The Narrow Way

[Below, you'll find the sermon from yesterday's worship services with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, as well as the live stream video of both services. Have a good and blessed week!]

Luke 13:22-30

Today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 13:22-30, begins with a question from a member of a crowd surrounding Jesus: “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”

Jesus’ answer is shocking!

He doesn’t give the man a number.

He doesn’t tell the man that good people who do good things will be saved.

Instead, He tells the man in Luke 13:24: “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.”

What is Jesus saying?

What’s the effort He’s talking about?

And what is the narrow door?

When Jesus says “make every effort” or, as other translations put it, “strive,” He is not joining the chorus of the first-century Jewish teachers or all the other religions of the world besides the faith commended by the Bible in saying, “You’ll get saved if you try really hard.” Jesus is not saying that we’re saved by our good works.

If Jesus were saying that it would represent a whiplash-inducing flip flop from what, just a few verses before, He taught.

In Luke 13, starting at verse 18, He tells a parable about the Kingdom of God, saying that it’s like a mustard seed which a man planted in his field, which later became a tree in which birds perched.

Starting at verse 20, Jesus says the Kingdom of God is like a bit of yeast a woman put into sixty pounds of flour until it permeated and expanded the size of the bread dough she made.

In these two parables, the mustard seed and the yeast represent God’s Word coming from outside ourselves–the Latin phrase that Luther used here was extra nos–to bring God’s grace, faith, salvation, and His Kingdom to human beings who could not do anything for themselves. The soil couldn’t grow a mustard tree apart from the seed and the agency of God and the farmer. The flour couldn’t become bread apart from the yeast and the agency of God and the woman.

The Kingdom of God comes to us from outside ourselves God the Father sends His Son Jesus to save us from sin and death. The Holy Spirit sends the Word of God, seemingly small and inconsequential, into our lives and it produces saving faith in Jesus that, alone, makes us fit for entry into God’s Kingdom!

In our Gospel lesson, Jesus doesn’t contradict Himself.

The root word translated from the Greek in which Luke wrote his gospel as “make every effort” or, in some translations, “strive,” is ἀγωνίζομαι (agonizomai) from which we get the English words, agonize and agony.

It was a word the Greeks used of the struggle and discipline employed by athletes to train and compete. The disciplined athlete strives for a prize, a trophy, or a reward, sometimes money, which she or he had nothing to do with creating.

The athlete’s job is to lay aside things like not getting enough sleep, eating too much, eating the wrong things, or using harmful drugs, habits that may keep them from attaining the prize created for them by others.

Jesus is saying that the free gifts of salvation–including God’s forgiveness of our sin, new and everlasting life with God, and being with Jesus at the heavenly banquet that never ends, gifts achieved for us by God through the cross of Jesus–is available to all who turn from sin and trust in Jesus to be their God and King!

This is what the preacher of Hebrews said in last Sunday’s second Bible lesson: “...throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles…run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith…” (Hebrews 12:1-2)

Jesus once said that it would be harder for a rich man to enter heaven than it would be for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The worship of and reliance on wealth to which the wealthy are especially tempted needs to be jettisoned if the wealthy are to be part of God’s kingdom. They must trust in Jesus above all else! Listen: We all have gods and sins we need to let go of in order to follow Jesus alone into the Kingdom of God! The discipline of that may cause us agony. We are in love with our favorite sins. But nothing this dying world has to offer compares with being set free by God to grasp the outstretched hand of Jesus for all the blessings He offers us freely!

We live in an age when people, if they ever think of God, see Him as a nice guy, a pushover. They figure God won’t let anyone to hell.

Let’s be clear: Jesus, God in the flesh, did die on the cross for everyone. But He doesn’t force salvation on anyone.

The doorway to a life with Jesus is wide open to everyone even though our inborn sinful nature, our inborn desire to be like God, along with the world and the devil, work to push us away from Jesus. 

Jesus says that there’s only one way to life with God. It’s the narrow way. And that narrow way is Jesus. “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved,” Jesus says in John 10:9. 

Jesus expands on this theme in the next verses: “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’ Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’” 

There will come a time when the door allowing people to have eternal life with God, the narrow way, will be closed. The door may close at death, when it will be too late to enter eternity with God through repentance and faith in Jesus. Or, if people are alive when Jesus returns to the world, to bring judgment, it will be too late for people to take shelter in His grace and forgiveness. In those moments, no matter how much people may pound at heaven’s door, those who haven’t turned to Christ in repentant faith in this life will pound in vain. 

And it won’t do these people any good to say, “We made big offerings to the Church. We sang hymns and praise songs. We volunteered for outreaches.”

To people like this, the owner of the house--Jesus--will say at the Judgment, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!”

Jesus goes on to say of those around Him who think they’ll be saved by genetics or good works, left outside of God’s kingdom: “There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.”

Those who turn from Jesus or who take Him for granted or who keep him removed by an arm’s length in this life, will have an eternity of pain and regret. 

But Jesus doesn’t end His answer at that. There is good news!

He says in verses 29-30: “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God. Indeed, there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”

You can take great comfort from these words from Jesus, friends!

People from the world over are already part of God’s kingdom through the crucified and risen Jesus.

The Gospel Word has come to them: preached, taught, imposed by water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and given to them as bread and wine that is also Christ’s body and blood.

And through that Word, they have saving faith in Jesus. All believers can cherish the Gospel promise in Romans 8:1 (along with countless other places in Scripture): “...there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…”

“But, Lord,” we might say, “I sinned this morning.” “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

“But, Lord, I’ve taken Your name in vain, stolen, lied, committed adultery, coveted what my neighbor owns. Just this week.” To those to whom the Word of God has given repentant faith, the answer is, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

“But, Lord, I’ve never been good at sharing my faith with others.” “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

Jesus opens the door to the kingdom of God to everyone!

As a sinner who deserves nothing from God, a rebel against God’s law of love from the moment I was born, I’m grateful that Jesus gives His righteousness to all who repent and believe in Him.

I belong to God not because I’m good; I’m not.

I belong to God not because I have the right genes; I don’t. (You can tell I lack perfect genes with one look at my oversized nose planted on an undersized head!)

I belong to God–you and I belong to God to God----because God is good and by His grace through the faith in Jesus that His Holy Spirit gives to us at our Baptism and offers to us whenever His Word is shared, He covers us with Jesus’ goodness and the power of His victory over sin and death.

Shortly before He set His eyes for Jerusalem and His cross, Jesus said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23)

Jesus leads those who take up their crosses–that is, who daily turn from their sin that God rightly condemns–and follow Jesus–meaning, those who trust in Jesus as their Lord, King, God, and Savior–into eternity with God.

Like Joshua, who God used to lead the ancient Israelites into the promised land, Jesus leads those who believe in Him through the open door of God’s grace.

One day, when Jesus returns, that door will be shut.

But today, while the door is open wide, let us turn from sin and death, from pride and arrogance, from the temptation of thinking that the the things of this world can set us free from sin and death, and turn instead to forgiveness, peace, hope, wholeness, and life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

The Place Where Riffraff Are Welcomed

[This was shared during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, earlier today.]

Luke 13:22-30

Today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 13:22-30, begins with a question from a member of the crowd squeezing in around Jesus: “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”

We don’t know the motive of the person asking the question. But we can surmise that the crowds--even the disciples--were beginning to feel uneasy by what Jesus was saying and doing. In applauding the repentant faith that He had seen in notorious sinners and outsiders like prostitutes, tax collectors, and Roman soldiers, Jesus seemed was saying that belonging to the kingdom of God He came into the world to bring didn’t come by the things taught by the rabbis, the scribes, and the priests. 

The Jewish religious teachers of Jesus’ day said that if you were Jewish, you were in the club. All Jews were righteous, they thought. All non-Jews, Gentiles, were not righteous. All Jews would therefore be saved, they reasoned. 

The Pharisee sect of Judaism would have said that not all Jews were saved, only the ones who obeyed their interpretation of God’s laws. 

So, Jews were being taught largely that salvation, life in God’s eternal kingdom, came only to those who either were members of the genetic club or who did righteous things.

But Jesus has been saying things in chapters 12 and 13 of Luke that said their confidence about salvation was misplaced. Jesus is teaching that salvation comes only through faith in the God now revealed definitively to the world in Jesus Himself. Jesus’ fellow Jews and all other people needed to follow Jesus, to repent for sin and trust in Jesus, submitting to Jesus’ Lordship, so that His grace could transform them. This upset people. 

It still upsets people. The moment you suggest to people that there's nothing they can do and no way that they can be good enough to earn salvation from God, they offer up a million objections. People want to preserve the illusion of their own intrinsic goodness.

No wonder that the man asked Jesus, “Lord, are only a few going to be saved?” 

Jesus responds in Luke 13:24: “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.”

We live in an age when people, if they ever think of God, say that God is such a nice guy that He won’t send anyone to hell. Let’s be clear: Jesus, God in the flesh, did die on the cross for everyone. But He doesn’t force salvation on anyone. He doesn’t force anyone to repent or believe in Him. He gives us the freedom to say no, to move through this life, presuming to be gods unto ourselves until this life ends. The doorway to a life apart from Jesus is wide open to everyone and, by our inborn sinful nature, it's the path, the easy one, that we most want to follow. 

But Jesus says that there’s only one way--a narrow way--to life with God. And that narrow way is Jesus. 

“I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me,” Jesus says in John 14:6. If we don’t enter God’s kingdom through Jesus, we can’t get it in, we won’t get in. 

Jesus expands on this theme in the next verses: “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’ Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’” 

There will come a time when the door allowing us to leave lives lived apart from God, the narrow way, will be closed to us. 

Death will come and then it will be too late to enter eternity with God through repentance and faith in Jesus. 

No matter how much people pound at heaven’s door, those who haven’t entrusted their lives to Christ will pound in vain. 

And it won’t dot these people any good to say, “We made big offerings to the Church. We sang hymns and praise songs...even the ones we didn’t like and almost never complained about them. We volunteered for outreaches.” 

To people like this, the owner of the house--Jesus--will say at the Judgment, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!” Jesus doesn’t truly know-- that is, have a relationship with--those who have no relationship of faith with Him. Christ only knows those who have opened the doors of their own lives and let Him in. Without such humble daily surrender to Christ, we’re just playing at religion; we’re only toying with Jesus.

To a church filled with lukewarm faith mentioned in the book of Revelation, the crucified and risen Jesus said: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” [Revelation 3:20] Jesus offers a relationship of intimacy and trust with Him, not just because it feels good, but because we need this relationship today and in eternity! Without a relationship with Jesus, we are dead now, though we may still be breathing, and we are dead for eternity.

With a relationship with Jesus, we are alive, even in life’s darkest and most difficult times. And one day, all who trust in Christ will be alive in a kingdom of perfection with God for all eternity.

To His fellow Jews, suffering from the delusion that being Jewish or that doing good works was all they needed to be saved--the way some people today think that all you need is to be Lutheran, Baptist, Catholic, or on the church rolls somewhere--Jesus says: “There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.” Those who turn from Jesus or who take Him for granted or who keep him removed by an arm’s length in this life, will have an eternity of regret. 

But Jesus doesn’t end His answer at that. He says in verses 29-30: “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God. Indeed, there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.” I take great comfort from these final words from Jesus. People from the world over, from every background, are already part of God’s kingdom initiated by the crucified and risen Jesus. 

Jesus takes in all we riffraff! When Ann and I were first engaged, her family didn't care for me at all. They raised all sorts of objections and laid down trivial conditions on their support for us getting married. One of Ann's dear friends crystallized things when she told her, "The problem, Ann, is that they're looking for Secretariat. Mark isn't Secretariat." I was no thoroughbred racehorse, only a donkey, riffraff. The blessed thing is that Jesus loves riffraff and will welcome into His kingdom all who turn from sin and turn to Him. 

That's the good news that transforms the life of every person who follows Jesus, Jew or Gentile, the world over! Together, we whose lives are being eternally transformed by the grace of God given to us through Jesus cherish what Ephesians 2:8-9 teaches us: “...it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” I am a wretched sinner whose only boast is that I have been saved from myself by the crucified and risen Jesus.

I belong to God not because I’m good, because, in fact, I’m not. 

Nor do I belong to God because I have the right genes, which, in fact, I don’t. 

I belong to God--I am saved from sin and death, futility and regret--because God is good and by His grace through the faith in Jesus that His Holy Spirit gives to me, He covers me with the goodness of Jesus and the power of His sacrifice over death, accomplished on the cross. 

Those who are saved are simply those who want, more than anything, to know and be with Jesus! They follow the narrow way: Jesus Himself.

The apostle Paul talked about this central desire of those who seek to follow Jesus in Philippians 3:10-11: “I want to know Christ--yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.” 

May we seek each day to know Christ, the narrow way, Who opens up life and eternity to all who repent and believe in Him. Amen

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Following the Narrow Way (audio and text)

Audio version, here.

Luke 13:22-30
Today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 13:22-30, begins with two seemingly simple verses. They tell us:

Then Jesus went through the towns and villages, teaching as he made his way to Jerusalem. Someone asked him, "Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”

Simple though they may seem, these two verses reflect the tension and apprehension that many people, both the disciples and the curious crowds following Jesus, are feeling.

For the disciples who have been paying attention to Jesus’ words and actions, there was a dread about what was coming in Jerusalem. For a long time before this point, Jesus has made it clear that in going to Jerusalem, He’s also heading to His death.

From the beginning of Jesus’ life on earth, in fact, it was clear that He had come with a singular mission, to live a sinless life, then offer that life as the perfect sacrifice for our sin.

There are some megachurches that have chosen not to have crosses in their sanctuaries. "The cross is such a downer," they reason.

Listen: The cross is the place where Jesus would fulfill His mission and destroy the power of sin and death over all who take up their crosses--owning the reality of their own sin and their need of a Savior--and follow Jesus.

The cross is the place where all who believe in Jesus are saved.

The cross is the place of Jesus’ victory for us. That’s why I love the story about the Lutheran being asked by another Christian, “When were you saved?” The Lutheran answered, “On a hill outside Jerusalem three thousand years ago.”

Jesus’ resurrection serves as confirmation of Jesus’ Good Friday victory. But it's at the cross that His victory for us came about.

The apostle Paul, a learned man, deemed the cross so transformative, so powerful, that he told the Corinthian Christians among whom he'd worked that he decided when he was them not to use any of his vast knowledge to convince them to follow Jesus. "For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you," he writes in 1 Corinthians 2:2, "except Jesus Christ and him crucified." Jesus' cross is that powerful!

Even Satan understood that the cross is the whole ballgame; it’s why He was constantly trying to keep Jesus from going to Jerusalem and the cross, tempting Him with worldly kingdoms.

After Jesus asked the disciples Who they believed Him to be and Peter rightly answered that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of the living God, Jesus told the disciples bluntly: “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” [Luke 9:22]

After setting His face to go to Jerusalem [Luke 9:51], Jesus told the disciples, referring to His crucifixion as His “baptism”: “I have a baptism to undergo, and what constraint I am under until it is completed!”

So, by the time we get to our lesson from Luke’s gospel narrative, the disciples are feeling extremely apprehensive.

But the curious, if unbelieving, crowds are feeling tension at this point.

You see, most first century Judeans assumed that because they were Jews, they would be saved from sin and death and be resurrected. It was all a matter of DNA. All Jews were righteous, they thought. All non-Jews, Gentiles, were not righteous. All Jews would therefore be saved, they reasoned.

But Jesus had been saying things in chapters 12 and 13 of Luke that said their confidence about salvation because they belonged to the club was misplaced. Salvation comes only through faith in the God now revealed definitively to the world in Jesus Himself.

The crowds of Jesus' fellow Jews needed to follow Jesus, to repent for sin and trust in Jesus, and submit to Jesus’ Lordship so that His grace could transform them. They needed to become disciples of Jesus.

This upset a lot of the crowds' preconceived notions. So, it was with apprehension that the man asked Jesus, “Lord, are only a few going to be saved?”

Jesus responds in Luke 13:24: “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.”

We live in an age when people, if they ever think of God, say that God is such a nice guy that He won’t send anyone to hell.

Let’s be clear: Jesus, God in the flesh, did die for everyone. But He doesn’t force salvation on anyone.

He doesn’t force anyone to repent or believe in Him.

He gives us the freedom to say no, to eat, drink, and be merry in this world, presuming to be gods unto ourselves until this life ends.

The doorway to a self-centered, self-indulgent, whatever-seems-right-to-us kind of life is wide open to everyone of us here on earth. But Jesus says that there’s only one way--a narrow way--to life with God.

And that narrow way is through Jesus.

“I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me,” Jesus says in John 14:6.

If we don’t enter God’s kingdom through Jesus, we can’t get it in, we won’t get in.

Jesus expands on this theme in the next verses: “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’ Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’”

There will come a time when another door, the door allowing us to escape a life of apart from God, will be closed to us.

Death will come and then it will be too late to enter eternity with God.

No matter how much they pound at heaven’s door, those who haven’t entrusted their lives to the God we know in Christ will pound in vain.

And it won’t do any good for them to say, “We made big offerings to the Church. We sang hymns and praise songs...even the ones we didn’t like and almost never complained about them. We volunteered for outreaches.” To people like this, the owner of the house--God Himself--will say at the Judgment, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!”

You see, Jesus doesn’t claim to truly know those who have no relationship of faith with Him. No matter how many good things we may do, even when we do them through and with the Church, Christ only knows those who have opened the doors of their own lives and let Him into the very center of their beings.

Without such humble surrender and a daily discipleship relationship with Christ, we’re just playing at religion.

To a church filled with lukewarm faith mentioned in the book of Revelation, the crucified and risen Jesus is recorded as saying: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” [Revelation 3:20] Jesus offers a relationship of intimacy and trust with Him, not just because it feels good, but because we need this relationship today and in eternity! Without a relationship with Jesus, we are dead now and we are dead for eternity.

With a relationship with Jesus, we are alive, even in life’s darkest and most difficult times. Five years ago yesterday, the young woman in whose remembrance I wear these two blue wristbands, Sarah, passed from this life at the age of twenty. She was a remarkable person, who fought leukemia through two bone marrow transplants, five remissions, and amazing faith! She lived her life with purpose and humor. She loved receiving Holy Communion. She loved helping young people. Even while she was fighting to live, she volunteered for the local Big Brothers/Big Sisters organization near the campus of Denison University. I wrote a song in memory of her a few months back called Phenomenon, motivated by the fact that from an early age, she knew that her life was going to be about helping kids. (And it was.) The first verse goes like this:

Fourteen years old and you know exactly what you're going to do
Listening and watching, I know you're bound to follow through
It's a mystery how one can be so young and yet so wise
When most of us go through our years and barely ever come to life 

Sarah was alive through circumstances of life in which other people who don't know Jesus would give up, more alive than most people I know who live each day in perfect health. With Jesus as our Lord, we are alive even when life is at its darkest and most difficult.

And one day, all who trust in Christ will be alive in a kingdom of perfection with God for all eternity.

To His fellow Jews, suffering from the delusion that being Jewish was all they needed to be saved--the way some people today think that all you need is to be Lutheran, Baptist, or on the church rolls somewhere--Jesus says: “There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.”

Do you know what it means to gnash one’s teeth? It means to grit our teeth and say, “I blew it! I blew it!”

Those who turn from Jesus or who take Him for granted in this life, will have that kind of regret. They’ll be left out the way Tim and I were when our morning flight out of Dallas was canceled last Sunday.

But Jesus doesn’t end His answer to the apprehensive crowd member at that. He says in verses 29-30: “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God. [Even Lutheran Christians! Even people from Dayton, Centerville, Springboro, Miamisburg, and West Carrollton, who have trusted in Jesus as their God and King!] Indeed [Jesus goes on] there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”

I take great comfort from these final words from Jesus. They echo what Ephesians 2:8-9 teaches us: “...it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

I belong to God not because I’m good, because, in fact, I’m not. I belong to God because God is good and He covers me with the goodness of Jesus and the power of His sacrifice over death, accomplished on the cross.

And, just as I didn’t care last Sunday if I was boarding the plane from Dallas with group 2 or group 4, I don’t care if I get into the kingdom of God first or last. All I want to do is be a part of it...to be with Jesus! Like the psalmist, I say: “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.” [Psalm 84:10]

When I consider that one day I will see the Lord Jesus face to face and that, because of His grace, I won’t have to hang my head in shame, I'm overwhelmed.

The world may consider me (and you) to be part of its gallery of losers, the least, the last, the pointless, the powerless, the unknown. But Jesus views no one in that way.

Every single human being is a child of God for Whom Jesus died and rose. 

Every single person can be part of that vast throng that gets a table at the feast that never ends, if they will only trust in Jesus enough to follow Him today and everyday.

Today, as we receive Christ’s body and blood in the sacrament, we will be given a foretaste of that feast. It’s the inheritance, the prized possession, of all who trust in Christ and let Him reign over their lives, who let Him into be their God and Savior and King and Redeemer.

It’s funny: Jesus never gets around to answering the question of how many will be saved. You see, He’s not into the mathematics of salvation; He wants everyone to be saved. And He refuses to give up on the possibility that every human being for whom He gave His life will give their lives to Him in return!

Today and everyday, trust Jesus and live confidently, joyfully in the knowledge that for all eternity, there’s a place reserved just for You in the kingdom of God. Live in that certainty...then go share Jesus with everyone you know so that they too can know and believe in Jesus and so, come to the banquet that never ends. Will you do that, please? Amen

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio. This is the message from worship this morning.]