Enter (Or Else)! - [Matthew 7:13-14]

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I don't know if you've ever seen a mirage, kind of an optical illusion. I did a little study on mirages this week.
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One source said a mirage is a naturally occurring optical phenomenon in which light rays are bent to produce a displaced image of distant objects.
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You're out in the desert and you think it's an oasis, you think it's water and you say to yourself, oh,
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I see something, it looks real, but in fact it's not real at all.
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I thought that's just like spiritual truth. There are mirages, things that seem right.
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There's a way that seems right to a man, but the end isn't so right.
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It leads to death. Can you think of any spiritual mirages? Things that maybe people see in their minds, but they're not true at all.
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You could probably come up with your own list, but here are a few spiritual mirages. Jesus is
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Savior, but he's not Lord. Seems maybe good on the outset, but it's a mirage.
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I think I'll wait to believe in Jesus when I'm older, or maybe on my deathbed
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I'll believe then. Again, that is a spiritual mirage. Here's another one.
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God is only a God of love. He has no other attributes. He's not holy, just, or righteous.
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He just loves everybody all the time, kind of like a grandpa. That's a mirage. There's not really a hell.
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How could a good God create hell? That's another mirage.
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Every religion's truths lead their followers to the same place.
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It's a mirage. If I only take the Eucharist and sacraments, baptism, catechism, confirmation, if I do those, then
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I can live the way I want to live for the rest of my life and I'm still going to heaven. That's a mirage.
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I'm a member of the church and I go, so God must love me. That's a mirage.
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Today's message is going to be tough. And it's only going to be tough because it's tough from Jesus' words.
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If you have a little child and that little child needs to go to sleep, what do you do to that little child? When my kids were little,
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I'd sing them a little lullaby. I'd sing them Jesus paid it all, maybe some hymn.
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But if your child falls into the quick -moving river 200 feet before Niagara Falls, you don't sing that child a lullaby.
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You act. And you might talk with forcefulness, but you act.
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And if you'll turn your Bibles to Matthew chapter 7, you're going to see that today. If you are not a
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Christian today, first of all, I'm glad you're here. But second of all, you don't need a lullaby.
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And Jesus' words here in the Sermon on the Mount, as we've been marching through the Sermon on the
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Mount, He now calls for a commitment. He says, I've taught you in chapter 5, 6, and part of 7, now what are you going to do about it?
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You must act. You must enter. Jesus has described the kingdom. Here's what a kingdom looks like.
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These are kingdom citizens. Here is the king. Here's how you enter the kingdom. And now
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He says, enter. And it's not one of these kind of sweet lullabies where you go, that kind of sermon just made me feel good.
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If you thought I was tough during the baptismal, wait till you hear Jesus' words. That was the lullaby compared to this.
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And when the Bible teaches us that God can comfort us like a father, and God is a very present help in time of comfort,
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I want to teach that. But when the Bible teaches this, I think you'll see even my demeanor will reflect
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Christ's message. We're up to Matthew 7, verse 13, commonly called the
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Sermon on the Mount, and now we come to the narrow gate and the wide gate.
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Jesus the King is on the scene. He says, don't follow the hypocrites. Don't follow the Sadducees.
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Don't follow other false teachers that basically say religion's external, it's not internal.
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Follow me, the King. God has not spoken through prophets since the Old Testament days, and now after 400 years, there have been some hints with John the
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Baptist, but now Jesus, God Himself, is on the scene. And He says, here's my sermon, and He said, it is to obey, to be obeyed.
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If you're a Christian today, you should be thinking these things as we go over this passage. I'm really glad I'm a
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Christian, because if it's that hard to enter into heaven, and I'm going, thank you,
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Lord, I could never do that on my own. If you're a Christian, you should say something like this, I wonder if my evangelism matches up to Jesus' evangelism.
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When I preach the gospel to people who aren't Christians, do I mirror Jesus' evangelism, or do
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I kind of find somebody who's a little, maybe softer? But if you're not a
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Christian today, I'm really wanting to talk to you. And as Jesus calls people to enter in the kingdom, that's what
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I'll be calling you to do. Let's read the passage, and then let's take a look at it in depth. Matthew 7, verse 13 and 14, about three -quarters of the way into your
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Bible, you'll have a Black Pew Bible in front of you. You'll get a lot more out of the message if you have a
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Bible in front of you. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the gospel of Matthew. 7 .13, enter, listen to Jesus' words, enter through the narrow gate.
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For the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it.
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For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
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These 48 English words weigh 48 tons when it comes to spiritual gravity and spiritual weight.
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Jesus now says, I'm calling you, I'm commanding you for you to respond, commitment, decision.
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When I was a kid, I liked to audit classes, didn't you? For you to show up, huh, I'll learn,
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I'll do what I want, I'll kind of play with my Blackberry during class, I'll kind of, you know, take my computer and I'll alt -tab over when
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I need to, and I'm just going to sit here and listen. I feel like I'm doing something, but it's a strict audit.
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I can just listen. Now Jesus is going to say, don't miss it. You can't audit his sermons.
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You can't just say, that was nice, that was wonderful. In this last section, verses 13 to the end of the chapter,
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Jesus gives four kind of red alert warnings. You can almost, I imagine when
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I love submarines, when I take tours of submarines and go down into the submarines. By the way, if any of you know how to get me on a real submarine on some kind of special tour, then
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I want to talk to you. But when I go on the ones that are, you know, decommissioned, the
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Nautilus, you walk down and you see these kind of lights, and you can imagine even from the movies you've seen, when there's trouble, when there's a leak, something's going on, impending battle.
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You just see these lights and they're red and they're flashing and they're to let everyone know with their eyes, with their senses.
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There's trouble, stand ready, be ready to act. Don't just, the light is not saying, now would be a good time to find a nice cot.
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And Jesus says in verse 13 and 14, the way is narrow, warning. Next week, we'll see in verses 15 through 20, the way isn't just narrow, but there are false teachers standing by the road who go, oh, you'll make it, you're good.
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Change things around. The problem of salvation is compounded because false prophets say the opposite of Jesus.
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He gives another warning, we'll see in several weeks, verses 21 through 23. You say you're a
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Christian is not the same as you are a Christian. Profession is not the same as what?
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Possession. And then he says in verses 24 and following, in about a month we'll get there, you cannot overestimate the importance of Jesus's words.
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Everything is based on Jesus's words. So today we're just going to look at that first warning found in verses 13 through 14, or 13 and 14.
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Enter the narrow way. This is the concluding section of the Sermon on the Mount. And Jesus is going to root out fake
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Christians, fake believers. Lemonster is the home of what? Plastics.
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I mean, when I came out from California and you see some kind of brown or blue sign next to the side of the road where it says, you know, this is a tourist area.
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And then it's like, Lemonster, home of plastics. Wow, I got to go there. This is amazing.
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Home of Johnny Appleseed and home of plastic. Wow, they're deep. Sorry if you live in Lemonster, but not that sorry.
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What does the word plastic mean? It's a Greek word, plastoi, means fake.
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That's not a dish, that's plastic, it's a fake dish. And there are lots of people in this room today, many who
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I don't think have entered through the narrow gate who aren't Christians. I'm not mean for telling you that.
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I'm just saying if James says, one of the best places to evangelize lost people is in the local church,
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I think he's probably right. We hear things, we have associations. Maybe it's just for our children who sit here week in and week out.
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We can't just come to this sermon, Jesus says, and think it's kind of a nice philosophy.
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It's kind of an intellectual deal where we just go, oh, that's very fascinating how he'd do that. And he had those kind of antithetical statements there in chapter five, that was a good way.
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He has kind of a nice rhetorical device about it. He asks these questions and he gives these answers and he's just wonderful how he does that.
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He talks in groups of eight, he talks in groups of three. He's just a master speaker. Well, of course he's a master speaker, but there's something else that's going on here.
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He basically kind of sticks his arms out with his words and grabs you by the shoulders firmly and says, what are you going to do with the words of Jesus?
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Or if I could put it a little more crassly, you say you believe in Jesus, that's
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James chapter one. Don't turn there, but just listen.
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First Kings 22, Jehoshaphat said, is there not yet a prophet of the Lord that we may inquire of him?
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We've got a problem, what will God say? The king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, there is yet one man by whom we may inquire of the
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Lord, but I hate him. Yeah, there's a guy, he's a preacher, he speaks for God, but I hate that guy.
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Well, why? Because he does not prophesy good things concerning me, but evil.
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He is Micaiah, the son of Imla. And Jehoshaphat said, let not the king say so.
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I need a prophet, I need instruction from God. I'd like to know how to live my life. Oh yeah, there's a preacher, he'll tell you, but you're gonna get convicted.
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Yeah, don't bring that guy. We don't wanna act like that. These are hard words, but they're our
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Savior's words, and we want to listen. Let me give you a series of commands. If you want an outline today, a series of commands that all focus upon the one key word in these two verses, and that word is enter.
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A series of commands to enter God's kingdom, to become a Christian. And again, if you're not a
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Christian, you just look back and say, this is how God saved me, thank you. This is how Jesus evangelizes, maybe
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I ought to do something like that. But if you're not a Christian, these are the 10 commands for you to enter
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Christ's kingdom. And these series of commands should give us all the nuances found in these verses.
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Number one, the first command is enter, even though you know salvation from sin is difficult.
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You must enter even though it is difficult. Look at verse 13, enter through the what?
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Narrow gate, the difficult to be entered gate, the pent up gate, the constricted gate.
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It is a difficult thing. Jesus doesn't say, oh, you know, it's an easy thing. If Jesus said, you know what, by the way,
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I want you to enter, and it's just by getting baptized. That'd be easy.
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Enter by just saying a prayer. That would be easy. Enter by just giving some money.
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That would be easy. Enter by just being better than your neighbor. That would be easy.
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But Jesus is saying, I want you to enter even though it is very, very, very difficult.
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It's not easy. The gate, you see the text in verse 13, is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction.
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And there are many who enter through it. The gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life.
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And there are few who find it. Salvation is what God does to the person.
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Yet in conversion, there is a response. God does not believe for you, repent for you, follow for you.
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God does all the saving in salvation. We believe salvation is from God alone.
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He made us alive. But there is a response in conversion that says, I believe,
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I trust, I follow, I forsake. And that's what Jesus is after here, that response.
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You say, this is hard. Listen to what he says in Matthew 10, three short chapters later.
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He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
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He who does not take his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. He who has found his life will lose it.
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And he who has lost his life for my sake will find it. It's difficult. Matthew 16, if anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.
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For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
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What profit? What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his own soul? It is difficult.
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And so Jesus says, enter. It's a difficult way, but I want you to enter it.
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Why is it difficult? Self -denial. We're born rebellious.
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Friends, if I could get you saved by having you walk an aisle, it would be easy. It wouldn't be difficult and narrow and pent up.
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Why don't people evangelize like Jesus does? Everything's so easy. I had a friend give me a book 18 years ago.
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The easy way of salvation. And here's the easy way. ABCs.
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Admit, believe, confess. It's easy. Well, I like admission.
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I like belief. I like confession. Salvation isn't, according to Jesus's words, easy.
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He's saying it's going to be hard. It's going to be like some doors that are smashing in and you've got to go through there and there's only room for you.
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Lloyd -Jones talked about it's like a turnstile There's no room for you and your sin and Satan and your friends.
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It's for you. It squeezes you. Never forget the time when I first took
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Haley as a little baby to the car wash. We went in there and you pay the extra $4, dial your number, you pull up and you're supposed to put it in neutral.
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And then it takes you along the conveyor belt and the things start coming down. There are these big blue rollers.
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I told Kim she should have rolled her window up, but that was another story. They're all going like this spray.
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You're thinking, what is going on? You're just compressed. It feels like everything's caving in on you.
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She hated it after that, by the way. I had to give her candy every time we went there. It was a Reese's peanut butter cup and I used to give her so many of those.
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They were now and forever affectionately known as car wash candy. This is the exact opposite of how people evangelize today.
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It's easy. Here are the four spiritual laws. You just, one, two, three, four. You believe these things? Yes. And then you're a
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Christian. I am? Yeah, it's easy. Jesus said, it's hard, it's narrow.
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It's kind of self -styled revivalists. Don't talk about obedience like they should so many times.
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Self -denial, constriction, confining. Sometimes evangelists don't make it so hard for the people that they realize they need
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God's help to be saved. Putting up hurdles so high that you can't hurdle them without the grace of God.
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And Jesus says, enter, and it's going to be very, very difficult. It's not like one of these highways.
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If you're traveling down a highway and you go, it's the width of 10 lengths and 10 lengths wide, no lane markers, no speed limits, no policemen.
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You just do as you want. Just everybody can go down that road as fast as they want, the direction they want. You want to go this way, you can.
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Oh, you're a pro -abortion Christian, welcome. Gay rights, Christian activists, welcome. Feministic Christian, welcome.
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Christians who don't believe the Bible, welcome. Universalist Christians, welcome. Liberal Christians, welcome.
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Christians who see truth in other religions, welcome. Come one, come all, there's room on the road for you.
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Now, back in those days, public roads were, by law, up to 16 cubits broad.
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Private roads, only four. So who knows? Maybe Jesus is by a private road, there's a public road over there, and he says, it's a small road here, and it's a larger road there.
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It's not easy according to Jesus. Why? Because people are self -deceived. They think it's easy.
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I'm not as bad as I think I was, I am. I'm not as sinful as the Bible says I am.
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God's not as holy as the Bible says he is, so it's kind of a nice meeting. God's not so holy, I'm not so sinful, and there's kind of a bridge to gap, and I can bridge that gap myself.
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I know the right language, I can say Christian words, I can say koinonia, I can say agape, and there's no internal change that's ever happened.
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Jesus is saying, enter, and it's hard. You need to read
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John MacArthur's book, hard to number two, second command to enter.
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Not only must you enter, even though it's difficult, you must enter today, do not delay.
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Enter today, point two, enter today. The text is, in the original, an imperative.
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It's called an aorist imperative. There's just a sense of urgency. There's just a sense of right now.
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It's not do it later, maybe another day. Jesus says, you have to make that decision today.
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It's like this, you say, well, this is just all pressure, this is all psychological manipulation.
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Whatever you want to dismiss it as is fine. You're gonna die someday, but you might die during the sermon, and if you're not a
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Christian, you're going straight to hell, while you listen to the sermon, if you die.
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You drive on the way home, I know people that won't get in airplanes, you won't get in an airplane because you're afraid to die, you want not to get in that car.
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You could die any second, and then what? People go, well, you know, I don't like all that fire and brimstone stuff.
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Well, I never thought you would like it, nobody does, but truth is truth. Joseph Elaine said, remember when you lie down, that for all you know, you may awake in flames.
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And when you rise up, that by the next night, you may make your bed in hell. It's true.
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So what does Jesus say in verse 13? Enter right now is what the idea is. Today is the day of salvation, according to Acts chapter four.
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Today, for the gate is wide and way is broad and leads to destruction, there are many who enter through.
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Eternal misery, eternal bliss, enter. It's not admire
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Jesus, it's not applaud Jesus, it's enter into the kingdom. You must believe, follow
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Christ. Spurgeon said it this way, be up and on your journey.
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Enter in at the gate at the head of the way and do not stand hesitating. It's the only place you can go to be rescued.
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Listen to what one man said, to know that God is your enemy. Where will you go?
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Where will you shelter yourself? There is no hope for you unless you lay down your weapons and sue out your pardon and get
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Christ to stand as your friend and make your peace. Enter. If you're not a
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Christian, why are you waiting? It might not be today and you can count that up to the grace of God, but it could be today.
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Why will you not enter? Jesus says today's the day of forgiveness.
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Today's the day to do what those baptismal candidates did right there. I realized I was a sinner, couldn't save myself and I cried out to God, Lord have mercy on me, the sinner.
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Number three. Third command to enter. Number one, enter although it's difficult.
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Number two, enter today. Don't put it off. Number three, enter because there are no other options for heaven.
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There are no other options for heaven. Listen, if there were other ways to get to heaven, then it wouldn't be such a big deal.
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Enter through Jesus's gate. Enter according to Jesus's words. Hey, if you could get to heaven through Mary, through Moses, through Buddha, through Muhammad, through being good, through L.
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Ron Hubbard, through anybody else, then it wouldn't be that big a deal. Just take your time, pick one of those, dealer's choice, no big deal.
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But when there's no purgatory, no middle ground, no annihilation, when there's either heaven or hell, eternal heaven or eternal destruction, the joys of heaven are the eternal misery of hell, then today better be a good day that you make that decision.
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There's no other way. Reincarnation, second chances, middle ground. Joseph Elaine said, oh, were it better for you to die in jail, in a ditch, or in a dungeon than die in your sins?
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There were five ways to get to heaven, no big deal. There's one way, Jesus says.
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Now, what he does here is very interesting. What the Jews would do is they would put two options out before people and say, here's a good way to try to motivate people to say there's two options, one or two, lots of twos.
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Even in our passage, two gates, two ways, two groups, two destinations.
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In verse 15 and following, there are two trees and two fruits. In verses 21 through 23, two professions of Christ, two destinies.
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In verses 24 and following, two builders, two houses, two foundations. So he says before the audience, with Jews and some
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Hellenistic Greeks, there are the two ways. Here, pick one. One says eternal life, one says eternal death.
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This is very common. Listen to Deuteronomy 30. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessing and the curse.
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So choose life. How about Joshua? And if it is disagreeable in your side to serve the
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Lord, choose for yourselves today whom you'll serve, whether it's the gods of your fathers who had served, which were beyond the river, or the gods of the
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Amorites. Jeremiah 21, you shall also say to this people, thus says the
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Lord, behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death. Or one you probably all recognize from 1
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Kings 18 and Elijah on the mountains of Carmel. How long will you hesitate between two opinions?
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If the Lord is God, follow Him. If Baal, follow him. Here's the choice.
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Here's the choice of choices, the eternal choice. Jesus just uses this language.
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Here's these gates. Do you see the text? 713, enter through the narrow gate. Or there's a wide gate.
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That wide gate, by the way, leads to destruction. So you say, well, good, at least it's destruction.
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If I have to go to hell, I'll just get destroyed. I'll get annihilated. I'll just get kind of creamed, and I won't be around.
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That word destruction does not mean annihilation. It means what you are made for is no longer valuable.
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You are intended for the purpose of worshiping God. You won't worship God, so we don't need you there anymore, and so we'll put you here.
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You're no longer, it's like a tire that's square. No longer usable for its maker's purpose.
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Hopelessness, lostness, destruction. That's why
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Jesus said in Matthew 10, just a few short chapters later, do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul, but rather fear him who is able to destroy, same root word, both body and soul in hell.
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You can't weep and have gnashing of teeth if you're obliterated in hell. So Jesus says, enter the narrow gate.
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Two roads, how important is it?
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If you were out in the middle of the ocean, there've been some cases like that. Remember the football players in Florida?
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They go out on the boat, and all of a sudden it capsizes. I wonder how loudly and for how long they screamed, help, over here.
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That's the earnestness that should be in the heart of an unbeliever. When Luke and I went over with the family to Germany, and then over to Belgium and other places, when we went to the
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Ardennes forest where some of the World War II battles were, we're sitting in some of the foxholes that still exist, kind of crouched down in the foxholes, we're thinking, can you imagine getting hit by some shrapnel, and then calling out for medic, medic, over here, medic.
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That's the earnestness. I need help, I need a surgeon, because otherwise it's destruction.
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Number four, this is a very, very important point.
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Number four, enter in spite of the majority. Number one, enter even though it's difficult. Number two, enter today.
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Number three, enter because there's no other options. Number four, enter in spite of the majority. It is so easy to go with the flow, isn't it?
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All the world believes this, all the polls believe that, all my other friends do such and such.
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And you see the text, verse 13, many and few, in verse 14. The way to heaven, few, the way to hell, many.
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The narrow way market is not popular. People don't go around and go, yeah.
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You know, it would be popular sermon if I just said, you know, God loves you right where you are. God loves you conditionally.
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If you didn't exist, God would just didn't know, he wouldn't know what to do with himself. And you're lovable, you're cuddable,
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I got cuddlable, whatever it is. And you have your best life now.
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People buy sports arenas to go hear that kind of stuff.
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And Jesus says, few and many. You say, but I'm spiritual. Yeah, most do, they're on the broad road, the many.
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Yeah, I'm very religious. Well, you don't understand me because I'm spiritual my own way. I go golf and kind of worship
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God. You know, Oprah can't be wrong, can she?
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When she talks about all those spiritual things, she's so spiritual. All those ladies on there and the men. God helps those who help himself, doesn't he?
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Did Jesus say that? Gandhi said that, by the way. Tragically, the crowd, the many say this.
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We do what is right in our own eyes. That's the book of Judges.
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Show me the crowd and I'll go, B, you better be careful. Unless you're at the Shepherd's Conference or together for the gospel.
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You think, well, okay, I guess that crowd might be easy to follow. But other than that, be careful. We came out of the Celtics game a while ago,
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Luke and I. And I thought, I don't know where the T is. I don't really get all this. We park at Alewife, take the T over. I just walk out of the
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TD Bank, North Garden, whatever it's called. And I walk out and I go, I need to find the T. I don't know where the
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T is. What'd I do? I just went with the flow. It was perfect.
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I was just going. Red line, orange line, I don't know. Just find me some kind of line. We're just kind of pushed along.
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It was awesome. I saw some people coming up the stairs as we were all going out. And I thought, you fools.
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The flow goes this way. Come on, brother, you're going. Luke and I are just, Luke's going, where are you going, dad? I know where I'm going, son.
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I know these things. It is fine when you're trying to get to the
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T. It is not fine when you go, what's everybody believe out there in the world?
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That must be right. I'll follow what they're teaching. I'll turn on the TV. Maybe they'll tell me the right way.
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The latest Barna data in 2009 polled Christians. You want to follow them, this is who you're going to follow.
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More than one fifth strongly agreed that Jesus Christ sinned when he lived on earth. 17 % agreed with that statement somewhat.
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40 % of the people. 38 % strongly agreed that the
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Holy Spirit is a symbol of God's power, not a living entity. 20 % agreed somewhat.
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The majority doesn't believe that the Spirit of God is a person. The majority doesn't know anything.
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I'll tell you an illustration of that. Wicca, how many people know what Wicca is? It's the good witchcraft.
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It's a good kind. It's the white witchcraft. Here's what they said.
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Do you have a positive or negative view of Wicca, the organized form of witchcraft?
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They didn't even say, well, you know, I don't know what Wicca is. Positive or negative view of Wicca, that organized witchcraft?
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What do you think they said? 40 % did not know enough to make a judgment call.
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You got a bunch of post -moderns walking around that won't even say right is right and left is left, and we're going to follow them.
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Jesus says, don't follow. If we were meant to follow the crowd, then why would Jesus ever even come to say, stop following the
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Sadducees and the Pharisees and the scribes and the hypocrites? That's the broad road.
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55 % of the polled Christians agreed that the Bible is accurate in all its principles.
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That means 45 % said they didn't. Sadly, the list goes on. Friends, we live in such a culture.
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If you talk about some of these things that the majority would believe, you will get blasted.
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If I said to you, do you want to follow most people who follow this person? Would you do it?
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Let me give you a few quotes. This is all from the same person. The dying, the crippled, the mentally ill, the unwanted, the unloved, they are
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Jesus in disguise. I love all religions. If people become better Hindus, better Muslims, better Buddhists by our acts of love, then there's something else growing there.
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All is God. Buddhists, Hindus, Christians, all have access to the same
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God. Mary is our patroness and our mother, and she's always leading us to Jesus.
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We tell people on their deathbed to pray to Bhagwan, to their gods. This person was asked, do you believe the
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Hindus that die believing in Shiva or in Ram go to heaven? This person said, yes, that is their faith.
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My own faith will lead me to God. So if they have believed their God very strongly, if they have faith, surely they'll be saved.
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Interviewer, today it does not seem that the Catholic church is trying to convert anyone. I know that John Paul II is saying now that those other religions are saved.
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You do not believe they're lost anyway, right? This person said, no, they're not lost.
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They are saved according to their faith. You know, if they believe whatever they believe, that is their salvation.
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Do you believe that? Do you believe what that person said? Most people do.
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And if I got up and said, let me tell you something about the patron saint of the world practically, believe this person, everybody'd go, yeah.
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But when you hear the words, you have to say the many and the few. Friends of Mother Teresa, who said those things, believed what she said.
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She was on the broad road that led to destruction. 51 % of Americans believe if you're good, you go to heaven.
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It's like when I was on the radio show the other day, someone called in. You know, what about that verse that says,
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Jesus, heaven's in you, heaven's in everyone. I just looked, in the radio studio, there's a screen there, like a glass.
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I got my headphones on, the microphone and all that. And I'm looking over at the radio producer going, who is this lady?
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She's like, yeah, everybody's going to heaven. Everybody's good. Everybody's got heaven in them. Why doesn't anybody talk about that?
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And I should have said, because it's the broad road that leads to destruction. Nonsense like that is damning. If everybody's going, why would the father punish his son?
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If everybody's going, why would the son say, yes, father, I agree with the punishment, and I'll take that, and I'll drink down the dregs of your punishment.
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To show what? To love? No. The crowd doesn't want holiness.
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The crowd wants happiness. The crowds follow liars like Joel Osteen and heretics like Joyce Myers.
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They love it. The Arbitron ratings of those heretics are sky high. That should make you think,
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I better be careful because there's the broad road and there's the narrow road.
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And basically Jesus says this, watch religion in your day and run from it.
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If it calls itself Christian, run, because it's not feeling in that's important, it's your latter in that's important.
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Now, as the disciples were hearing Jesus, I don't think they're all just kind of high -fiving everybody and har haring. Isn't that interesting?
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No, they had the look on that you have on right now. And it's like a tsunami that comes in through Jesus's words, and that is the intention.
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It is a caution. It is not the sergeant in the army that gives a direct order to someone because they have to have battle stations, and he's concerned about the self -esteem of that young private.
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Consider your latter end. What road am I traveling on? J .C. Ryle said, surely it is better to enter into life eternal with a few than to go to destruction with the great company.
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True or false? Just a few people are being saved. You know, somebody asked that to Jesus.
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If someone came up to you, are just a few people? You mean to tell me based on this, only a few are going?
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When I go to a football game, I look and I think there's 80 ,000 people in this stadium. And you know what
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I say to myself? Turn to Luke 13, and if you thought
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Matthew 7 was hard, wait till you get a load of Jesus's other words that are very similar.
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Luke 13, verse 22. Again, talking about majority, talking about few. My job is not to be popular, but faithful.
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I don't expect everybody would like me after a sermon like this. After all, they crucified Jesus. They killed
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Stephen. But our job is never to get people to like us. Our job is to tell the truth.
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And here Jesus gets asked this question. Just a few being saved?
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Friends, there's no verses like this in all the Bible, in my opinion. This is shock and awe.
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Verse 22 of chapter 13. Matthew, Mark, Luke 13, 22. And Jesus was passing through from one city and village to another, teaching, proceeding on His way to Jerusalem.
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And someone said to Him, Lord, are there just a few who are being saved?
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Based on what you're preaching, this is such a narrow road. You can't come into heaven with your sin and Satan and self and everything else, by yourself, self -denial.
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You mean to tell me just a few? And back in those days, there was a big argument theologically.
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And sometimes we'd say, well, I wonder who the elect are. Others would say, all
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Israel would make it. Others would say, well, maybe not too many because when you think of the promised land, not many made it.
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And here's Joshua and Caleb, but not too many others. And so it was this kind of, how many angels dance on the head of a needle, of a pin?
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It's just kind of fun to talk about because you know what it does? It deflects the finger of God, like Nathan pointing at you going, are you one of the few?
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So when people start evangelizing, I remember when I was an unbeliever, driving down Santa Monica Boulevard, people start doing this, are you a
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Christian? Basically, the guy said this to me, how can you call yourself a Christian? They knew how I lived. And so then what do you do?
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Oh yeah, I know words like inerrancy and hypostatic union. Boy, that was an interesting way the pastor did the indicative imperative today.
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I didn't say that, but you just kind of, it's just all this, we're gonna move over because I hate to be at the target.
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It's like, all of a sudden, you're talking to someone and you look down, you go, there's a red dot right here.
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I wanna get out of that laser beam because that thing has got my name on it. And so it's always kind of, people run up to him, the rich young ruler,
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I got a question for you, Jesus. And Jesus always turns it right back around to the person because he loves the father, he loves them, so he tells them the truth.
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So he's gonna do something different. He doesn't answer the question directly.
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He answers the question by putting his long finger out and says this, agonize, verse 24, strive, make every effort.
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Sweat should come off your brow. Enter through the narrow gate is what he's basically saying, but here he calls it a door, like Matthew 7, a metaphor for entering the kingdom, entering salvation, following Christ, being a
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Christian. Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many,
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I tell you, will seek and will not be able. Some say they wanna go, but they can't go.
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So I want you, young man, to exert every fiber of your muscles, strain every nerve to go.
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Forget the crowd, forget the fews and the many. What about you? If you're a kid here and your parents belong to this church and they're faithful and they serve,
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I'm after you. Jesus says, strive.
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You know, look at the text. Some seek to enter and will not be able. They don't try by the grace of God.
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They try to save themselves. They try to be good. They try to be baptized. They try to get some kind of keeping some of the ceremonial law.
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Who knows what they do, but they can't save themselves. And they seek who wants hell.
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They want heaven, but they're not able to get it because they won't come to God on his terms. They love their sin.
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Jesus says, they love the darkness rather than light because their deeds were.
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It's a narrow road. It's a troubled road. Why don't many get on this road? Back to Matthew chapter seven, verse 13 and 14 in English both contain the word narrow, but they're two different Greek words.
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One's narrow, compressed, and the other is narrow because there's persecution. There's trouble, there's trials, there's affliction.
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You want to follow Christ? It's narrow to get in, and there's afflictions on the way. Jesus says, you got to enter it anyway.
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There's no other options. And thankfully, Jesus doesn't say, yeah, enter. It's kind of hard.
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And then the rest of your life is just a cakewalk. Come to Jesus. Your marriage will be awesome.
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Kids will be great, have good manners. You get a great job. Now, you know what?
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Your kids might have good manners. You might get a good wife. All those things might happen. But you don't come to Christ to get those things.
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Jesus says, you want to follow me? Enter through this gate. It's going to be hard, and you'll probably be afflicted.
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Where else do we go, though? That's the only option for heaven. Well, everybody else over here, they don't believe that stuff,
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Pastor Mike. I want you to look at your own Bible and say, it's not Mike's words. Jesus said it himself.
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Let God be true, and let every man be found. Or what? I don't want majority.
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Here's what a majority would say to us, though, now. Oh, how fearful would be the cry if God would take off the covering from the mouth of hell and let the cry of the damned ascend in all its terror among the children of man.
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And of their moans and miseries, this is piercing, killing emphasis and burden.
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Forever and ever, they will cry. That's the crowd I want to go against.
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And lastly, I need to make it quickly, number five. Enter because no decision is a decision.
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Enter because no decision is a decision. You're not born neutral. You're born sinful.
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You're born running down the broad road. And Jesus says, stop running. You go, I'll wait till later.
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That is a decision that says, no, Jesus. We used to play football. Somebody would come up and tackle you. You have the football.
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What do you do to that person who's going to come and tackle you? You give them a stiff arm. Right up in the chin would be a good place.
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And you knock the person's head up a little bit and they can't see where they're going. And off you go. Not that I know how to do it because I was a recipient of it more often than not.
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Jesus says, you're either for me or you're against me. You either love me or you hate me. You can't say, I'll decide later. That is a decision that says, no,
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Jesus, forget you. Here's a stiff arm to your face. You're the son of God. You died for sinners.
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You were raised from the dead. But I don't care because I like my own sin and I like to do things my way and I will not have
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Jesus reign over me. And so I just want you to know if that's the way you say things, you have made a decision already.
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This is not have your mom believe, your dad believe for you, your pastor believe for you. Jesus says, you are accountable.
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You are responsible. There's enough out in the world by creation, by children being born, hydrological cycles that you stand in accountability before God.
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And now how much more can you be held accountable for as you've heard the words of eternal life?
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If you're not a Christian, you cannot keep going the same way you're going now. You can't say, well,
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I'll just do a little reformation. I'll just be a little bit better. I'll just start to go to church a little bit more. Today is the day to say,
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God, grant me saving faith. God, help me to believe. Jesus calls for a verdict and He says,
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I'm not the Savior. I better be your Savior or you're not going to heaven. And here, what does Jesus do?
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Full frontal assault. He goes for the jugular. He's not vague.
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He's not kind of hazy. It's right to the beachhead of the heart. For Jesus, there is no demilitarized zone, no
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DMZ. John 9,
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Jesus heard that they had put Him out. Finding Him, He said, do you believe in the Son of Man? I ask you the same question.
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Jesus said to Martha, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live even if he dies. And everyone who believes in me will never die.
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Do you, Jesus said, believe this? And Jesus goes right to the man's mind.
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So the question today is, enter. Have you entered? Will you enter?
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Why won't you enter? Jesus is the only Savior. There's salvation in no other God. Jesus said,
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I am the door. If anyone enters through me, he shall be saved and shall go in and out and find pasture.
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Jesus said in John 8, 24, I say to you, therefore, that you shall die in your sins unless you believe that I am
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He. You shall die in your sins. Robert Frost, no
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Christian, he knew it. Two roads diverge in a wood and I took the one less traveled by.
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And that has made all the difference. But Frost thought it was a way of life. This is life or eternal death.
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For Christians, can you believe you've entered? It's only by the grace of God.
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Who could enter? I've entered. God has cloaked
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Himself with human flesh and lived a perfect life. And in a sense, broke open the gates of all eternal bliss for me by living in my place, by dying in my place.
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BBC saints, won't you evangelize like Jesus did? Unbelievers, today is the day for your salvation.
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Enter through the narrow gate, let's pray. Our Father in heaven, I pray that you would use your words to do something so supernatural in the hearts of these visitors today, in the hearts of these members today, in the hearts of all who have attended to change their world forever.
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To increase the gratitude of the saints and increase the conviction unto salvation of those who have come today not having bowed the knee to Jesus as Lord.
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Father, by your grace, would you have many from our church enter through the narrow gate.