Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost

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Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 16C)

August 24, 2025

Text: Luke 13:22-30

            The Door to salvation and eternal life is narrow.  And it opens in the shape of a cross.  That is to say, Christ is the Door.  Christ crucified for sinners.  Christ risen from the dead.  Christ alone.  Christ only.  What makes the Door narrow, is not that it is available only to a privileged few.  It is, rather, the exclusivity of it that makes it narrow.  That is, Christ is the only way to salvation.  All roads do NOT lead to the same place.  All doors do NOT open to life.  Not even many roads, and many doors.  All religions do NOT lead to God.  Only Christ.  Only Christianity.  Jesus says it this way in Matthew Chapter 7 (13-14; ESV): “Enter by the narrow gate.  For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.   For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

            We kick against this, because we know any number of (humanly speaking) very fine people, who are not Christians.  They’re nice.  They give to charity.  They do good deeds and lead good lives.  And we know any number of Christians who are (humanly speaking) not very fine people.  They wear their sins on their sleeve.  That is a scandal, to be sure.  But see what we’ve done?  We’ve made salvation dependent on human behavior.  Human disposition.  Works.  We want the way to be wide, in such a way that whoever is sincere, a basically good and decent fellow, regardless of the god he worships, gets in.  It’s politically incorrect to say that Jesus is the only way.  It’s tempting to say it doesn’t matter.  Just go the wide way.  Beloved, repent.

            To say that Jesus is the only way is not arrogant.  It doesn’t make those of us who know the way any better than those who don’t.  Actually, we confess quite the contrary, don’t we?  “I, a poor, miserable sinner.”  It just means we’ve found the Door.  And, as Lutherans, how is it, we confess, that we found it?  By grace.  By grace alone.  By the Holy Spirit, bringing us to the Door by His Word.  By someone telling us about the Door.  By the preaching.  (In this way, perhaps, it would be more accurate to say, “The Door found us!”)  And now, because we’ve located the Door, it is incumbent upon us to tell others, “Here is the Door.  The only One that leads to Life.  This is the Way.  Jesus.  The cross.  Christ alone.  There is no other Name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12).  Every other door leads to death.”

            Of course, that kind of pleading with others to enter through the Door comes with its own frustrations and heartaches.  That is, so many reject our pleading.  So many of those we dearly love reject our pointing them to the Door that is Christ.  Why?  “That Door is small,” they might say.  “Insignificant.  Most people are traveling the broad way.  Safety in numbers.  Consensus must equal wisdom.  And, it’s easier to go the broad way.  And more attractive.  That narrow Door, shaped, as it is, in the form of a cross, necessarily means it is difficult.  It is ugly.  It entails suffering.  I don’t want that.  So, no thank you.”  Endless are the reasons people give for passing by the narrow Door.  The plain fact is, that Door appears foolish to fallen human reason.  Thus St. Paul to the Corinthians: “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor. 2:14).  It takes a gift of the Spirit to be caught by the preaching of the Door, and so enter through it, enter through Christ and the blessed and holy cross.

            But this leads to a question, doesn’t it?  If the Holy Spirit gives faith to some who hear the preaching, and not to others… and if the Spirit wants everyone to be saved, as He says He does in His Word (for example, 1 Timothy 2:4: God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth”)… and if there is nothing in man that makes him worthy of coming to faith (finding the Door), but God alone gives faith as an unmerited gift (again, St. Paul, Eph. 2:8-9: “For by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast”)… then… what’s the question?  Why are some saved, and not others?  Or, as some well-intentioned disciple asks in our Holy Gospel this day, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” (Luke 13:23).  That question is a variation on a theme, isn’t it?  The mystery why some enter through the Door, and others do not. 

            How does Jesus answer?  He doesn’t!  Why some, and not others?  After wrestling with this question (the Doctrine of Election, we call it in theology) in Romans 8-11, St. Paul essentially puts a finger to his lips and says, enough with the question!  The answer is not for you to know!  It’s up to God to do as He knows best.  Instead, here’s what you should do.  Follow Paul’s example, and simply praise God’s incomprehensible wisdom: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!” he says, as he silences all questions.  “How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Rom. 11:33).  Instead of trying to figure out how and why God elects people, (and, frankly, judging Him as unjust, because you don’t understand the mechanics of His choice) just rejoice that you are one of the elect, take comfort in that, and give God all the praise.  Well, similar answer to the question, “will those who are saved be few?”  Worry about you, Jesus says, essentially.  You, “Strive to enter through the narrow door” (Luke 13:24).  “Strive to enter through Me, and remain in Me.”

            Here, the Lutherans have another problem, they think.  Strive.  Sounds like works.  Here’s the problem with you.  You always fall for the old sleight-of-hand trick of the adversaries in the Lutheran Reformation.  That is, slipping in the idea that the striving itself is what justifies, what saves.  That’s not what Jesus says.  He’s already brought you to the Door.  He is giving you, even now, at this very moment, by grace, to enter through it.  But you know it’s a striving.  That is to say, it’s hard, now, in this life, to remain in Christ.  Because the old, easier, comfortable, broad way is calling you to come back out the Door and join the world.  And your sinful nature wants you to do just that.  Because it appeals to your flesh.  And you look at the cross shaped Door of Christ, and you don’t want to have to go through that, because that means suffering.  The broad way means all kinds of pleasure and ease and comfort, now, heedless of any suffering that may await you at the end (plus, you won’t have to worry about all those other people who won’t come through the Door).  The narrow Door means suffering now, in anticipation of the great joy of the Kingdom and resurrection in the End.  See what it means to strive?  Not salvation by works.  Salvation is in Christ alone.  But mortification of the flesh.  Patience.  Discipline.  Resisting the temptation to apostatize (forsake the faith).  Suffering for the sake and Name of Christ. 

            Some Christians think they can have their cake, and eat it, too (you understand that phrase?  If you eat your cake, you don’t have it anymore.  It’s gone).  That is, they keep one foot… or maybe just a toe… maybe just the little toe… near the Doorway, or so they think, by maintaining their outward Christian bona fides.  Whatever that is, in their minds.  They come to Church however much they think they should.  They do good things.  Live good lives.  According to their own definition of “good.”  But they’ve actually left the Door, little toe and all.  By trusting in those bona fides instead of Christ alone.  Like the Pharisees, who trusted their own righteousness.  Or, they thought they would leave the Door, but stay close enough that they could rush back to it when the moment of crisis comes.  Like somebody who doesn’t really participate in Christianity on any regular basis, but they plan to get to it, someday, near the end of their life.  And what happens is, death will come… or maybe even the End, when Christ comes again… and the Door will be shut... before they have a chance to repent.  Before they can run back to the Door.  That is the warning of this text.  They will have lost out on the Time of Grace (the time of this earthly life).  It’s this great mystery why not everybody feels the urgency.  Why they don’t seem to want the comfort, and peace, and joy we have as Christians.  “Lord, why?  Why do some reject You?”  What is Jesus’ answer?  Don’t let that be you.  Don’t be one of those banging on the Door on the Last Day, shouting that you should be let in, because you deserve it, somehow… even though you wanted nothing to do with the Door when it was open to you.  Don’t be one of those who are shocked when Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the Prophets enter in, with this great multitude from east and west, north and south, but you yourself are shut out. 

            How do you avoid that?  Be in the Door now.  Be in Christ now.  Be receiving His death, and therefore His life, now.  How?  You know it, because you’re here.  Be in His Church.  Be in His Word.  Be at His Table.  Often.  Always.  These are the means He gives you, by which you remain in Him.  Will those who are saved be few?  We worry about that, because we want everyone to be saved, and especially those we love.   But you can’t believe for another.  And you can’t be in Christ for another.  But you can be in Christ for you.  And you are.  God has given you to be here (called you by the Gospel, enlightened you with His gifts).  Stay here.  No matter how hard it gets.  Because only here, in Christ, is there Life and salvation.  And call out to others: “Here it is!  The Door!  Come on in… to Christ alone.”  Some won’t listen.  But some will.  Some will even surprise you.  And that will be a joy to you for all eternity.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.