August, 25, 2013
Several cotton farmers were whiling away a winter afternoon around
the potbellied stove.
They soon became entangled in a heated discussion on the merits of
their respective religions.
The eldest of the farmers had been sitting quietly, just
listening, when the group turned to him and demanded,"Who's right, old
Jim? Which one of these religions is the right one?"
"Well,"said Jim thoughtfully,"you know there are three ways to
get from here to the cotton gin.
You can go right over the big hill. That's shorter but it's a
powerful climb.
You can go around the east side of the hill. That's not too far,
but the road is rougher and difficult.
Or you can go around the west side of the hill, which is the
longest way, but the easiest."
"But you know," he said, looking them squarely in the eye,"when
you get there, the gin man won't ask you how you came or what religion you
believe.
He just asks, 'Man, how good is your cotton?'"
Jesus uses the parable of the locked door to explain to his
followers that there is more to being a follower of Jesus than they might
think.
The parable of the locked door refers to those who tarry in
accepting Jesus.
Jesus says very clearly that it is not enough to follow
Jesus, eat meals with him and listen to him.
We cannot claim discipleship by mere affiliation.
There is something more that has to be done.
Having once accepted Jesus' invitation, each one has to live
by his teachings every moment of every day.
Those who do not remain faithful to him will be left outside.
Jesus is warning people of faith not to take their salvation
for granted.
What he does say is that salvation is not guaranteed for
anyone.”We are your people” will not be
good enough.
What Jesus is saying is that no one, no matter who he is, has
an absolute guarantee of being saved, of being accepted by God.
No one is saved by claiming identity with a particular group
or by carrying a particular name tag.
So, merely “being descended from Abraham, Jacob and all the prophets” as
the Jews were - did not count;
there is no such thing as national salvation.
The
narrow gate indicates that salvation is not cheap.
We
need to discipline ourselves, use the things that happen to us to help us grow,
rather than get us down.
We
need to remember that the tested people, the people with the most problems, the
last people, may be the ones who get in the door first.
Those
are the people that will easily slip through the narrow door.
Indeed,
many are lost because they do not choose the narrow door.
They
prefer a religion that is not too demanding, one that does not make it
mandatory to, say, merely show up for Mass every Sunday.
We
may be surprised to discover that some who seem less worthy will enter the
kingdom before us.
To
end, salvation is a gift from a God which must be willingly and fully embraced.
Christian
life is a daily struggle to rise to a higher spiritual plain.
It
is wrong to sit back and relax after we have made a personal commitment to
Christ.
We
cannot remain stagnant in our loyalty to God’s kingdom; unless we move forward
we shall move backward.
And
this is the Good News of today.
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