If God welcomes everyone to his house through mercy and love, why is he throwing some people out?
In today’s passage, some people who have dinned with Jesus find themselves on the outside. They thought they were a part of the Kingdom, but they guessed wrong.
What’s going on?
Like today, some people thought they had a free ticket to ride. They thought they were a part of the Kingdom simply because of who they were: either because of their cultural heritage or the ceremonial works they performed.
Yes, God’s mercy is free and his love is for all, but he’s calling us to respond.
If we’re entitled, he’s asking us to have a change of heart and place our trust in Christ instead.
If we’re stubborn and refuse, then today’s passage is a warning: the door, after all, is narrow.
To respond to God is to have a change of heart and imitate his love and grace.
He’s calling us to pay it forward.
Yes, today’s gospel may rattle us, but it does this so that we get on the right path that leads to the Kingdom.
The Reading
It is like a grain of mustard, which a man took and cast into his own garden, and it grew and became like a tree, and the birds of the sky took up lodging in its branches.” And again he said, “To what may I liken the Kingdom of God? It is like yeast, which a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, until the whole was leavened.” And he traveled on throughout cities and villages, teaching and making his journey to Jerusalem. And someone said to him, “Lord, is it the case that those being saved are few?” And he said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not have the strength. From the time the master of the house rises and closes the door, you then begin to stand outside and to knock upon the door, saying, ‘Lord, open it for us,’ and in reply he will say to you, ‘I do not know you, where you come from.’ Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank before you, and you taught in our streets.’ And, speaking to you, he will proclaim, ‘I do not know where you come from; stand away from me, all workers of injustice.’ There will be weeping and the grinding of teeth when you see Abraham and Israel and Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God, but yourselves driven outside. And they will come from east and west, and from north and south, and will recline at table in the Kingdom of God. (Luke 13:19-29)