Jesus’ words in the following text are particularly counter-cultural in evangelicalism—Matt. 7:13 “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. 14 For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.
Even at first glance, isn’t this so contrary to what we are told in our day about the Christian life? Instead of Christ completely delivering us from ourselves and becoming our Master, it is taught that when we come to him in faith, he gets in line with our desires, our dreams and our will. This leads to horrendous and destructive expectations of the Christian life.
Even if we don’t articulate the following things, these assumptions could still be lurking in our hearts—”I’m a Christian; therefore marriage should be easy, parenting should require little effort, at work—my pathway should be one of promotion and utter respect, and I certainly should never have any significant financial struggles or health issues—doesn’t God promise to love his children after all?”
We know that we have great adversaries in our flesh and the devil, both of which war against us, so how could we think that the fight of faith in our circumstances would be easy and comfortable? Furthermore, if the Christian life isn’t a struggle or strain in the face of opposition, then what is Jesus referring to when he speaks of the cost of following him? We can read Luke 14:25-33, in which Jesus declares the innate sacrifice of following him as it relates to everything in our lives, including relationships and possessions. This is why the Christian life is rightly classified as a life of forfeiture or giving up ourselves for the sake of others, and clearly there will be internal and external opposition in this struggle.