As we've been working our way through the Gospel of Luke and as Jesus is gradually making His way closer and closer to Jerusalem, He has been increasing the frequency of His warnings of division and judgment. We have heard Him speak of perishing. We have heard Him preach of fig trees being cut down and cast out. And we have already seen, as we go through the Gospel of Luke here, that this is disturbing people. And it's disturbing some of them, especially when these warnings are directed very plainly at even members of the Old Covenant. We were just in a synagogue the last two Lord's Days. We were there in the synagogue where Jesus called the synagogue leader a hypocrite. He called him a religious pretender. And then earlier in chapter 11, we remember Jesus declared condemnation upon the apparently most righteous. He declared a word of condemnation to the Pharisees, who Jesus said were very eager to go through external ceremonies. They were very eager to wash the outside of the cup, but the whole time they were not repenting of their inward greed or their inward wickedness. He condemned the Pharisees and scribes and hypocrites there. He condemned them as religious pretenders who pretended to put on life, but it was this mask of spiritual life that they were wearing, but actually they were just spiritual graves of death. He condemned them there in chapter 11 as prophet murderers. He condemned them as being outside the kingdom of God. And you can imagine how this would have made most in the Jewish community very concerned. It would have made them wonder, well, who is in the kingdom? What are we to make of the kingdom? What are we to make of these promises that we've been raised with? Why, if even the scribes and the Pharisees and the priests and the synagogue leaders are in danger of not entering the kingdom, well then, who can be saved? You can hear this question running through the minds of many people that Jesus has been preaching to. It was assumed by many in the Old Covenant, if not most, that all of the members of the kingdom, maybe there would be some exceptions, but it was assumed generally that all the members of the Old Covenant would be saved. But now Jesus is warning that that's not true. Jesus is challenging assumptions that they had about automatic kingdom membership. This is bothering people. He's challenging assumptions, in other words, about who would be first and who would be last. He's challenging assumptions about who was automatically in and who was out, who would be admitted and who would be excluded, those kinds of things. And so Jesus probably heard a certain question. He probably heard it on several occasions. Are there only a few who will be saved? So there's a certain one who asked him that question, and at first, it might look like a number question, but I don't think this is a number question. I don't think the person asking the question is moved by simple curiosity over numbers. I don't think that this person is trying to build some kind of salvation spreadsheet. I don't think that's it at all. So why does he ask the question? What's behind it? Well, I think that there are several possibilities. One possibility is that the person asking the question was nervous. That could be a possibility. Why does Jesus seem to be greatly restricting admittance into the kingdom when He preaches? Why is it that when He preaches it seems like the door of the kingdom is so narrow? Are there only going to be a few who are saved, Lord? Maybe it's a question out of nervousness. Why so many warnings? Why so many condemnations spoken and even spoken to the Old Covenant community? If even members of the Old Covenant Kingdom are being warned about missing out on the Kingdom of the Messiah, well then, Lord, who really can be saved? Is it only going to be a few? We already know, we've already seen some people have responded with great concern over this tone in the preaching of Jesus when they begin to try to figure out, well, then who's going to be safe in this judgment that you speak of? Are we more safe than those murdered Galileans? Who's in and who's out? The question, are there few who are saved? I don't think is being asked by someone who's looking for a specific number. But I think it's being asked by someone who has become unsettled. So maybe they're nervous. I suppose the question or what's behind the question, what's moving it could be something other than just simple nervousness. I look at this question, I wonder if it's a complaint. I wonder if there could be a complaint or a complaining attitude behind the question. Lord, based on what you're saying, is anybody going to be saved?" As if he's complaining against the Lord for this tone that the Lord has taken. Maybe there's some sarcasm in it. Lord, is there anybody that's going to be saved? Nervousness, unsettledness, maybe there's a complaint behind it. Maybe there's sarcasm behind it because the person doesn't like what he has heard. I listened to this question and I wonder if this person is trying to find someone to blame if there are few who are saved. In other words, it might be something like this, if few are saved, then whose fault is it exactly? If that is behind the question, this person might be in a not so subtle way casting doubt on the one who claims he can save. Now, this is complicated, but I think about these kinds of things because this is just the way we work, isn't it? So I think questions like this are always more complicated when you begin to dig down and think about what's moving this person to ask the question, is this person who has heard Jesus make these very plain claims of forgiving sins and He's given these miraculous proofs and preaching of salvation, But are there few that are going to be saved? As in, Lord, is there some kind of problem with your willingness to save? Is there some kind of problem with your generosity? It's not that your willingness is small, is it, Lord? It's not that your generosity is small to save. Is that the issue? Lord, are you really being generous enough? I think these kinds of things can work behind a question like this. Those who are truly entering the kingdom according to Jesus, seems to be the few instead of the most. Lord, why is this? The question might be a complaint over salvation being limited, seemingly, to the few. It might be a question wondering why, why even the religious leaders are not being granted automatic admission. This is puzzling. This is disturbing. The person asking the question, given the general context that Jesus is working with here, this person is probably coming to the Lord with lots of unfounded assumptions when it comes to the kingdom. And he's probably working with all kinds of unfounded assumptions when it comes to thinking about salvation. So he comes to Jesus with a question about salvation. It's really a question about the kingdom. Are there few who will be in the kingdom? This kind of a thing. Well, let's listen to the answer that Jesus gives here in Luke 13 as He goes on to explain something about kingdom membership. Let's listen again to His answer here beginning at Luke 13 and verse 24. Jesus said, "...strive to enter through the narrow gate. For many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able." When once the master of the house has risen up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock at the door saying, Lord, Lord, open for us. And he will answer and say to you, I do not know you, where you are from. Then you will begin to say, we ate and drank in your presence and you taught in our streets. But he will say, I tell you, I do not know you, where you are from. Depart from me, all you workers of iniquity. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and yourselves thrust out. They will come from the east and the west and from the north and the south and sit down in the kingdom of God. And indeed there are last who will be first and there are first who will be last. Are there few who will be saved? What is this about kingdom membership? So here's Jesus' answer. He takes us out to a house. And the house is the greatest mansion that you have ever seen. In fact, it's more than just a house, it's a vast estate. As we approach the estate, we can begin to hear the sound of voices. But Jesus doesn't take us into the house at first. He stops at the front gate because the first voices that He wants us to listen to are the voices of people who are standing outside the gate of this mansion in this vast estate. And speaking of the gate, we do notice, now that we're there, we notice that the gate is narrow. And we notice that there's a crowd outside this narrow gate. And we look at them, and it's sort of an uncomfortable situation. We notice that they are seeking to enter into the estate, but they cannot get in. And the reason why? Well, it's not because the gate is narrow. It's because the gate is shut. Now how can that be? Well, the Lord tells us, the master of the house has already risen. The master of the house has already come to the gate and he has shut it closed. Well, we know what that means. That means that this narrow gate had been opened earlier. It hasn't always been closed. It was opened earlier, but now it is closed. And so we notice this sort of odd situation, this crowd outside is not pressing to try and enter through a gate that is still open. Yes, they are trying to enter, but only after it's too late. We're not to assume that they just arrived there to the house. I think there's an implication here that they've been near But they didn't try to go through when the gate was open. But now that the gate is closed, they're pressing. But the gate's closed and there they are after it's too late. They weren't seeking to get through the gate when the open gate was offered. They did not seek to enter while they had opportunity. Look at them standing there. Look at them standing there, banging on the shut gate. And listen to them as they call out, hoping that the master of the house will hear them. Listen, you can hear them say, Lord, Lord, open the gate for us. But from inside the house, we can hear the master of the house. And he calls back and he says, I do not know you or where you are from. So the master does not open the gate for them. It was earlier an open gate. Yes, narrow, but also yes, earlier opened, but also yes, now closed. The master does not reopen the gate once it is shut. But the crowd outside does not silence their voices. They begin to offer reasons why the master should open the gate. And as we listen very carefully to what they say, we begin to recognize that they speak to the master as if he has committed some kind of horrible mistake. They speak to the master as if he has a memory problem. They speak to him as if he is forgetting all of the good reasons why he should reopen the gate to them. They speak to the master as if he is wrong not to let them in. And so we begin to feel uncomfortable as we're there listening to this. They speak to the master as if he owes it to them to come to that gate and reopen it. The crowd says, We ate and we drank in Your presence. We were like this. We were near to You and You were near to us, even in our own houses. You were near to us. Why, we heard Your Word up and down our streets. We were near to You and You were near to us. We were near to Your Word and Your Word was near to us. But listen carefully to them. Can you notice what you don't hear? You don't hear them ask for the mercy of the Master. They don't humbly beg for something as if they don't deserve it. They demand as if they have earned the open gate by something they did, or they demand admission into the house simply because of their proximity at some point to the master. And how does the master of the house respond? Well, he again says, I do not know you, where you are from, but then He adds this additional statement, "'Depart from me, all you workers of iniquity.' Yes, they had been in the vicinity of the Master. Yes, they can say that He was near to them as He taught. And yes, they can even recall the things that He might have said to them. But the Master knows that they never responded to Him in a sincerely positive way. Yes, they heard Him teach. But they never turned from their wicked ways, is what he just there says to them. There they are, they're banging on the closed gate, they're making an appeal to their own works, they're making an appeal to some kind of nearness that they had to him, proximity to him. And so the master basically says, well if it's your works you want to bring up, your works are wicked. And then, upon this judgment, the master sends them away. He sends them away with a command that they have no power to resist. He commands them to leave. The whole time we're standing there and we're listening and this is really, it's more than awkward, it's become very, very uncomfortable. So he commands them to leave and then the whole atmosphere changes. When the master refuses to reopen the gate for them and when they realize that all of their pleading is of no use, they're banging on the gate and their demands are replaced with weeping. Can you hear it? Can you hear this weeping? It's the saddest sadness you ever heard. It's the most painful grieving you ever heard. This crowd outside this shut gate, they are inconsolable. It's a sad despair like you've never seen or heard. The weeping that you hear is an expression of the pain of the most intense trauma that a human being will ever experience. It's an expression of the pain of the intense trauma of realizing that they are shut out of the house and in realizing that they will be shut out of the house forever and they weep. But listen carefully. Listen very carefully as they weep, because it's not just weeping that you hear outside the shut gate. Mixed in with the weeping, you can hear the sound of the gnashing of teeth. And this is not just simply another expression of sadness. No, it's not that. Do you know what gnashing of teeth is? This is an expression of fury. They weep and they are angry. They are furious. Did you expect them to be sad and humble? They are not. Did you expect them to sadly admit finally that the Master is right? No, they never will. In the middle of this trauma of being turned away from the house forever, they are furious. They grind their teeth with wrath against the Master. Ah, it becomes more clear to us now. We might have wondered earlier if the Master was just being too harsh. After all, these people were wanting to be let in. Why can't He just let them in? But now these people themselves, they're the ones who make it clear to us. Yeah, they're banging at the gate. They want to come into the house. They want the benefits of the house, but they don't love the Master. They don't love Him. They're angry. They're furious at Him. They don't love Him. They hate Him. They never did really, sincerely trust or love His Word, though they pleaded their nearness to it. They want the benefits of the house, but they will not love the Master. And they never will change. They never will love Him. And He sends them away. Which is interesting to think about When we think about that, even the intensity of this worst kind of pain and trauma doesn't change their hearts. They hate His judgment. They hate His judgment. But by their own reaction of wrath against the Master, they actually confirm that the Master is right to send them away. The master isn't sending away friends, he's sending away enemies. Maybe they tried to hide their hatred at first, but it comes out. And so they weep from the trauma and they gnash their teeth with fury. But would you like to know another reason why they are so traumatized and would you like to know another reason why they are so furious? It's not just because they are excluded, it's because they are given a glimpse of who is inside the house. So let's now step inside the house and see for ourselves who is there. Can you see who is in the house? Inside of the house we see Abraham and we see Isaac and Jacob and we can see the prophets. Now we know what that means. We continue to look around the house and that means that we can see Enoch. and we see Noah, and we see Sarah. And over there, there's Joseph, and over there, there's Moses. They're in the house. We continue to look and we see there's Isaiah, and there's Jeremiah, and there's John the Baptist. And when we see them, we can remember that there is something that all of them have in common. All of them believed something. We remember that they all believed that without faith it is impossible to please the master. They all believed that promise which even Abel believed that those who the master counts as righteous, they are the same ones who put their faith in the promise of the provision of someone else's righteousness. And they put their faith in the promise of someone else's payment for their sins. Look carefully at this situation. Is it that we have here a situation where it's the sinless who are welcome into the house and sinners are sent away? No, that's not at all the picture. Everyone who's in the house, they would admit, yes, they were sinners, horrible sinners, yes, they would admit that. All of these people were sinners who were in the house, but when the Master was near to them so that they could hear His Word, they admitted that they were poor. They admitted that they did not have the money to purchase an entrance into the house. With hearts that were broken over their poverty and broken over their helplessness, they did not ask for what they thought they deserved. They asked, they pleaded for what they knew they could never have or never earn on their own. All of these people, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the prophets, are they inside the house because they yelled louder than other people? No. Do they just bang long enough at the gate? No. It's this. They're in the house because when the gate was still open, They walked through. That's how they're in the house. When the narrow gate was open, they walked through. Before the gate was closed, the master granted them entrance. And it's not because they had money in their hands. And it's not because their righteous works outweighed their sins. It's because they came through the open, narrow gate. They didn't try to gain access to the house through any other way. They came through the gate. They didn't plead their mere awareness of the Master. They didn't rest their sense of security upon that. They didn't plead their proximity to the Master. They didn't try to come through any other gate that men might imagine would open up into that house. No, they are there, they are in the house but only through the narrow gate and those who are outside of the house are given a glimpse of this and they are furious. Now look again inside the house. We've seen people that, you know, they have names that we know, they have names that we recognize. We also, as we continue to look in the house, notice there's a crowd that we cannot number. There are people whose names that we don't know and they have come from the four corners of the earth. We might have wondered earlier if the master was being a little too stingy, a little too miserly, a bit of an unreasonable recluse, unwilling to open his house and share the riches of his house. But actually this is not the case at all. Look in the house, there are numerous people of all sorts from lots of different places and lots of different backgrounds from all over the planet and there they are in the house. And look carefully, don't turn your eyes away just yet, look carefully at what all of them are doing in that house. You see what they're doing? They are sitting down. They're all sitting down. Why, it looks to us like the Master is hosting a feast. It looks to us like those who are inside the house are not scurrying around under a heavy burden of toil. Why, it looks to us like there's no toil at all. It looks to us like there's no burden at all. It looks to us like there's no misery at all. It looks like to us there's no fatigue. There they are, sitting. We listen and we can't hear any weeping. and we listen and we can't hear any angry gnashing of teeth, we'd look, we would say to ourselves, this looks like rest. It looks like the happiest rest ever as they sit at the Master's own banquet table. And then Jesus concludes His parable with a proverb. It's a very simple one-line proverb. There are last who will be first and there are first who will be last. And that's basically Jesus' answer to the question, are there few who will be saved? That's basically His answer to the question about salvation or about kingdom membership. There are first, there are last who will be first and there are first who will be last. That's a way to summarize this little story that we've just walked through. The parable that we have just walked through, it presents a picture which reverses what some people were expecting. People that Jesus is preaching to here as we go through the Gospel of Luke, they were bringing assumptions when it came to membership in the kingdom and Jesus is attacking those assumptions. Jesus is reversing those assumptions. He's turning them on their head. The end result is not what some will be expecting. Perhaps we could say the end result is not what many are expecting. Who is on the outside of the house and who is on the inside might surprise you, I think is what Jesus is saying to the one who asks Him the question. Are there few who will be saved? Well, those who are saved and those who are not saved, it might meet you with some shock. Who's on the inside of this house and who's on the outside of this house? Many will be surprised and they're surprised, will be joined with despair and fury. This proverb of reversal of expectations It should remind you of what, speaking of John the Baptist, it should remind you of what John the Baptist earlier said when many came out to hear him preach and he said to them, Brutivipers, and that's not a compliment by the way, children of snakes, offspring of snakes, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore, John said, bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father. Don't even begin to try to plead proximity, John said to them. John said, for I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. In other words, John preached and said, don't even begin to try and justify yourselves because of your proximity to Abraham or because of your nearness to the covenants. Don't even come to me with that. Don't even try to say that you are naturally first or that you are somehow automatically granted admittance into the kingdom. God could grant admittance to these rocks. Don't come to me with these things. John preached to them. John said, without repentance and without faith, you are not fleeing the wrath to come. Plead your proximity to Abraham all you want. Plead your nearness to the covenants. Plead your nearness to God's word. Without faith, you're not in the house. So, Jesus is asked a question, essentially about house membership. And this little proverb then, we can hear it now, it's a warning, isn't it? Jesus gives an answer which is a warning. Which brings us back to the original question, Lord, are there few who are saved? And the answer back to Him is a warning. Well, you might be surprised with who isn't. you might be surprised with who is. If your assumptions are all wrong, you just might be shocked. And there are many who will go to the final day with all the wrong assumptions, and it'll be too late. Don't make the wrong assumption as to who is on the outside of the gate and who is on the inside. Don't judge this by sight. Don't judge this by how clean the outside of the cup is. Well, let's reflect on this a little bit. The kingdom of heaven can be compared to a tree that is so magnificent and so sufficient that birds of all sorts from the four corners of the earth will fly to its branches and find safety in its protective shadows." The prophets had foretold of this kingdom. They had foretold of its king. Beginning with Adam, God gave the promise of salvation through a son who would be born of the woman. And through many generations that followed, God gradually at various times and in various ways, He gave further special revelation on this promise. Further revealing the nature of the Son, further revealing the special work of this special Son, further revealing the means by which the Son would be delivered into the world. He would be a son of Seth. He would be a son of Noah. And then God began to narrow down the focus to a particular nation. He would be a son of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. And God narrowed down the focus. He narrowed down the anticipation to a particular family within that nation. The son would be a son of David. But all along, As God was narrowing down the focus, the whole time God had made it clear, He had made it clear even to Cain and Abel that salvation would be by faith in the Son and not by our works. But you know how sinful men are. Sinful men hate this. Sinful men don't like to hear this. Sinful women don't like to hear this. Naturally, we don't like to hear this, that salvation will be by faith alone in this promised Son alone and not by our works. But salvation would have to be by faith alone and not by our works. Could the children of Adam run back into the Garden of Eden? Could they run back in? Could even Adam and Eve have run back in and said, let's have a second go at it? Impossible. Could any of the children of Adam by natural generation have fellowship with God upon the terms of a broken covenant? It's impossible. God is holy. So powerful was the realm of death that had entered the world that none of Adam's children had the ability to break the imprisonment that had come upon them. None of them had that ability. Every function and every part of soul and body was corrupted. To know God and to love Him as He is to be known and loved was lost. Righteousness, lost. True holiness, lost. The exercise of a worshipful and righteous and holy dominion that would spread the glory of God across the planet, lost. Salvation and the restoration of fellowship with God, it couldn't be by our works. It would have to be by grace alone, through faith alone, in the promised Son alone. And so Abel brought his offering with faith in the promised Son and God accounted Abel as righteous. Abel was justified by faith alone in the promised Son alone. Cain brought his offering but with no repentance. Cain brought his offering but with no faith in the promised Son. And God counted Cain's offering as a wicked exercise of self-righteousness. Abraham believed the promise and he threw himself upon it as his only hope for salvation from his sins and God justified him." You know what that means. God declared Abraham's account before him as righteous and God accepted Abraham as righteous in his sight, but only for the righteousness of the promised son imputed to Abraham and received by Abraham by faith alone. And this was no secret because God did not hide this truth because God sent prophet after prophet after prophet after prophet who condemned the pride of Cain and who preached this very gospel, who preached the only gospel that God has ever given. The justified before God find deliverance out of the realm of death and they find deliverance into the realm of true and lasting life by faith alone in this promised Son alone. Prophet after prophet after prophet preached this. The prophet Habakkuk is but one example. From chapter 2 of that prophecy, the prophet said, Then the Lord answered me and said, Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it will speak and it will not lie, though it tarries, wait for it, because it will surely come, it will not tarry. Behold the proud, His soul is not upright in Him, but the just shall live how? By His faith." But what happened when the Son was finally delivered into the world? When He was delivered into the world, this world of His own making, this world did not know Him. They did not love Him as He deserves to be loved. He came to His own people in the line of Abraham. And He found them, although with the blood of Abraham in their bodies, He found them without the same faith as Abraham. He found them without the same faith as the prophets in their own souls. And you know who those people were? They were the people who had the Scriptures. They had the special revelation of God committed to them in writing. why it was as if God himself through many generations had walked up and down and up and down and up and down their streets because he was so near to them in his word. They themselves pronounced their great proximity to God and then the promised son came. And then the promised son came and he preached to Abraham's descendants, but their response was mainly rejection and not thankful reception. Some believed and we rejoice to see the record of that here in the gospel of Luke, but many did not believe. Why? Well, because the son is the light of men. And His Word and His work is an attack upon the realm of darkness. And the dark, deathly corruption naturally hates the light. Just like God did with Cain, the Son preaches the gospel to men bound in their sins, but their countenance grows dark. And their countenance grows angry. when their pride and their self-trust is rebuked and when their works are called evil, how dark their countenance grows. And so rather than giving comfort to the descendants of Abraham on the basis of their natural membership in the old covenant nation, Jesus shuts them out of the kingdom promises and excludes those who will not put their faith in Him. Even the apparently most righteous members of that community, the scribes and the Pharisees and the priests, they are rebuked as unbelievers. Which is probably why someone said to Him, Lord, are there few who can be saved? And the Lord's answer then can be summarized as this. You want to ask me if there are few who will be saved. You're disturbed by the warnings. You're disturbed by the condemnation that comes to those who will not believe. Here's the answer. Behold the proud. His soul is not upright in Him. Behold the proud. who proclaim their own righteousness by virtue of simply being in proximity to God or being near to His Word. Behold the proud who put their trust in their close proximity to the covenant or to the covenant community, but behold how slow they are to humility. Behold how quick they are to speak of the goodness that they have done. Behold the proud, his soul is not righteously upright." Those that are saved, those who are saved, they are those who discern the limited time that the narrow gate will be open. Those who are saved, they are those who discern when mercy is available. Those who will be safe, those who will be accounted as righteous, they rest not upon their own works. They have found life and everlasting safety by faith alone in the promised Son alone. Those who are saved, well, it's those who have the same faith as Abraham's faith. Those who are saved, those who believe as Isaac believed and Jacob and the prophets believed. Those who are saved, even those who are born far away from the covenants of promise, those born far away from the commonwealth of Israel, if their faith is in the promised Son. And some of you, Jesus is saying here, some of you, you will see these people born far away. They have nothing to plead when it comes to proximity. you will see them dining with Abraham because they believed. Well, I hope that you'll leave the room today applying this to yourself. The Lord has done a very helpful thing for you here today. Someone asked him a question about salvation and what he did was to lift the curtain that hides your eyes from things that were happening then or things that are happening now. And ultimately, he is lifting the curtain a little bit that hides your eyes from the future. He lifts it a little bit and he is giving you a glimpse of how judgment works. And He is certainly giving you a glimpse of what you wouldn't otherwise be able to see with your eyes right now, but He is giving you a glimpse of that great and horrible and final day of judgment. And that's a very helpful thing that the Lord has done for you today. And you have been shown the gate to the house. You've been shown the entrance into the kingdom and it is a stenotic door. It's a very, very narrow door. Very narrow. Would you like to know why it's narrow? Would you like to know why the gate to the kingdom is narrow? Well, it's because this is the gate of justification by faith alone. That's why it's narrow. It's narrow because it shuts out any of your works that you think you might use as your ticket for admission. The gate is narrow against those kinds of things. It is narrow because this is the gate of justification by faith alone. The gate is narrow because it shuts out the comparison And I know you've done this. There's a comparison coming up here in a little bit in the Gospel of Luke. It goes like this. Well, I'm not as bad as... The gate shuts that out, doesn't it? Well, I'm not as bad as so-and-so, so that's my admission, right? No, this gate is narrow and it shuts that out. The gate is narrow because it shuts out those who will not believe the prophets. The gate is narrow because it does not admit based on physical lineage or proximity to believers. The gate is narrow because the master of the house does not just simply sweep sins under the rug and pretend you didn't commit them against him. The gate is narrow because every sin, no matter how small, deserves eternal condemnation. Don't imagine that God is like you. The gate is narrow because every function and every part of you, body and soul, is touched and corrupted by the realm of death and so there is no thing of yourself that you can appeal to. The gate is narrow because this is the gate of justification by faith alone. The gate is narrow because there is only one Savior who has the righteousness that you need to be granted into your account before God. There's only one Savior. The gate is narrow. You know how men in this world are, they imagine this gate to be wide with, you know, lots of different gates and lots of different paths to this house. But no, no, no. There's only one Savior who has the righteousness that you need draped across your shoulders like a robe so that you may be in the presence of the Master. There's only one Savior who has that. There's only one Savior who can grant that to you. The gate is narrow because the righteousness you need to be accounted as righteous before God, it must be nothing less than the righteousness of God. Okay, so plead what you've done and plead that your good works outweigh your bad. The question is, are you as righteous as God? And if not, you are in big trouble unless you have believed the word of the prophets. that one did come into the world who was righteous, in possession of the righteousness of God, and He's willing it to share to all who call upon Him for His mercy. This is why the gate is narrow. It has to be the righteousness of God in your account. And there's only one Savior who has that. The gate is narrow because all sins must be paid for with hellish agony. Every last sin ever committed will be paid with hellish agony. When Jesus says, strive to enter through the narrow gate, what He is saying is basically this. He is saying this to you this morning. He is saying, take off the mask of a pretended faith. and sincerely cast yourself upon His mercy." That's coming through the gate. Look ahead. Look ahead especially to the Day of Judgment and look ahead at those who are outside the gate. Whose fault is it? It's their fault. It's not the Master's fault. And look carefully, they are not begging to be let in through the gate while it was still open and while it was still available to them. They are the ones who resisted and would not ask for the Lord's mercy. And they continued to do so until it was too late. And you might say, well, look at their tears though. Aren't they worth something? Look, they are weeping. Yes, but their tears are not the tears of repentance. Yes, they weep. But they're weeping perhaps over the consequences of their sins. They do not weep over their sins. Yes, they weep with the trauma of realizing that they will not escape the eternal hellish agony, but even then it is not the weeping of a brokenness over their sins. One commentator put it this way, he said, there's a lot of quote-unquote repentance that does not have the character of repentance. There is a kind of repentance, he said, that is little more than regret, which though it fears the consequences of sin, it does not deplore the sin itself. The door is narrow because every sin deserves condemnation and there is only one Savior who has paid the penalty and who has the righteousness." It's a very helpful thing that the Lord has spoken through His Word to us today because there's a moment coming when the door will be shut forever, but today the door is still open because God is merciful. because God is merciful. And you're here, and you're breathing, you're still alive, and you have not put your faith in this Savior. You have been up to this time perhaps wearing a pretended mask, if even you've been pretending. It's a pretended mask of faith, but maybe you haven't even been pretending that. You hear preaching of the gospel and it's just like this. Your arms are extended and you say, that's fine for other people or I'll get around to that later. I have time. You don't know that you'll get around to it. You don't know that you have time. How many people stand outside that gate on that day and they went to their grave saying, tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow. But the door now is open. By the preaching of the Word, this Master has again extended His offer to you. The Master of the house who is Christ Himself, He is near to you in this very moment in the preaching of His Word. He is near to you. If you have heard the preaching of His Word, And in as far as I have been faithful to represent what the Word says, you have heard the Word of the Master of the house speak to you today." The door isn't shut yet. It is yet open. It is yet open. The free and sincere offer of the forgiveness of your sins is given to you by Him right now. right now it's offered to you, the free offer, the forgiveness of your sins. May it not be so for you that when you come to the final day that you are dismissed and sent away by Christ. May it not be so for you that you would be one of those sent away, perhaps even with painful memories of all of those sermons which you heard and with painful memories of all the opportunities that were offered but which you never took. The gate is open. Yes, it's narrow. There's only one gate and it's narrow. There's only one Savior, but the gate is open to you this morning. Let me conclude then with a word to you, dear ones who have sincerely believed this gospel and to you who have sincerely believed this Savior. It's a very sobering thing that we've thought about today. The Lord begins to speak of people that He sends away. It's terrifying. But for you who have put your trust in Him, I would say to you, listen to what the Lord has said today and be refreshed and be strengthened with what you have seen by believing this word of your Savior. because one day you will sit. You will sit. There's a sitting, yes, that we know by faith already, but how in our souls and bodies we still carry such heavy burdens. One day we will sit. We will sit in His kingdom. Dear believers in the Lord, there's a picture that the Lord has given here and it's a picture of peace in soul and body. We will sit because we will have entered into the Sabbath of God. Imagine the Sabbath of God. The toil and the burden and the weight of the misery of this world will all be gone. The burden of toil and soul and body will be lifted, and soul and body will rest with the delights of glory." Oh, what would that be like to recline at the master's banquet table? All the toil is lifted and all the misery is lifted. not a hint of anything nagging, not a hint of any anxiety, you will be in soul and body, you will be at rest. There's a wonderful promise for those who have put their faith upon this promised Son alone. Believe the promise, dear saints, given here again. Just as God spoke to Abraham the promise that he was accounted as righteous, just as God spoke to Abraham and assured him that he was accepted, this promise has again been spoken to you who have cast yourself upon the sacrifice that God provides. And so, dear saints, let's consider the promise that Christ has given for those who have walked through this narrow gate of justification by faith alone and the promised Son alone." Let's make the words of Psalm 107, let's make them our praise, shall we? Let us be the ones who give thanks to the Lord for He is good, because His mercy endures for others. Let us who are the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy. We are the ones that He has gathered out of the lands. Look at us. We are from the east and we are from the west. We are from the north and from the south. We are the ones who were wandering in the desert in a desolate way. We are the ones who searched sinfully thinking we could find a city of refuge in this life. Yes, we searched but we found no city to dwell in. We found no rest here. We found no peace here in this life. Look at us, there we were, hungry and thirsty with our souls fainting in us. But then the word of this very gospel came to us and we cried out to the Lord in our trouble and He delivered us out of our distresses. He led us forth by the right way that we might go to the city. He led us through the gate and we walk through by faith and we dwell in His kingdom and we will dwell in His kingdom Oh that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men because He has satisfied our longing souls. He has filled our hungry souls with goodness. We remember who we were We were the ones who were sitting in darkness. We were the ones sitting in the shadow of death, not as the literal, just the literal last moment of breathing, but the realm of death. That's where we'd live. That's where we were sitting. That's where we were bound in our affliction, bound in our irons. We were the ones who were rebelling against the word of the Lord. We were the ones who despised the counsel of the Most High. We confess it. And He brought down upon our hearts labor. He brought down upon our hearts the misery of it and He convicted us of the sin. And so we then fell down. We fell down and we were crushed and we found none to help. But then we cried out to the Lord in our trouble. And He saved us out of our distresses. He brought us out of darkness. He brought us out of the shadow of death. He broke our chains in pieces. Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men like us.