Pentecost 12, Proper 16, 2004:

I received the following list of reasons people don’t go the church. Someone had substituted the word "bar" for the word "church." Unfortunately, it made the same amount of sense.

"I stopped going to bars because...every time I went there they asked for money. The bartender was the only one who spoke to me. Some of the people who go there are hypocrites. They don’t sing the kind of songs I like. My dad made me go with him when I was a kid. You don’t have to go to a bar to get drunk."

Jesus said, "Strive to enter the narrow door." He said that in answer to the question, "Will only a few be saved?" Apparently, salvation involves a bit of struggle and the answer to the question is not a straightforward one. The analogy that I have shared before is the story about the little boy who was out in the backyard watching the struggle of a butterfly as it tried to emerge from its cocoon. The process took several minutes. On the next limb down the boy noticed another cocoon begin to wiggle. He felt sorry for the trapped butterfly and ran into the house and pick up a sharp kitchen knife. He went back to the wiggling cocoon and carefully slit the side to help the butterfly escape. Sure enough, the butterfly tumbled out, but the boy noticed that it had no strength or luster to its wings. The butterfly soon died. The boy went crying to his grandmother who wisely helped the boy not feel guilty for his feeling of compassion, but explained that the process of struggling out of the cocoon was the thing that meant life and health to the butterfly.

There just might be a lesson it that for us. Strive to enter the narrow door, Jesus said. That’s the path that leads to life and health. It does not always appear to be so. Struggles are difficult and sometimes we, and those whom we love, seem to have more than our share. Jesus said the door was narrow and we are to strive to enter it. The meaning is clear. The correct way requires effort. We live in a culture that spends billions on shortcuts, on gimmicks that are said to save much of the effort. Many are praying that medical science will develop a pill that can be taken each day to undo the ravages of an indulgent lifestyle. No exercise would be necessary, no avoiding temptations, and no real discipline would be needed. We forget that discipline is kind of like taking out the garbage. If we don’t do it, something is bound to stink.

So, dear summertime remnant of the faithful, what will help us to strive to enter the narrow door? I would, first of all, want to say that we can make distinctions. We are rational creatures, endowed by God with the capacity to make those important distinctions. The way of the mob, the large crowd may well be the wrong way. The easy way, the way that requires no struggle or discipline, may be the way to self-destruction. Jesus said that those on the path that leads to life are in a continuing relationship with God. Such folk use those God-given endowments to remember who it is that leads the parade and they attempt to follow the narrow path. Obedient believers are more ready to face the dangers and trials along the journey.

I would also want to suggest that we can find the proper direction if we remember the guidebook and the Guide. One of the primary lessons to be learned in striving to enter the narrow door is that we can’t find the way by ourselves. We need someone greater than we are to provide guidance and direction for us. Through disciplined prayer, meditation, and communal worship those instructions are disclosed to us. No doubt, some of our fellow sojourners in this wonderful church are hypocrites. Maybe even a large number of you fall into that category. Even the leadership of the parish, lay and ordained, might be guilty of acting the part, which is what hypocrite means anyway.

Rest assured, if we are living our life in ways that degrade, use, and abuse others and we are giving our allegiance to the cheap things of the world, we need to turn around and head in the opposite direction. That’s what repentance means anyway.

Finally, I would want to suggest that we stand a better chance of entering the narrow door if we develop a disciplined life. The Christian way is the way of disciplined living. We’re paying a terribly high price for total permissiveness in our society. The cost can be viewed in government, education, business, church attendance, and the decrease in volunteerism in our culture. Disciplined living means striving to understand and discern God’s will for our life and living into that will, come what may, cost what it will.

I am convinced that when we stand before the throne of grace and are asked to account for our God-given life the questions we will be asked will not be "Were you perfect? Were you the flashiest Christian in your neighborhood? Were you the most moral, the most holy person around? Was your philosophical and theological system the best you could design?"

No. I believe the questions will be more basic and much more practical than that. I believe it is consistent with scripture, with the record of God’s relationship with God’s people, and with the mission, message, and ministry of the one called Jesus the Christ to suggest that these questions. "Did you strive to find my will for your life and did you strive to live by it? Did you strive as best you could with all that I gave into your keeping to serve me and hold up my name before others? Did you strive to live a life that was pleasing to me and, when you did those things that you shouldn’t have done and did not do those things that you should, were you honest in your confession? Did you strive to believe in the One whom I sent to show you the way home or did you stumble too much in the darkness of your own making?

"Will only a few be saved?" I don’t know. Jesus never said. But I do know one thing he said. He said, "strive to enter the narrow door." We are at least struggling as we must when we strive to make the proper distinctions, when we depend on God to direct us, and when we are committed to disciplined living. Who knows? That might make the door just wide enough. Amen.