Daily Word

Luke 13:24

The words about the “narrow gate” are the sum of Jesus’ teaching about the three groups that He “does not know.”

The word Jesus uses for “strive” could best be translated “agonize”, and means to struggle like engaged in an intense athletic contest or a terrible warfare: a struggle filled with agony.

The agonizing struggle to enter the spiritual life.

The struggle to live the spiritual life.

To “be saved” is easy.

Paul told the Philippian jailer, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.”

But to enter the spiritual life is a more profound matter.

Owning Christ is one thing – but the crucial question is: does He own you?

That requires giving up one’s entire carnal self-life: all self-trust, all self-centredness, and self-realization. In the narrow gate all this is squeezed to death and that is not possible without deep agony.

We die with Christ from our self-life in order to rise with Christ to the Christ-life.

It is about full identification with the crucified and risen Christ to a completely new kind of life: “no longer I, but Christ in me.”

And it takes a very long time before we begin to understand what a radical change this entails in all areas of life.

Over and over again we need to let this truth penetrate into the depths of our being until we truly “KNOW that our old self was crucified with Him.”

Even more difficult is it to take in the words of Jesus in Luke 9:23, “If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross DAILY, and follow Me.”

So, we must die “daily”!

In other words, it is not a one-time event, but a death that goes deeper and deeper, day by day.

And the deeper it penetrates, the more clearly Christ appears in us!

And the more He appears, the more all the powers of hell rise up against us to prevent this from

being realized.

The holier you want to live, the greater and more cunning temptations and trials you will face.

This is the daily struggle to live the spiritual life.

Unfortunately, very few Christians understand what an incredible struggle and agony this involves!