If you are of a certain age, you may remember a song from the 1956, “What’s Behind the Green Door?”  Jim Lowe, the writer, never finds out.  There’s old piano playing and lots of laughing, but try as he might he can’t get in.

“Strive to enter through the narrow door,” (Luke 13: 24) Jesus tells someone who asks if those who are saved would be few. Like the curiosity about the green door many will try to get through the narrow door and even claim that they know the doorkeeper, Jesus and yet will find the door shut.  Name dropping is not enough. The key, if you will, is to believe that Jesus is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.  He brings near the Kingdom of God because he and his word are the kingdom of God.  Jesus is the one whom the angel announced as the Savior, Christ the Lord.  He is the dividing point for the world.  Therefore, all need to repent, turn toward God.

What’s behind the narrow door? Isaiah 66, informs us that the faithful will be part of a gathering of all nations and languages.  Step inside the narrow door and one finds oneself entering into a new creation with new heavens and new earth, a new universe. Behind the narrow door are the myriad of angels and God, the judge of all and Jesus whose blood speaks a word better than the blood of Abel.  All those gathered will be in constant worship of God.

Luke 13:29, Alleluia. People will come from east and west, and from north and south, and recline at table in the kingdom of God. Alleluia.

Prayer: O Lord, you have called us to enter Your kingdom through the narrow door.  Guide us by Your Word and Spirit, and lead us now and always into the feast of your son, Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with You and the holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.