Luke 13:22-35

Someone said to Jesus; “Are there few that are saved?”  Jesus replied that he was to strive to enter the strait (narrow) gate.  Why did Jesus say “strive?”  It is because when you get to wanting to go into that gate, all the forces of evil will try to hinder you.  The gate represents accepting Jesus, who said in John 14:6 “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me.”  We better be quick because soon the door of Heaven will be shut.  Verse 26 represents all sorts of reasons why they should be let in, but they did not enter by the strait gate.  Jesus will say to them, “I never knew you.”  They may say all roads lead to Rome, but we are going to Heaven not Rome, and Jesus is the only way to get there. 

There are a few things in the next three verses that are hard to interpret.  I believe in hell whether before (Luke 26:23/the rich man) or after in the lake of fire, there is a sense of animosity of God.  That is why the gnashing of teeth.  The rich man could seem to see that Lazarus was in the place of those blessed by God.  That is what verse 28 is about too.  The Pharisees tried to scare Jesus with a warning about Herod. Jesus knew where and how He would die.  He then gives a decree against Jerusalem.  He does the same with weeping after His ride into Jerusalem on the donkey, a direct fulfillment of Daniel 9:25, exactly 482 years later to the date.  Poor Jerusalem, they did not know the day of their visitation, or who it was that visited them.  Zechariah calls Him the Dayspring from on high. (Luke 1:78)

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