Be Concerned for Your Own Soul!

14th Sunday after Pentecost, 8/29/10
Luke 13:22-30


Be Concerned for Your Own Soul!
I. Know that there’s only one door to heaven.
II. Take advantage of your spiritual opportunities.


What’s the most common response in the following situation?

Little Heather runs to her mother who is busy filling out some medical information and announces, “Mommy, Michelle keeps making faces at me even though you told her not to.”

Her mother is not likely to drop her important task and attend to this trivial matter, no matter how important it may seem to young Heather. Instead, like countless other parents, she tells her daughter, “Don’t worry about what Michelle is doing. Just worry about yourself.”

To be sure, there’s a time and place to be concerned about the misbehavior of someone else, but there’s also the time and place to simply be concerned about what you’re doing or what you’re not doing.

“Just worry about yourself.” That seems to be a good way of summarizing the response that Jesus gave to a man as he was preaching and teaching one day. Of course Jesus wants us to be concerned about the masses of people in this world who don’t know him as their Savior. In fact, he gives us the Great Commission in which he tells us to make disciples of all nations. But first and foremost, he wants us to be concerned about our own spiritual welfare.

And so he tells us to be worried about ourselves. Be concerned about your own soul. Let’s do that very thing this morning as we center our attention on his word.

Part I.

No doubt as a young child your parents read to you children’s books that were short and contained a fairly simple plot. The first pages introduced the characters, the middle pages explained the problem these characters faced, and the final pages revealed how all their problems were solved and then the story ended with the words, “And they all lived happily ever after.” That’s what we grow up thinking. We have this unrealistic ideal in our minds, but only until we get a little older. Then reality hits us.

But some people never grow out of that way of thinking spiritually. I’m sure you’ve met more than one of them. They’re people who think that everyone is going to heaven no matter what they believe. They’re of the opinion that it doesn’t matter whether you’re Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or whatever else. Somehow, God, whoever that is, will get everyone to heaven, whatever that is.

There was a slightly similar teaching among the Jews of Jesus’ day. The Jews felt that they were so spiritually superior to all other nations that God would bring all Jews to heaven with him simply because they were Jews, descendants of Abraham.

Perhaps that’s the reason for this man’s question. “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?” Perhaps he had been under the impression that he and all his fellow Jews were going to heaven because of who they were—God’s chosen people. But the message he heard from Jesus didn’t support that view at all. Perhaps he had heard Jesus warn his disciples about the false teaching of the Pharisees and his condemnation of their self-righteousness. Perhaps he had heard Jesus call the crowds to repent and to trust in him as their Savior. Whatever the case, what he heard from Jesus rocked his opinions about who was going to heaven and who was not.

Jesus, who knows all things, knew what his false beliefs and questions were. And so he reinforced what he had been stating about himself as the only way to heaven. He said, “Make every effort to enter the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.” The door to heaven is not wide, it’s narrow. It won’t allow people to believe whatever they want and still get in. In fact, it’s very narrow. There’s only one way to enter it—through faith in Jesus.

And yet people won’t put up with that. They’ll continue to think that they can get through heaven’s door on their own. By that, Jesus means they will continue to believe the deadliest lie of all—that you get to heaven on your own by trying to obey the Golden Rule and trying to be a decent, caring person. In fact, they might be the most outwardly pious person in the world.

But it won’t get them in. Jesus states, “Many…will try to enter and will not be able to.” That’s because the only key that will unlock that door is faith in Jesus. In another situation Jesus proclaimed, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). After Pentecost Peter proclaimed, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). Jesus never allowed people to think that he was one of the ways to heaven. If that were true, then Jesus would be unnecessary and so would his life and his death. He always declared that he was the only way to heaven. In fact, that’s one of the reasons his enemies put him to death. He wouldn’t allow them to believe whatever they wanted to about him. The miracles he performed, even raising people from the dead, backed up what he claimed about himself. Jesus is the only way to heaven.

And he wants you to be concerned for your own soul. Know that there’s only one door to heaven and Jesus is that door.

By now you may be saying to yourself, “Pastor, you’re preaching to the choir. I know Jesus is the only way to heaven. That’s one of the reasons I’m here this morning.” And for that I rejoice. We all rejoice. We know the saving truth that Jesus is the only door to heaven. But how does knowing and believing that truth practically impact your life in the way that you are concerned for your own soul? How high on your list of priorities is the care of your soul? As a parent, what priority does the care of your child’s soul possess? Do we cherish the opportunity to hear the word of our Savior and to receive his Lord’s Supper or are they simply something we do weekly or even less? Jesus warns us against being concerned with all sorts of things in this life and failing to care for our souls properly. And we’ve fallen into that trap more times than we care to admit. But we hold to the saving truth that Jesus is the only door to heaven for us. He’s the One who lived for us and died for our sins. He’s the One who rose again to assure us of our forgiveness and to guarantee that he is the only door to heaven. Be concerned for your own soul! Cherish that truth!

Part II.

We know and believe the truth about Jesus as the Son of God and the only Savior of the world. We call that teaching the gospel. It’s the good news that Jesus is our Savior.

Martin Luther likened the gospel to a rain shower. He noted historically that in certain areas of the world the people had the gospel proclaimed among them but only for a time. Sometimes it was for centuries. At other times it was only for decades. But when the people who had that good news about Jesus no longer appreciated it or held to its truth, then the gospel moved on. Like a rain shower, it’s here for a while and then it moves on.

At the time that Jesus was on this earth, the Lord was showering the Jews with his grace. Our text states that Jesus was making his way through the towns and villages preaching and teaching. Imagine hearing the word of God from God himself! Imagine having the opportunity to speak with Jesus, to ask him questions and to hear his amazing answers.

In fact, he even took the time to eat with them. Repeatedly he accepted invitations to eat in the homes of his friends and enemies alike. He shunned no one. In fact, his highest desire was to reach out to one and all.

But just having contact with Jesus isn’t enough. Jesus states that by sharing one of the objections of those who can’t and don’t enter heaven. “Then you will say, ‘But we ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’” In other words, they claimed to know who Jesus was. They claimed to have spent time with him. They listened to him. They may have even entertained him in their home.

But just knowing Jesus isn’t enough. Just having heard the words of Jesus isn’t enough. Just doing some of the things Jesus tells us to do isn’t enough. In fact, those things are worth nothing in the attempt to enter heaven’s door. Jesus will tell such people, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!” He will tell them he doesn’t know them as his own people. And the reason? They have no trust in him as their Savior. They know of him. They know what he taught. But they don’t believe the truth that he is their Savior from sin.

That faith in Jesus which, by God’s grace, you have, comes only through the gospel, that spiritual rain shower that God is pouring on us right now. That shower was pouring on the Jews of Jesus’ time, but many of them rejected it. That shower then moved on until ultimately it began raining on us. By God’s grace that gospel is raining on us today. Thank God we haven’t missed that opportunity!

Be concerned for your own soul! Take advantage of your spiritual opportunities!

It would be easy for us to look around, evaluate who isn’t here this morning and then give ourselves a spiritual pat on the back for taking advantage of today’s spiritual opportunity. But if we’re honest, we’re not flawless in that regard either. Even so, our sinful pride would have us look down on others and up at ourselves as if we are better followers of Christ than so many others. Before we do that, let’s take care of our own souls by confessing what is sinful and by holding on to our Savior’s promise of forgiveness. That’s the kind of soul care Jesus wants each sinner to be concerned about. May love for him and what he’s done for us always cause us to carefully care for our own souls. Amen.