The Road Less Traveled By - Matthew 7:13-14

(2nd time given)

Text: Matthew 7:13-14
Subject: Christians
Theme: Why are there so few Christians?
Proposition: Because few find the way to eternal life.
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Introduction:

Why are there so few Christians?
As we look to scripture this morning I wish to take as my theme:
"The Road Less Traveled By"
"Why are There So Few Christians?"

Main Points:

I find in Matthew 7:13-14, four reasons there are so few Christians.

I. The Gate That Leads To Destruction Is So Wide
(That Many Look No Further)

A. You Can’t Miss It

All the world’s language
when you get behind the grammar
when you explore its history
is based on pictures
backed up by mental pictures.

The same is true in this passage.
There is a picture we read.

And there is a bigger, vibrant picture
Which would have been in the minds of the hearers.

Why are there so few Christians?

The picture of the "wide gate"
Can help us understand.

According to the Greek -
The wide gate is spacious,
It is roomy and spacious,
It is wide, empty, with a lot of vacant space.

As you walk through it
There is nothing in the way.

Though "many enter through it,"
It's not crowded!

There’s plenty of space to get in.

Its like a giant Saint Louis Archway -
You know its there
But its sooo... big
That as you walk through it
It really doesn’t make any difference that it’s there.

Why are there so few Christians?
Because the gate to destruction is so wide!

There are
No barriers
No speed bumps
No guards.
No map needed
No effort needed.

You don’t have to even look for it
If your alive, unless you consciously chose not to go that way,
Unless you keep alert,
You just automatically walk right through it.

B. It’s The Natural Thing To Do!

And why wouldn’t you? -

As you look ahead through the gate
As you look down its distance
All you see are broad pastures
Cooling forests
Magical streams.

A Paradise with
Sunshine beyond every shadow.

The grand vista of the wide gate holds the promise
That you can BE ALL THAT YOU CAN BE!

Holds - the promise of prosperity.
The promise of ease.

How can anything this good not be
full of promise?
not be right?

And as you look through the wide gate
Sitting on its horizon
Shimmering, Golden, Larger than Life
You can see heaven in the distance.

Yes, heaven is clearly visible
Heaven seems to crown the broad way.
And its so clear.
It can’t be far.

The road is so pleasant
It can’t be long.

It can’t be hard.

No wonder so many -
even in the Christian churches
even among people who know about Jesus
even good, straight kids
from Christian homes
and terrific youth groups -
walk right through the wide gate
thinking all along that there is nothing wrong!

Sure, there’s river at the other side of this grand vista!

But forget the rich man in hell.

Hey, forget that he could see Abraham in heaven on the other side.

Forget that even Abraham could not cross the chasm to quench the man’s thirst.

With all that’s provided
Between here and there
With the loving grace of a good God!
Surely there will be a way across.

Surely a bridge will take you
to that door that is standing open there -
Beckoning you to heaven.

C. (Ah yes!) The Wide Gate is comfortable!

Why are there so few Christians?

Why is that many are called but few are chosen?

Because the wide gate is so. . . comfortable!

Buddhists and Hindu
Muslims, Protestants, and Catholics
Baptists, Quakers, Methodist, Pentecostals
Presbyterians, Congregationalist, Episcopalians
EVEN FREE METHODISTS!

There’s room for everybody
with no need to bump heads or elbows
no need to quarrel.

Just move over a space.
There’s room for everybody.

It’s so comfortable.

And hey, this road is big enough
The white congregation doesn’t have to mix
With the black congregation doesn’t have to mix
With the Spanish congregation doesn't
have to mix with the Korean
congregation.

But hey !
If you want to mix
You can, if you want to.

Or when you don’t want to
Step over here and
You don’t have to.

It’s so comfortable.

Rich people hang with the rich.
Poor with the poor.
Middle class are in a class by themselves.

It’s so comfortable.

You can avoid your parents.
You can avoid your kids.
You can avoid your enemies.
You can avoid your friends.
You can join the crowd.
You can avoid the crowd.

It is so comfortable!

You can duck problems.
Skirt the issues.
Avoid the undesirable.
Even duck all responsibility.
If you want to.

Just like Sky Lodge -

There’s room here.
Nobody will even know!
If you're a "loner"
A little shy,
Plenty tongue tied.
You can slip unnoticed along the fringes
Or hid in a crowd.

A wide, comfortable road and heaven in view!

No wonder so many Christians abandon
the narrow way and walk here too!

Why are there so few Christians!

Because not only is the way to destruction wide and comfortable,
but ....

II. The Road To eternal Life Is Narrow

The road to
eternal life is narrow.
Though Many Find It Attractive
Few Are Willing To Walk In It.

A. Many Do Find It Attractive.

Don’t be fooled!

The Good News has gone out throughout the world
Evangelism may not have reached every remote corner yet
But according to the Bible
The Good News has gone out throughout the world!

God has placed in each man and woman
The knowledge that there is another way
A better way.

As Romans 1:19-20 says:
What may be known about God
Is plain to them.
For since the creation of the world
God’s invisible qualities
His eternal power and divine nature
Have been clearly seen
Being understood from what has been made
So that men are without excuse.

The heavens declare the glory of God.
The skies proclaim the work of his hands.
Day after day they pour forth speech.
Night after night they display knowledge.
There is no speech or language
Where their voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out into all the earth,
Their words to the ends of the world.
Psalm 19:1-4a.

Many have heard of the narrow way -

B. But Few Are Willing To Walk In It.

Even in advance of the evangelist
Many know the demands of the Gospel Way
The Cross Way.

1.) Many try to emulate Christ’s life

They do what they have heard.
They practice what they have been taught.
They call out Lord, Lord.
They prophesy in Jesus Name.
They cast out demons in Jesus Name.
They perform miracles
in Jesus Name.
They see the narrow way.
They want the narrow way.
They try to climb up onto it.
They try to emulate it.
They try.
But, Jesus says of them:
"Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord.’
will enter the kingdom of heaven,
but only he who does the
will of my Father who is heaven.
... Away from me you evil doers!
I never knew you."


Many see the narrow way.
They want the narrow way.
They try to climb up onto it.
They try to emulate it.
They want it.
They will it with their whole
Mind, Soul, and Body.

BUT THEY DO NOT KNOW.
THEY THINK THEY KNOW.
BUT THEY DO NOT KNOW.
HAVE NOT DISCOVERED -
THE WILL OF THE FATHER.

2.) Many Others Know About The Narrow Way.

But That’s Just the Problem
Especially among people raised in the church.

Knowing about the way
Is the problem.

The way is too hard!
There are wolves along the way.
If there is a wolf in my church,
If there is a wolf at Sky Lodge,
Count me out!

There are demons along the way.
If the demons raise their heads near my church,
near my youth group,
near my family,
near Sky Lodge,
If the demons raise their heads near me!
Count me out!
There are battles,
and valleys,
and mountains,
and dark shadows,
and unknowns,
and treachery,
Count me out!

And if that isn't enough -
There are poor people
lined up all along the way.
Begging, abusing, yelling
Ceaseless, relentless,
You can’t get away from them.

And there are the hungry.
Those who need clothes.
Strangers to take in.
So many sick you think you’re in a hospital.
And they need your care.

And prisoners, chained
and unchained!
The Way is crowded in by them!
You can count me out!

And those rich folk -
How did they get up here?

Those Spanish Christians -
Why I don’t understand them -
the least they could do is speak my language.

And those Vietnamese and Koreans -
You prospered them with the jobs, God,
And businesses
I and my kids need.

Well I know Jesus said,
"Whatsoever will may come!
But - COUNT ME OUT!
I’ll watch from here!

And you ask me, "Why are there so few Christians?"

Why are there so few Christian?
Because many chose not to enter.

(But perhaps most important)

C. Because The Gate To Eternal Life Is Narrow.

(And Though Many Will Try To Enter/Only A Few Will Find It)

Friend’s even when you know to
look for the gate to the narrow way,
even when you know that the narrow gate
stands for the will of God,
it is not easy to find.

Narrow here is another picture word.
Narrow here means crowded, but not with people.

In the Greek it literally means
Hard to find because of all the obstacles
Hard to find because of
And things close about.
All the things standing in the way.

You see you can’t find the door
because of all the statues and
pillars that crowd the porch
at the entrance to the Parthenon.

The gate to the narrow way
Is not board and easy to see
or walk through.

The gate to the narrow way
Is hidden in the crowd of things in life.

In the Gospels Jesus lists a few
of the obstacles that crowd the gate,
(Some are really quite shocking):

Mothers
Fathers
Wives
Husbands

Brothers
Sisters
Children
In laws

Friends
companions
along the way.

These stand in the way of our entering in the narrow gate!

The ox in the ditch
Our work
Our real estate
Our possessions

Marriage
Death
Sickness
Health

The pleasures of life
The deceitfulness of wealth
The desires for many things

The struggle for power
The struggle against shame

Having too much
Having too little
These stand in the way of our entering in the narrow gate!

Trouble
Persecution
The worries of life
The gate, the pearl of great price,
is not easily found.

Let me illustrate:

It is like sailing on the ocean.

You know that to sail around the world
you must find the Straits of Magellan.

To get from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean
you must find the Straits of Gibraltar.

To get from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea
you must find the Bosporus Straits.

You know that home is on the other side
Through a small "strait" that opens
into the sea of life eternal.

You know that somewhere there is a coast line,
But in the middle of life’s ocean
Which way is the coast?

And when you have sighted the coast
where are the Straits to Eternal Life.

First, you feel the currents pulling you and so you say,
The water must be flowing through the straits
Out of this world and into the next.

So you go with the flow!

But its the Gulf Current
And it carries you to Greenland
And you spend a winter frozen in the ice.

Then, you learn that the gate is narrow
And the river of life flows from the throne into the ocean.

So you sail into every little place where the ocean splits the
land and the water is a little fresher.

But these are only a thousand mouths
to ten thousand rivers
or the dead end in an inlet to
a bay or small sea.

Narrow is the Gate,
the Straits to Eternal Life, are
Lost among a thousand obstacles
And best guesses.

You search and search
until you swear
That it is hidden in a hall of mirrors
Each reflecting the promise of entry to the narrow way,
But each in fact a barrier.

D. How then can we enter?

It is not enough to will to enter in
It requires knowing God’s will to enter.

Jesus calls out:

"Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But narrow the road and small is the gate that leads to life . . ."

WHY ARE THERE SO FEW CHRISTIANS?
WHY ARE THERE SO FEW,
EVEN IN THE CHURCH,
WHO WALK THE NARROW WAY?

Proposition: Because narrow is the road and small is the gate,
Only a few find it.

CONCLUSION:

Every day of our lives there are two options set before us.
Which will you chose!

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
to where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both - that morning - equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

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.
by Robert Frost

Way indeed leads on to way.
And it is seldom that we ever come back.

Which way will you follow?

The narrow way -
Or the wide -

For I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


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Text: Matthew 7:13-14
Subject: Christians
Theme: Why are there so few Christians?
Proposition: Because few find the way to eternal life.