Matthew 7:13-14 (NLT)
You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way. But the gateway to life is very narrow and the road is difficult, and only a few ever find it.
As John churned out story after story during the first “Back to Basics” series, I was feverishly writing. Both taking literal notes and making mental notes for future devotions. One of John’s simplest thoughts - no more than a sentence long - stuck with my spirit more than anything. In the midst of the should-we-start-a-church drama, there were seven open pastoral vacancies in local Baptist churches. Should he have so chosen, John could have plugged in at any of them, done good work, and made a comfortable living. Instead, John chose to follow through with what the Lord was calling him to, thus refusing to take the easy way out.
Pastor’s example provides us with a greater example, a Biblical example. Read today’s Devotional Passage again, this time from the Message: “Jesus says “Don’t look for shortcuts to God. The market is flooded with surefire, easy formulas for a successful life that can be practiced in your spare time. Don’t fall for that stuff, even though crowds of people do. The way to life - to God!- is rigorous and requires total attention.””
The modern-day church gets bashed enough as it is so I’ll refrain from lashing out. I will, however, bring it to a personal level. From experience, I can tell you how easy it is to slip into the comforts of a “Christian” life. Oh, how easy it is! Show up for the service. Smile. Shake a few hands. Go on about our business. Live a good life. Take care of the family. Play with the kids. Watch the ballgame. Go shopping. All while failing to allow Jesus to saturate our conversations and actions. It's not that we fuss and cuss or commit crimes or do deplorable things. It's that we just do enough to get by. But “getting by” doesn’t “get by” with Jesus.
Read the passage yet again. If we’re going to follow Jesus, it requires our whole heart. Trusting him, just as Pastor did. Just because an easy way presents itself, it's not the best way. The road may be pocked and punctured by pitfalls, but the “narrow path leads to life.”
In the Biblically inspired words of America’s greatest poet (in my opinion anyway), Robert Frost, “…I shall be telling this with a sigh, Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.”
