Widen the Road!

"...But small is the gate, and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it"

Matthew 7:14

This past week I began a Rob Bell book "Jesus wants to Save Christians". I am a big Rob Bell fan...it seems that he says what I am thinking...and he pushes the limits sometimes. He's not afraid to stir up some controversy...which I think is really healthy. In chapter 4 of the book (The chapter is called "Genital Free Africans"...I just had to put that in here, sorry..carrying on), he spends a lot of time talking about how the early church was so focused on, "the way things have always been done". It was against the law for a Jew to associate with a Gentile, followers of Christ had to be circumsised, everyone had to be baptised, sabbath had to be followed to the letter, and the list goes on and on. But Rob Bell focuses on some people who went against the grain. Phillip baptises an African Eunuch...as Rob Bell says, "you can't mess with the good if you don't have any". In other words...this person couldn't be circumsised, and yet Phillip still baptised him as a believer in Christ. Peter visits the home of a Centurian, a home filled with Gentiles, something that according to Jewish law was forbidden. There are many instances of people in the bible going against the religious leaders of the day.

Anyway, this book got me thinking that...it wasn't just like that for the early church. Today, there are many Christians who are doing their best to enforce the law, who are trying to keep things the way they have always been. It starts for people who want to become Christians...according to many they have to give up smoking, drinking, swearing...they have to dress a certain way, pray a certain way, get baptised, remove their tatoos, take out any piercing that isn't in their ears (or all of them if they are males). The list goes on doesn't it? I'm sure we all know people who are constantly judging other believers or new believers. Then they begin to enforce the rules of the church...the music must be only at this volume, the drums can't be too loud, the tempo can't be that fast, we must sing 3 hymns and 1 modern chorus, the sermon must be within 25-35 minutes, we can't have a woman pastor, children must be excused from the service, everyone must wear this type of clothing, no smoking within 100 feet of the church parking lot...the list continues. Now, fortunately I attend a church that is very willing to "accept the unacceptable". Our church is right next door to a rehabilitation center for recovering alcoholics...we get a lot of struggling people in our doors. Thank GOD we don't have anybody judging them...but the reality is, most churches have somebody like that...many churches are made up entirely of people like that. And it's awful.

My point is this...as the verse says at the start of this blog post "Narrow is the road that leads to life". I believe that...there is one way to get to eternal life and that is through Jesus. Unfortunately, I believe that many Christians make the road too narrow. They add on all of these requirements that aren't only unbiblical, but they are ridiculous. I think we have to be very careful to not make the Narrow Road too small. Here's my opinion on all of this...if a person loves Jesus, and believe that Jesus was (and is) the Son of God...and that Jesus was resurrected from Death, and they do their best to follow the instructions of Jesus...then they are on that narrow path. I think that when we reach heaven we will be very surprised at 1)who made it to heaven, and 2) who DIDN'T make it. A lot of these "law makers", I believe will be a part of the "depart from me" group, while many of these "law breakers" will be in the "Welcome my good and faithful servant" class. Can someone be a smoker and a Christian? Of course they can. Does it matter if they wear an AC/DC shirt to church on Sunday? Not really. People need to get off of their high horse and rip up their rule book (Their personal rule book...not the Bible, just to clarify). We need more Peter's and Phillip's. More people who aren't afraid to go against the current religious understanding of what is acceptable and unacceptable; hang out with Gentiles, baptise a Eunuch, and touch someone unclean. The bible says the road is narrow...it's not impossible to find.