Readings: Isaiah 66:18-21; Hebrews 12:5-7, 11-13; Luke 13:22-30
The question Jesus is asked in today’s Gospel —
“Lord, will only a few people be saved?” —
seems like a natural question to ask.
After all, when you are entering a contest
you kind of want to know
how hard it might be to win it.
Jesus’ answer is frustratingly indirect,
but it doesn’t sound like the odds are very good:
“Strive to enter through the narrow gate,”
but “many” who “attempt to enter…
will not be strong enough.”
It also sounds, however,
as if the consequences of losing the contest
are disturbingly severe:
those who find themselves on the outside
will depart to wail and grind their teeth.
Sobering news.
The kingdom of God, it might seem,
has sharply policed borders
and stringent conditions for admission.
But at the end of this sobering news
the words of Jesus take a somewhat different turn.
He says that “people will come
from the east and the west
and from the north and the south
and will recline at table in the kingdom of God.”
Rather than a single point of entry,
and a narrow one at that,
Jesus speaks in a way reminiscent of our first reading,
from the end of the book of the prophet Isaiah,
which speaks of how God will “come to gather
nations of every language,”
and that this multitude will stream
to God’s holy mountain in Jerusalem
“on horses and in chariots,
in carts, upon mules and dromedaries,”
a mighty caravan of new citizens for God’s kingdom.
The people of God is made up
of all sorts and conditions of humanity.
The table at which they feast
seems capable of infinite expansion.
The kingdom of God, it seems,
has open borders.
So, which is it?
Is God’s kingdom entered
through a single, narrow gate,
a gate that many will fail to enter,
or is it a kingdom into which
a multitude will stream
from all directions?
Perhaps it is somehow both.
When we hear the call of Jesus,
we hear the call to strive:
the call to strengthen our drooping hands
and our weak knees,
the call to learn obedience
through the discipline of the cross.
St. Ignatius Loyola, in the very first of his Spiritual Exercises,
directs us to imagine ourselves before Christ on his cross,
and to ask ourselves,
what have I done for Christ?
what am I doing for Christ?
what ought I to do for Christ?
If we call ourselves followers and companions of Jesus,
then of course we ought to strive to serve him.
But there is a danger and a temptation in our striving.
As I ask myself what I have done for Christ,
I might forget what Christ has done for me.
As I try to calculate how much striving is necessary,
I might forget that God’s grace is beyond calculation.
As I can strive to enter the narrow gate,
I might forget that my salvation
is not a reward for my striving
but the free gift of God,
won for me through the passion, death,
and resurrection of Christ.
There is a reason why St. Ignatius directs us
to imagine Jesus on the cross
before asking ourselves
what we have done, are doing, or will do for him.
Because all our striving should be nothing but
our grateful response to what Christ
already has done, is doing, and will do for us.
We are saved first and foremost
not by adherence to a code of conduct or a creed—
as important as those things are—
but by being drawn into the narrow gate
of the love of Christ crucified.
And here we can see how the glorious vision
of the multitude steaming into God’s kingdom
can fit with Jesus’ command
to strive to enter the narrow gate.
For if we strive to enter into the crucified love of Jesus
we begin to see the world as he sees it:
not divided into strivers and non-strivers,
but one giant herd of lost sheep that he longs to shepherd.
We begin to see that the love that we have received
is not a love cautiously measured out
but one that pours forth from his pierced heart,
a love that cannot be contained,
a love with unpoliced borders
that embraces a multitude.
Jesus calls us to enter through the narrow gate,
but that is a gate that leads us
into the heart of Jesus himself,
who loves us and saves us not because of our striving
but because of his own goodness and generosity.
So let us make our own the prayer
with which St. Ignatius concludes
his “Contemplation to Attain Divine Love”:
Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding,
and my entire will,
All I have and call my own.
You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.
Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace,
that is enough for me.
