Gatekeeper

I am a gatekeeper.  

Much of the time it is unintentional, but by my very existence I have the potential to usher others down the Narrow Road or push them away.  I either make Jesus attractive to the world or I don't.  This doesn’t mean that everyone will like me and want to come to my “Jesus party”.  He warned us over 2000 years ago that the world would hate us because it first hated Him.  But I never want my life to be a deterrent to someone’s spiritual acuity.

It may have been though. Tragically, I walked the broad path that leads to destruction even while I bore His name. And I wonder.  How many hearts were affected by the darkness?  How many were diverted from that gate? If only I could have a second chance, I would have so much to say!  

I would tell them that the one I showed them wasn't the real Jesus.  That knowing the Truth and obeying the Truth are not the same.  But that Jesus’ love is greater than a messed up life and He is able to bring beauty out of ashes.   And I would tell them about Grace – a word that sounds so "churchy" yet I wonder if few church people truly grasp its meaning.  Because sometimes when you are in church, you don’t see yourself like you really are.  You start to see yourself as “cleaned up” and “fixed” as if Jesus were a onetime decision.  In reality, He is an every day, every minute decision.  And the walk gets more difficult yet more glorious because He asks for more and more of us.  More emptying, more sacrifice.  But oh how sweet the life!

The road beyond the gate is marked by rough terrain and it is not for the faint of heart. By its very design, it is narrow and for the masses, impassable.  But He is calling us onward.  And He has given me the awesome privilege of telling His story laced through the fabric of my own fallenness.  

For you see sometimes the Light shines best through the broken.