Entering the Narrow Door to the Great Mystery
Preacher: Marcia C. Wilkinson

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Luke 13:22-30

At the staff bible study this week Peter told us a simple story that points to the gospel lesson.  It’s about a chipmunk and an old- fashioned glass milk bottle with a narrow neck.  The bottle was filled with peanuts which a chipmunk discovered.  So he climbed in, packed his jowls with the treasure to later store in the ground.  Only his cheeks were so full that he couldn’t climb through the thin- necked bottle to bury his treasure.  The passage was too narrow for the stock piling.  When all was said and done the chipmunk, if he was to get out through the narrow neck of the bottle, would have to leave behind those desired peanuts.

So it is with the image of the narrow door.  Striving to get through the narrow door will be costly but worth it in the end.  Note this is the second week of difficult words from Jesus.  Last week he told us he came to bring division, not peace.  Today we hear not everyone is getting into God’s kingdom.  That is why Jesus spoke of the narrow door.  When someone asked him: Will only a few be saved? He didn’t answer directly with specific numbers.  That would have given them fuel for speculation resulting in competition and arguments about who will be in, who won’t be included.

God will do that choosing, and many who think they deserve to enter will not be admitted.  Others who presume to be excluded will be welcomed in.  Instead of answering directly, Jesus gave a stern warning for everyone.  Each person must struggle to enter the narrow door.  Many will try by their own devices.  Many will be kept out because they won’t take God seriously.

The image of Jesus’ narrow door means we are near opportunity, and to be conscious of that opportunity while the offer still holds.  There will be no leisurely strolling in by chance at the last minute.  No coming in on the coattails of a grandparent or parent.  Weeping will not help, nor the gnashing of teeth in despair.  Rather, entering the narrow door will require deliberate decision, purposeful energy.  It is a struggle for each of us.

In order to fit through the narrow door we have to leave our stuff behind.  Our baggage, all the material things we hold as prized possessions cannot go with us.  Our stack of diplomas and credentials won’t do us any good, not even the books we’ve stacked to read.  The narrow door is wide enough only for one at a time, each person stripped naked of all stuff.

Likewise, there is no room at the narrow door for spiritual baggage- the prideful, the self-centered, those who are fixed on their own sinful pleasures.  The narrow door won’t accommodate those who hate and seek revenge on their enemies nor people who can’t even forgive the ones they claim to love.  Folks who step over the poor, and ignore justice for the abused and persecuted will not enter.

The narrow door won’t admit the spiritually arrogant who think they have earned the right to be included in God’s kingdom, religious leaders who think they are faithful because of good works in the church, any who boast belonging to 3-4th generation Christians, Jews, and believe their ancestors give them rights to inherit the kingdom.  Jesus is saying there is no automatic privilege and no social cards will open his door.

And for those who argue they have served their country well, or have given everything to their field of study to make a better world, or been true to themselves by taking care of their own, well- Jesus says while these are good in themselves, they are not the criteria for coming through the door.  Living unto ourselves depending on ourselves and thinking we have everything because we have worked hard to earn it…they are things of accomplishment in the world’s eyes but Jesus wants more for us.  I think we get the picture.  The significance of the narrow door is sufficient space to contain one person at a time that belongs, is integrated into a life that is deemed acceptable to God.

Why choose to give up all these things to enter through the door?  Jesus wants us to realize they aren’t needed for the abundant and rich life he offers.  They distract and divert us from what is best.  They seduce us away from what is real and satisfying- in the truest sense.  They separate us from Christ and the ways of God.  And, finally they will leave us alone to muddle in the stuff of our own making and to live in alienation from the One who knows what true life is meant to be, and cares for our lives, and loves us completely.

If striving, struggling to go through the narrow door means leaving behind our old, self important nature, giving up on thinking we have all the answers, and the permission to do as we please in life- then what does this striving look like?  It is human striving only to a point.  When we strive for admission through the door into the kingdom, as if we must depend on our own initiative, remember that even though we work hard, it is fully God’s grace that opens the door to us.  We cannot in the end do what is necessary by our efforts.  That is why Jesus had to go to the cross for each of us as if we were the only one.  All sin against God.  All fall short.  We dare not presume on God’s grace to forgive us.  Yet, God will and does forgive those who bear their hearts in confession.

Remember the old song, “Green Door?” and “what’s that secret you’re keeping?” Jesus has revealed his secret.  He is the way through the door.  And he is invited us to seek him and his kingdom.  Come and see what lies inside and beyond the door.  It is worth leaving our stuff behind, and the value we have attached to our own way of living.  We try our own way and may have already discovered it has not worked to bring good life.  Now is the time to take inventory and to leave behind those destructive patterns.

When we are broken by life, eventually we are humbled and stripped of our arrogance and pride.  In the process we realize our need and dependence on something outside of ourselves.  Poverty in our own spirit can lead us to seek and depend on the Lord.  We ask for his direction and count on his voice and spirit to be in the middle of our comings and goings.  These are neither abstract nor vague possibilities.  They are the things of faith that give substance to our everyday living. The psalmist was spirited with a passion for God that was quick to praise and show his gratitude for God as a safe place, a needed strength, a God who was with him. He took heart in the gifts of God and was confident because God had proven he was trustworthy.  Witnesses surround us that can speak to the wonders of God so that we too can have courage and hope.

Jesus promised.  Seek the kingdom and we will find him.  And, as we give ourselves to the Lord, repenting at his narrow door, we will receive forgiveness, and the love of God that knows no end.  The powers and principalities of our world would have us think and believe that the door is broad and at the end of time, the floodgates will be open and every sort of people will pour in.  This is not what Jesus is saying this morning.  It does matter.

In the Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis said:  “I do not think that all who choose wrong roads perish; but their rescue consists in being put back on the right road.  A sum can be put to right: but only by going back till you find the error and working it afresh from that point, never by simply going on.  Evil can be undone, but it cannot develop into good.  Time does not heal it.  The spell must be unwound, bit-by-bit, ‘with backward mutters of dissevering power’ or else not.  It is still ‘either-or’.  If we insist on keeping Hell we shall not see Heaven:  if we accept Heaven we shall not be able to retain even the smallest and most intimate souvenirs of Hell” (p. V111).

How then shall we live?  We are influenced by what we believe, where we place our trust and value.  Jesus says to strive, make deliberate choices to leave behind the things that keep us out of tune with our life in Christ.  Slow down to listen to God, and depend on God’s Spirit to discipline our thinking and actions.  Invite God into our homes with prayer and quiet.  Through the narrow door is everything you and I need and could want in an abundant life.  When we discover this, even a very small piece, we will know why Jesus offer to feast in the kingdom is so grand.  A place is set for each of us who want to belong to him now.