“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.”
As we lean on the Holy Spirit to help us become the people we are designed to become, we need to be mindful of the easy and accessible paths of this earthly life. In several instances in the Bible, we are told of the easy paths to destruction. In fact, there are so many references to the ways in which we can go astray, that I often feel like I don't have a chance at keeping it together. Jesus went as far as to say, "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
What we see is in the Bible is not doom and gloom but rather a reminder that we need the Holy Spirit to take help us "enter by the narrow gate." We really do not stand a chance on our own. Left to our human instincts, and our fleshly desires, we will certainly find ourselves heading for the wide gate ... the easy way. Why is that way so easy? It is because the ways of the world so nicely fit our leanings towards sin. We are born as sinners, called to the easy ways of the world. Money, power, admiration, acceptance, and comforts call us to the rocks like the songs of the sirens.
God reminds us through Jesus's parables and through other parts of the Bible that we will not succeed without Him. Rich or poor, we are camels trying to fit through the eye of that needle. How do we shed our innate desires ... our draw towards the earthly passions? We lean on something much more powerful than ourselves. We cannot stop our slouching towards sin without the help of the creator.
The narrow gate is hard to maneuver. It isn't made hard by anyone but ourselves. God, through his eternal grace, has provided us a way past our self-made obstacles of sin and towards that narrow gate to life. As we find ourselves on the easy way, I pray that we seek God's divine assistance back to that narrow gate to life.