Luke 13:22-30, 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time

The crisis over flood control is very much in our news these days. A flood happens when there is much coming in and very little going out. We will not dwell on why so little is going out except to say that the outlets are constricted because of mounting garbage that is both material and moral.

In the Gospel today, it is not constricted outlets that give us worry. The inlet to heaven is apparently narrow. “Strive to enter through the narrow gate,” the Lord counsels us, “for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough.”

Many will try to get through but only a handful will be strong enough. What kind of strength then will be enough to get us in?

Surely, that strength is not of the brute and physical kind. Entering heaven is not a matter of muscle. Might does not make right. Those who wield power may get away with stealing or lying or even killing but this kind of strength will not get them through the narrow gate.

We get to heaven not by shoving people out of our way, not by stepping on others to get ahead, not by lording it over the weak. Easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, we have been warned. And so we know that not even our wealth or power will get us in.

If not brute power or wealth, what kind of strength then?

Surely, the kind that comes from the loudness of our voices is not it. Nor will the tightness of our connections get us through. We may shout, “Lord, Lord” till we’re blue but all the Lord will ever say is, “I do not know where you are from.”

We may think that by merely bearing the name “Christian” we’ve got it made. We may suppose that our loud praises to God or that having our passport stamped with the name of Christ might get us through. But his warning is clear: getting into heaven is not a matter of crying out “Lord, Lord”.

If we can’t get in on the sheer volume of our shoutouts to the Lord, what kind of strength then will get us through?

Surely, that strength has something to do with the last assurance of our Lord today: “Some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.” The strength that is enough is the strength to be last, the strength to go last.

No one really wants last. We train hard, we work hard all our lives not to be last. Last is for losers who give up running the many races in this life.

But the pathway to heaven is not a race. And even if it were so, we know that “the race is not always to the swift (Ecclesiastes 9:11)” or even to the first.

To get through heaven’s gate all we need is to be strong enough to stay behind. This takes guts and it is no different from the courage of the boat captain who stays behind in a sinking ship until all have been brought first to safety. This kind of strength demands a lot of will, the kind you find in shepherds who will not rest before the lost ones are found; the same kind of heart you see in parents who at table will not be full ahead of their children or until they have had their fill.

It takes a lot of strength to go last and stay behind. It takes courage to surrender our pride of firstness and its trappings of entitlement. It takes guts to serve others quietly and humbly and patiently. To brave the wear and tear of waiting and staying behind in love is not for the timid of heart. It takes a lot of bold to care for the ones who are first in the eyes of God.

If we ourselves are turned off by those who are so full of themselves, how can we expect God or the angels who guard heaven’s gate to be swayed by those who put themselves first above others?

“Lord,” someone asked Jesus on his way to Jerusalem, “will only a few people be saved?”

Lest we be trapped by that question, the Lord assures us that heaven’s gate, however narrow, will always be open. People from all over will even “recline at table in the kingdom of God.”

There is no need to panic therefore and rush for the entrance to heaven. We will get through, this is our hope.

All we need is to be strong really, strong enough to go last and let the rest go first.

*image from the Internet