HARDSHIPS

“Go in through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in through it. Because narrow is the gate and constricted is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it”, Mat.7:13-14.

Many people do not take Jesus’ words seriously at all. There is a modern preaching since ever that always tries to dilute away whatever Jesus said. Jesus said the way is hard and there is a hard way after a narrow door has been spotted and entered with courage, and people want to live as if it is not so true.

The point is that Jesus tried so hard to make it a clear point that there should never be any illusion concerning His ways and His Life. Everywhere in the gospels we come to see Jesus coming back again and again to state to people they should never attempt to save their own lives, but rather make sure they loose them. We see it in Luk.14:25-35 just how hard Jesus goes about to take illusion away from the Christian walk and talk. Nevertheless, there seems to be people still, who preach the end of the road is a sinner’s prayer for which we find no grounds in the Bible. Jesus said the door was narrow while people preach and present a big, easy gate to them and Jesus states there is still a narrow way ahead for which one should find ways and spotlessness to be able to keep it to the end, while these so-called preachers say once you have said their sinner’s prayer, heaven is secure and that against Jesus’ own words everywhere.

There is no road as hard and as difficult as the Christian walk. I just realized Jesus means every word He uttered concerning it all. Yet, while He states the road is hard, He does not say it will be feeling hard unto us. His yoke will be easy on the hardest way there is. This is mainly what he means. It cannot be hard on any of us even if it is the hardest way there is.

What makes it hard then? What is there that makes Jesus’ yoke weigh heavily on us?

First, I believe many people come to Jesus to have their sinful being saved and kept instead of dead, and it cannot be. They come to have their former life saved and not done away with. People still believe the devil is their worst enemy and not themselves, they still believe hardships are caused by the devil and not by their sins, they still believe it is demons and the devil which choke the word within them and not worldly anxieties and cares, Mat 13:22. Then, if realizing they are their own worst enemy, it so happens that they loose all confidence since they only hoped upon an earthly behaviour and life since coming to Jesus, and that to have a better earthly and sinful life alone. By loosing confidence and motivation to go on that way, it means they do so because they love themselves extremely. Willingness to give up on life means, alone, there is love for self still going on somewhere, I mean, there is still hoping that Jesus would and should save sin and not from sin. People give up because they love self and never because they despise life. Discouragement comes and slips in because they cannot have their own way with God. God works to kill self and people pray hard to keep it alive and well still.

If the yoke is not easy, sin or earth is the main aiming point for that Christian anywhere in this wide world. It is hard to expect a blessing from God when people want to be happy in sin and not happy in holiness. Any proper Christian’s heart would pray to God to be a wreck of unhappiness if sin is to be looked at still. That would be a prayer in accordance with God's will.

I find women coming to Jesus because they want a certain husband given to them, I find men coming to God because their wives are not loving unto them, and we find children coming to God because their family gives them a hard time. It is true that Jesus alone heals wounds and converts whole families as well, but it cannot be true that fathers and sons’ hearts would be converted for any other's sake but God’s alone. If sons’ hearts are turned to their fathers according to the promise of a Holy, faithful God, Mal 4:6, it will only be so because God’s kingdom within them is at stake and needs to be restored to that original image, to the roots of its creation.

Now, the reason why people preach an easy road and moan on it all the time is because their easy road gives them a hard, inner time. If their whole heart was set on believing what Jesus wants them to make no mistake about, their souls would feel light no matter how harsh their way turned to be on them. Because they not believe the way is narrow and hard, they do not prepare for it. So, people exchange poles here again, thinking inner struggles are there because an easy road is to be looked for from a Holy God who never lied concerning that sort of stuff at all. An easy road and a hard time inside the heart are synonymous and an easy time in the heart in a hard way near a living God is a truthful assumption we may take out of an obedient life style anytime. Disobedience or disbelief towards what God says (I mean that people believe what they wish will be true instead of despising it from a point on) is what makes a wonderland become a hard time within. All wonderlands exist inside the mind and heart of people alone. They commit adultery and wish to call it love; they wish to be dishonest in business and call it a good deal; they use Scripture as it suits them, I mean, when they read “God so loved the world” they say “God so loves me”; and when they read “the wages of sin is death” they say “my husband should read about this”! Double heartedness, double standards, dubious ways is what makes it difficult to feel the yoke of Jesus as light. It is never the difficulty of the narrow way to heaven at all.

“Do not err, my beloved brothers” Jam 1:16. Amen.

José Mateus
zemateus@msn.com