"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. - Matthew 7: 13-14 (NIV)
The broad road is broad for a reason beloved. Because that's where most of the people are unfortunately. The Bible teaches us that in the end days people will not want to hear sound doctrine and they will seek out and gather around themselves teachers who will tell them what their itching ears want to hear - even myths. It is a myth that babbling incoherently brings any glory to God. It is a myth that in order to have a Spiritual experience you need to be knocked down and roll around on the ground. The prosperity gospel is a myth. The hyper-grace gospel is a myth. The word faith, name it and claim it, blab it and grab it gospel is a myth. The seeker friendly purpose driven gospel is a myth. These are all myths designed to make us feel alive when we really are quite dead. We sing and dance and put on mighty plays but there is no real move of the Holy Spirit. In our pursuit of being relevant to the culture that is dying - we are no longer relevant to the God that can save them.
Jesus then implores the church to wake up, go back to what you heard and believed at first, hold onto it firmly, repent, and turn to Him again. These are four imperatives all of which reveal the state of the current church. The first revelation is that if Jesus is telling us to wake up then by definition we are asleep! We have been lulled to sleep by the name of Jesus. What do you mean preacher? The modern church is convinced that merely saying the name of Jesus makes something holy. But remember at the last day we will learn otherwise:
"Not everyone who calls out to me, "Lord! Lord!' will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. On judgment day many will say to me, "Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.' But I will reply, "I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God's laws.' - Matthew 7: 21-23 (NLT)
It is not enough to say Lord Lord - we must actually be doing what He has instructed us to in His Word. We must not be found to be breaking God's laws! Casting out demons in His name? Ask the Seven Sons of Sceva how that worked out for them! We must stop convincing ourselves that our acts of religiosity are righteousness. That building our congregation or expanding our individual Towers of Babel means we have added to the kingdom of God. We need to stop sleepwalking through our salvation.
Secondly, if we need to go back to what we heard and believed at first then by inference we have indeed left sound teaching. Somewhere along the line the church became more important than the kingdom. The vast majority of churches today operate under the purpose driven model which turns the unsaved into the unchurched and seeks to horizontally build individual churches. We need to put down the impure doctrine that tickles our ears and return to the only Gospel that has the power to save.
I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel-- which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God's curse! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God's curse! - Galatians 1: 6-9 (NLT)
The prosperity gospel is no gospel at all! The hyper grace gospel is no gospel at all! God did not ask for purpose driven sheep! We follow too many perversions of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ and God is calling us back to what we first believed. The Gospel that truly saved us. Only there is the power of God.
