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When I wrote there are two vital truths that we should not forget, let me be clear - that I should not forget! As I reread these verses about the nitty-gritty of effective Christian living I felt the challenge acutely.
First, Jesus asks us to make a hard choice. There is no better way of living than to follow Jesus and to live among people who take the command to imitate God seriously in being like Jesus. It is the way to eternal life. His love and his grace are the world's best news BUT he asks each of us to make the toughest choice to enter by the small gate and follow along a narrow road. Matt 7:14 gives a graphic picture. The small gate is highly unpopular for the narrow way involves restrictions and high expectations. Jesus demands disciples with discipline! After all he is Lord.
What a contrast with the wide gate and broad road which is as wide as contemporary culture, allowing us to move with maximum choices about how we live. The broad way goes with the flow of culture - how the majority of people think and behave. It involves everything - habits, ideas, customs, values, and it's subtly insidious, creeping in everywhere. The more secular culture becomes the more it minimizes God, and the more it allows self choice and self-assertion.
In the States I learned the expression attractional church. Often larger churches, they blacked out any windows with seating as comfortable as a cinema's. In fact, the whole experience was rather like being in a movie theatre with spotlights on the front stage, where a music group would be singing to the audience, before an articulate amusing preacher came on stage. Coffee and doughnuts were constantly available with movement when refills were required. And the preacher winsomely spoke of the love of God expressed in Jesus, who died for us that we might be forgiven and receive eternal life.
But not one word about a small gate and narrow word. About restrictions and high expectations of following Jesus. Nothing about the intentional hard choice required to obey the Lord.
I know I am guilty of some parody here but the contrast between the narrow road and broad way is a critical challenge today, isn't it?
2 comments:
Greetings Brother Michael, Yesterday one of your recorded sermons came up on my audio player. It was a sermon on Abraham and Melchizedek, given in Chicago I believe, with the theme of how strange twists and turns in the biblical stories have the authenticity of reality, i.e. the "ring of truth." I had probably downloaded that message years ago after first hearing you preach at Asbury Theological Seminary. All this is preamble to say, I was gratified to find your blog again and to discover you have continued to add posts. Your observations about preparing to preach and whether to re-preach older sermons are quite relevant to me. I'm sympatico with your yearning to deliver a message that challenges the speaker as well as the parishioners.
Greetings to you brother Keith. Thank you so much for your kind comments. It's extraordinary how cyberspace enables all kinds of material to float around. Glad to be reminded of my visit to Asbury and to connect with someone on the front line like you. May you know strength and joy in your continuing ministry. Really good to hear from you.
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