Day 38: The Narrow Road

Today is, gloriously, a day of rest. I was considering whether to walk to church tonight when I remembered that it is my guilt-free day off.  What a joy.  The sermon this morning was very applicable for my blog, all about the two roads that the world walks on during this life.

"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 there are few who find it."  Matthew 7.13-14

You would think that Jesus would spend ages explaining why the 'wide road' is not the one to be on, but He actually makes it sound pretty appealing at first.  'The way is easy.'  How much we would love to stroll through life on an easy road - a road that requires you to do nothing, a road of self-indulgence, a road that is full of friends who will never challenge what you believe or do or say.  Conversely, the narrow road is defined as a hard road.  A road that requires you to make decisions (hard ones), a road of self-denial, a hard and difficult and lonely road.  Doesn't sound too appealing.

The problem is that the wide road, the one that lets you off and makes everything easy and doesn't require any difficult decisions of faith or practice, "leads to destruction".  The narrow road may be very difficult and hard and lonely and weary, but it is also short.  You spend perhaps 80 or 90 years on a hard road (less, for some), but  the entirety of the rest of time is spent in a place of ultimate joy, with no hard roads or difficult decisions or frustrations or pain or sorrow ever again.  Whereas those who have enjoyed their easy and fun and popular life face pain and sorrow and horror and regret and anger and bitterness for the rest of the second life, beyond time as we know it.

Makes the narrow road a little more appealing after all.  Walk on!

Watch the sermon here: 
Which Road? - Matthew 7v13-14 from Airdrie RPCS on Vimeo.