity the law of the land, and suddenly everyone becomes a Christian.

            But you will notice that Jesus not only describes the entry point but also the continuing life of kingdom citizens: "and the way is narrow [restricting, pressing, squeezing, confining] that leads to life." Our Lord does not hesitate in the least to deny the spirit of accommodation so popular in our day that allows virtually anything in our lives as long as we deem it to be Christian. He has explained His way in the Sermon. Matthew 5-7 tells us what a kingdom citizen's character, attitude, behavior, and practice looks like. "It is a fact that revealed truth imposes a limitation on what Christians may believe, and revealed goodness on how we may behave" [Stott, 194]. Don Carson is right, "the more hesitation there is about going Christ's way wholeheartedly, without reserve, the more confining his way seems. However, the more enthusiasm there is for following him regardless of personal opinion or peer pressure, regardless of cost, the more liberating his way appears" [The Sermon on the Mount, 124].

            It is this very truth that caused the parting of the ways with some that claimed to be followers of Christ. Read the story for yourself in John six. Once these fair weather followers of Christ began to understand the demands of the gospel of Christ, they found it too narrow and restrictive. They bailed out! "This is a difficult statement," they said, "who can listen to it?" They stumbled over the words that Christ was to be their very food and drink.

            Offer an "anything goes" Christianity, and you will attract the masses. Say nothing about sin or the sinner's helplessness and hopelessness; say nothing about the narrow gate of repentance and faith in Christ alone or the necessity of the cross of Christ as the sinner's only hope, and the crowds will come. Say nothing of the demands of discipleship at all costs, or the fact that biblical Christianity brings with it opposition and affliction, and the masses will join you. But spell out what Christ has declared, and see that "there are few who find it." By God's grace, are you one of the "few" that Jesus describes in this text? Certainly He is not giving an explanation of how many will be saved but rather an awareness that Christians will typically - apart from periods of great spiritual awakenings in given areas - be in the minority. Are you willing to stand apart from the crowd even if it costs you everything? Then "enter through the narrow gate... that leads to life."

 

II. The other way

            The other way is more popular. I've found myself contemplating this so much lately when I'm in any kind of public gathering. Last week as I braved the crowds to shop for Christmas I thought about the "broad" way leading to destruction that so many are mindlessly treading. Consider it for a moment. How much seriousness do you see in daily life concerning eternal issues and one's relationship to God? All of the frivolity and entertainment that seems to be the mainstay of life in our area tells me that little thought is being given to what it means to be a kingdom citizen. Let me ask you; are you one that gives little thought to your soul, and to you relationship to God? Are you satisfied to just cruise through life, satisfied with a little dose of Christianity to make things more palatable, but uninterested in pursuing Christ alone as Lord of your life? Then, my friend, you may be treading the broad way leading to destruction and you do not even realize it.

 

            1. Easy way

            In contrast to the narrow gate, "the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it." This is the easy way. I don't mean that people traveling the broad way leading to destruction never have problems or bad things happen to them. It does rain on the just and the unjust. We all face problems in life. But the many on the broad way do not connect the dots - they fail to see the unfolding of God's sovereign rule over humanity. Instead it is an easy way because they see no need to live like a kingdom citizen. They are just not interested in bothering with the commands of Christ - that is far too restricting! They do not have to look to find the "wide" gate; it is very natural to everyone outside of Jesus Christ. "It is easy not to be a disciple of Jesus, but it leads to destruction" [TDNT, V, 74]. These just don't want to bother with the demands of the gospel. The reason "is that they have never seen the glory and the magnificence of the Christian life" [Lloyd-Jones, 234]. To them it is a narrow, restrictive, boring life - one that they do not want. So they take the easy road.

 

            2. Accommodating way

            The description of this as "broad" implies accommodation - anything goes. No restrictions to any kind of life will be found on the broad way. Live however you please is the mantra. Do what you feel like doing. You are your own man, so do whatever you want to do. If you want to be religious or irreligious, that is up to you. If you want to be moral or immoral, there are no differences on the broad way; that is strictly your choice. You can be thoughtful and kind to others if you choose, or you can be selfish and arrogant if that fits your desires better. Anything goes as long as it is not confining or restrictive or demanding. "The way is broad that leads to destruction," Jesus tells us. As a "way" it is thought to be a long journey that appears to be leading to better days ahead.

            But such a way "leads to destruction." It is not the narrow way leading to life. Think about it in these terms. We are eternal beings. Our souls will live on, either in eternal life or eternal destruction. We are so bound by time that we think that someone like Senator Strom Thurmond that turned 100 years old this week is very old. But what is 100 years compared to Methuselah's 969 years? That would be like someone living only a little over 9 � years compared to Strom Thurmond's one hundred years. That's not long. But compare the Senator's 100 years to 10,000 years, and suddenly his life seems rather brief. Now add another zero and another to the 10,000 years, and Strom Thurmond's 100 years is indeed like "a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away" (James 4:14). Are you one of those that thinks if you can just do whatever you want to do for 70 or 80 years then you will be forever satisfied? Think again. The broad way of accommodation to anything-goes leads to destruction.

 

            3. Crowd-pleasing way

            But I know that this way is popular: "and there are many who enter through it" [i.e., the wide gate]. "Many" implies popularity, the way of the crowds. You will not lack for companions on the broad way - at least for now. If you must have the approval and applause of the crowd then I dare say that you do not know what it is to walk the narrow way of the kingdom citizen. Some among us are not Christians for the very reason that you love the approval of others more than you love the pleasure of Christ. Will you wake up and see that?

The crowd makes people feel comfortable. As long as we can see others happily doing what we are doing we find that such companionship eases our soul concern. Yet, as Calvin reminds us, "How is it that men knowingly and willingly rush on, carefree, except that they cannot believe that they are perishing, when the whole crowd goes down at the same time?" [Calvin's NT Commentary, I, 233]. If you find your comfort in the crowd then you will find your end with them as well.

 

            4. Destructive way

            And that end of the crowd is the way of destruction: "the way is broad that leads to destruction." We prefer the "out of sight out of mind" approach to life. If we don't think of or see the end of our lives, then what does it matter? But Jesus declares that all of us are heading somewhere. There are no dead-ends to life. "Destruction" is not annihilation but the complete ruin of everything good, worthwhile, honorable, helpful, useful, purposeful, joyful, fulfilling for all eternity. In short, this eternal destruction is described as "away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power" (I Thes 1:9).

 

Conclusion: There are only two ways to live. Which way describes your life?

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