The Sermon on the Mount
Vs. 13-14, The Narrow Gate
Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat:
Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.
So we are to look for that small gate, that opens to a narrow, hemmed-in path. This sounds like the awful, constraining lifestyle that the World disdains.
That's why most people will pass it by, and go through the wide gate. The broad way (Broadway!) is totally loose and free, and allows all kinds of damaging and destructive lifestyles. So it's very seductive and misleading, and those people will be destroyed by it.
But the people who are honestly seeking Light and Truth will find that narrow gate, and they will know that all the hedges and fences along that narrow way are there to keep them on the path. So they will be able to experience all the wonderful and glorious bounty God put on this Earth fur us to enjoy, and eternal life with God forever.
O my Father, You are so good to us, to all of us, to all that You have made. You have offered every single person You made to choose to come to You, but there are so few who do, compared to the many who do not.
You have allowed the enemy so much influence, to have Mankind build his World to be so seductive to draw us away from You. Now we are tempted by the World, and our own defective DNA, as well as our enemy. Three directions of attack aimed at each one of us.
It's no wonder that the many refuse the narrow path for Broadway and Main Street. Father, You want to give us true freedom, that liberty that allows us to choose what is right and wholesome and freeing. To bypass all the consequences of their poor choices, just as You told Your people (in Exodus 15:26),
If you will give earnest heed to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I the Lord am your Healer.You wanted them to bypass all the consequences the Egyptians suffered by all their unhealthy practises. And You also want to protect us from the results of the unhealthy lifestyles that spread the diseases that are rampant in our World today.
O Father, You love us so much! You want us to have good, productive, healthy, bountiful, joyful lives here on this beautiful Earth You made for us!
So many of Your children do not understand Your ways enough to enjoy the blessings You want to lavish upon them. Some have even swallowed the enemy's lie that "alternative lifestyles" are "normal"!
Thank You, Father, for giving me the years to study Your Word, and Your Spirit of Truth to teach me Your ways. Thank You for opening my eyes to see how Your commandments and precepts and statutes protect me from so many horrible consequences! Just like a child in a fenced yard has a barrier between him and the traffic in the street on the other side of the fence. He's not restricted, he's protected.
And I am protected, and have been freed to enjoy Your wonderful blessings! O Father, show all Your children how the liberty You provide them is so much better than the license the World offers. Your freedom leads to Life eternal, but license only leads to death, eternal separation from Life.
Father, please send more workers into Your fields that are ripe and ready to be harvested. Protect those who have already gone out into the most difficult and dangerous fields; lead them to Your lost sheep who are seeking You, and protect them from the dogs and swine who are looking to destroy them.
Send me, Father, to the fields that You have prepared for me to connect with, and strengthen me to be Christ to those who are looking for Him. Show me, Father, what I need to accomplish in order to fulfill all the plans You have planned for me before You made anything.
And Your Name will be uplifted and praised, and You will be worshiped and adored, when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess Your greatness and glory and honor.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
