"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."
MATTHEW 7:13--14

I was inspired to explore the concept of the "narrow gate" in much the same way I was drawn to reflect on the popular biblical phrase, "fight the good fight." 

Recently, my pastor took our congregation through a journey of Jesus's words in the Sermon on the Mount. Every Sunday he went almost straight through the text, a few verses at a time. For me, this journey was amazing because I experienced the context of each of these inspiring verses. Seeing the verses containing the "narrow gate" passage in context dramatically changed my perspective on what "walking through the narrow gate" might mean.
 
When I look at my Bible, I have neat little titles to help me subdivide and better process the text. Looking at Matthew 7, most Bibles have a section labeled "Judging Others," followed by an "Ask, Seek and Knock" section, and then the "Narrow and Wide Gates" passage followed by "True and False Prophets." What these titles cause us to forget is that Jesus didn't pause between sentences to change his PowerPoint slide. 

Listeners continuously experienced this sermon (given on "the mount"), and so each topic of his sermon informed the next. Jesus speaks with a logical progression, not in unconnected quotes for Instagram inspirational art. So if we want to think about what it might mean to walk through the "narrow gate," then we might have to remove the extra-biblical passage headings and just read all the words of Jesus without breaking it apart.  

If you go back to Matthew 6 and keep going through Chapter 7, you can see that much of what Jesus says is directed to supposedly righteous people. He gives instruction to "be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others," to not pray "like the hypocrites" and to "not judge." After he mentions the wide and narrow gate, he goes on to warn the people to watch out for "false prophets" and false disciples. 

All of these instructions seem to speak most directly to people who would have been concerned about their righteousness. His intended audience for these comments was praying people who would be tempted to judge and would be willingly engaging with religious teaching and teachers. So what does this mean for all of us as we try to understand the meaning behind the analogy of the narrow gate? 

I will admit that before considering these things, I had always thought that choosing the "narrow gate" and "narrow path" meant resisting drugs, swearing, cheating and stealing, basically avoiding all "bad" things. Essentially, staying faithful to my "to-don't" list. But I had never considered that the "wide gate and path to destruction" could be traveled on by people who seemed to be righteous but who harbored vanity, pride, judgment and self-righteousness in their hearts. If haughty eyes and a proud heart are the lamp to the path of sin (Proverbs 21:4), then maybe finding the "narrow gate" truly isn't easy because following that path deals with purity of the heart.

Lyrics:
I've seen a devout man hustling down the wide way
He's judging himself by a standard that his own hands made
Relying on his deeds, forgettin' who he needs
The Savior's at his door, but he's too busy keeping score
If only he were...
 
Walking through that narrow gate,
And treading softly down the narrow way
it ain't easy, it ain't easy
 
I've seen a two-faced man sauntering down the wide way
Parading himself and doing it all just for the fame
The King would have his heart, but he just wants to play the part
If only he were...

Walking through that narrow gate,
And treading softly down the narrow way
Living meekly, but it ain't easy
Walking through that narrow gate,
Lay yourself down everyday
It ain't easy, it ain't easy
 
There's only one way and it ain't easy
I gotta find it, 'cause my life is at stake at that narrow gate
 
If I follow the crowd they're taking me down the wide way
Facing the dead-end where everything crumbles and fades away
 
Walking through that narrow gate,
And treading softly down the narrow way,
Can be so lonely, and it ain't easy
Walking through that narrow gate,
Lay yourself down everyday
It ain't easy, it ain't easy
Oh it ain't easy, it ain't easy