“And someone asked Him, Lord, will only a few be saved (rescued, delivered from the penalties of the last judgment, and made partakers of the salvation by Christ)? And He said to them, Strive to enter by the narrow door [force yourselves through it], for many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able” Luke 13:23-24 AMP
To conclude that it is easy to enter into the Kingdom of God or to even remain there is a fallacy. I am not debating the fact that many people can see the Kingdom by being genuinely born again. I am talking about entering into the kingdom by being born of water and spirit. Jesus frankly said few are those that are in the strait gate and narrow way that leads to Life. Many for a reason best known to them are trying the impossible. They want to reconstruct the strait gate and the narrow way into the wide gate and wide path. We are skilled at manipulating the emotions of other people to no avail. But it’s time we closely examine what the Lord Himself said about this issue according to him, the way to the Kingdom is anything but easy.
FIRST, Unless you are born-again, you cannot see.
“I tell you the truth, unless a man is born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God… unless a man is born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God” (John 3:3,5).
Being born-again is not the goal, but the first step towards the goal: the goal is the Kingdom of God. We could state it like this: the narrow gate is not the goal, but it is the first thing we must pass through in order to enter the narrow path. Our goal, and God’s goal, is not the gate or we would not need a path. Though we begin our journey by entering the gate, the goal is at the end of the path, not at the beginning of the path.
So what is the goal?
“Who will have all men to be saved (narrow gate), and to come unto the knowledge of the truth (narrow path).” 1 Tim 2:4.
Here we see one will of God with two expressions – a gate and a path. We enter the gate in a moment, but we walk the path over time. We are saved in a moment, but we come to the full-knowledge (epignosis) of Christ over time. Birth is the beginning of Life, not the goal of Life. The goal in view here is not being born-again, but entering the Kingdom.
If Jesus has truly translated you into His Kingdom, then the end has come to sin, unrighteousness, iniquity, fear, death, shame, disgrace, calamity, shakings, poverty, joblessness, cancer, oppression, depression, impossibilities, sickness and disease, diabetes, fibroid, attacks, barrenness, prolonged singleness, addiction and all sorts of things that are outside His Kingdom. This is your portion today.
“Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:” Col 1: 13.“By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.” Heb 11:5.
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