And that has been my thrust all along. If you pick back through my posts, I have even provided scripture to uphold that view.
Matthew 7:13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
This comes on the tail end of the Sermon on the mount which starts in Chapter 5. It is a summary from chapter 5 forward. In Jewish thought, what counted was putting the commandments into action. Another way to say it is to put flesh around the commandment. What you do matters...
The Narrow Gate is about doing... How we live. It's not about who Jesus is, it's about HOW Jesus lived and how he instructs us to live. Many times from chapter 5 Jesus says, "You have heard it said, but I tell you..." He is rightly interpreting Torah and then showing the way to live it out. The bar is set very, very high and it shows us that we will always fall short. If you skip up a few verses, Jesus tells us that however we judge, that measure will be used to judge us. This should put us in our proper place.
Nobody can live out the commandments the way Jesus interpreted them (Matthew 5 -7).... Except Jesus himself. This forces us to come to Jesus when we fall and it also brings us closer to Jesus in a good way because when we do the things Jesus did, or try to live our lives like Jesus did, our eyes become open to a whole new world and we start to understand the world the way Jesus understands the world and we start to see the real truth, not our truths. It's difficult because it goes against our very sin nature.
It's narrow sinful nature thinking when we start dividing the Body of Christ based especially on doctrines that don't address the way we are to live in accordance though Jesus sermon. Yet we see how widespread this issue has become both in our current day and age as well as from a historical perspective and frankly, it's destruction has been wide and many embrace it.
To enter the narrow gate is to stop being led by our sinful nature. Deny your feelings and take on the spirit of Christ that doesn't condemn the sinner, but leads them to repentance by addressing their actions.
Jesus said he was the son of God, and he said he was the son of Man. Later he even asked Peter, "Who do you say I am".
Phillipians 2:5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in very nature[a] God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
Why then do we judge so quickly those who don't embrace our doctrines on the diety of Christ. Seemed the focus on Jesus was being servant.
I can see your point in the first part as to what Christ is inferring about the wide and narrow gates, and how that relates to the nature of man, and what we are talking about in terms of mankind's abilities, or knowledge. I'm not sure I'm wording this correctly, but I think we are on the same page.
The problem with this is that the bible does not specifically speak of salvation outside of knowledge of Christ, but it does infer it. For example when Christ says "I am the way", that could be taken a few ways. Do I have to know this? Is His being the way something more about what he did, or my knowledge and direct acceptance of what he did and who he is.
On the one hand we can run into a danger of universalism, and on the other hand we can run into the danger of pious legalism. So I think we have to be more specific, but when we do that we can't help but fall back on basic doctrines, and as you know when we do that we get into the same old debate. Then we are left with the extremes again, of is my salvation based on what I do, or what God has done.
I think you know where I will stand, and that's why I did not want to go there. Some will say, as you have, that we must apply the principles of a godly life via our own volition, while others will say that those with faith do that via Christ and not of their own volition, and then the whole things deteriorates with everyone going home mad left to their own thoughts on the matter.
However, we are talking about being saved outside of the direct knowledge of Christ. The OP, I believed, used terms like heathen, and atheist and such, but I would make a distinction between those who suppress the truth and those without a certain amount of knowledge.
What I see in your commentary is the idea that the narrow gate is indicative of ones ability, or circumstance, to gain knowledge, and their use of that knowledge. However, Paul points out that it's the opposite, not the gaining and use, but the covering up, the suppressing of what is known regardless of the level of what is known, that condemns a man.
See the difference?
Paul further says that ALL man has been given a knowledge of God. He says at the very core, the very lest, that anyone can and dose possess a very basic understanding of God just through nature. So in this way we are in his image, or God has written something on the hearts of everyone. So this would include that native born in the jungle of some far off land who has no direct knowledge of Christ. It's not correct to call that man a heathen, or reprobate, or atheist. That man may very well live for the knowledge he does have and allow that light of God to shine in his life, not by his effort, but by the faith he has in what he does know of God.
Yes I know, God has commanded the spreading of the gospel. Some take this as a duty to save others. I understand that. But, to others this is a privilege to testify to the glory of God. We should spread the gospel. It's good news, but yet we still see it spread as bad news in legalistic a pious ways.
....we are in a deep problem when it comes to salvation. It seems to suggest a willfulness on our part, but I can't say to what degree. I just don't know, and thr bible does not make such things clear.
