The Narrow Way

It is true God calls us to live on a narrow path. Sometimes that path is very different than what we might imagine. It is often uncomfortable and even called unnecessary to the one who would see it as so. It’s a path of many sacrifices. It’s giving our lives up to find Him. God is not balanced when it comes to loving us. He gave us His entire self. His jealousy over our lives is a reflection of anything but half-hearted devotion. For there is nothing half hearted about Him. There is nothing balanced about Him. He went all the way. He loved us to the point of literally giving up His life! In the same way, we are not called to give Him only a part of our hearts, but everything. The cry in our hearts should be, “I will go where you want me to go and I will do what you want me to do no matter what that looks like. And I do it out of love, not because I have to.” That looks different for every person. For one it may be saying yes to raising children and being a full time mom or dad. For someone else it may be teaching (wink, wink). For someone else it may be literally giving their life as a martyr. Not everyone will be martyrs, but we can all be living martyrs – those that live so in love with the Lord that we would do anything for Him, even if it means giving up things that are seen as necessary and valuable. That is the narrow way. It’s not the easiest way, but it’s the only way to truly find Him. Whatever it looks like in your life, it’s an honor to give Him our very best.

To say we are called to love Him is something that easily rolls off of our tongues. But what does the path of love look like? Do you know how difficult it is to live a life where He is our only audience? Of course you do. If you don’t, I will tell you. It’s difficult! It’s hard living our life with our identity being in God alone. That means, it doesn’t matter so much what people’s opinions are of us, good or bad. Instead, it’s about what we do when no one is looking and learning to live under His values, which are quite different than what we are used to. It’s not about promoting ourselves to become the next best thing. It’s about being the lowest and most humble servant we can be and promoting others ahead of us. It’s about loving unconditionally and taking the last seat so to speak. It’s about loving our enemies and blessing those that curse us. It’s about our inward life and thoughts, not so much our outward appearance. It’s about blessing others in secret and never telling anyone. It’s realizing that God is the only one that sees every part of you, and His opinion is the only one that counts. If we can live out of that reality – that His opinion of us really is the only one that counts, do you know what kinds of things we could accomplish on the earth for His Kingdom?

That’s what He is calling us to – to have our identity so wrapped up in Him, that we aren’t afraid, we aren’t insecure, and we aren’t aware of what other people think. And, of course, we love everyone who talks about us, insults us, and does any wrong against us. Yikes! That’s a tough one! He is calling us to confidence in Him and in His heart and opinion about us. We must be growing in intimacy with Him. It is this kind of love relationship with the Lord that will guard our hearts against being offended at what does or does not happen in our lives. Staying close to the Lord in prayer will protect us from the many disappointments that will happen over our lifetime. The person who is confident in love will love well, especially the ones who treat him/her wrong. You can love your enemy when you know the One that really matters most is undeniably for you and not against you. Our identity must be rooted in Him, or we will get swayed with the opinions of others and end up wasting our lives just because we cared what someone else thought. Think about it! What a waste to let someone else have that kind of control over us! He is calling us back to the first commandment – loving Him with all of our hearts, soul, mind, and strength. It’s only when we have this as first place in our hearts that we can learn to love others well. It doesn’t work the other way around.

Living the narrow way is saying yes to having Him change us. It’s making a real choice to live by His values and not what’s popular in our culture. It is the way of love, serving others, and humility. It’s being ok with living in the background and not being the next best thing. It’s giving your life for someone else to be successful. Will it be easy? Absolutely not. Will it be worth it? I think so.