The Most Important Culture
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about the uniqueness, importance, and goodness of Western Civilization. I think that Western Civilization is worth preserving, promoting, and defending. With its blend of Greco-Roman philosophical ideals, Judeo-Christian moral teachings, Enlightenment rationalism, and modern democratic values, Western Civilization is built on a wide range of virtues. Ancient Greco-Roman virtues like prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance, biblical virtues like faith, hope, and love, enlightenment virtues like reason, liberty, and equality, and democratic virtues like the rule of law and religious freedom shape our Western identity. Ideas like civic responsibility, moral duties, human dignity, and human rights create an ethos in the West unparalleled the world over. The pursuit of truth, goodness, and beauty is a pursuit worth preserving, protecting, and promoting.
But is recapturing and reviving the ethos of Western Civilization the most important work Christians can do on the earth? It is a good work. But is it the most important work?
I don’t think it is. The Bible, one of the building blocks (dare I say cornerstone) of Western Civilization, shows us a more fundamental and eternally important work. The overarching narrative of the Bible tells us that God is most concerned with bringing glory to himself by redeeming a people from all the peoples through Jesus Christ and gathering them into local churches that reflect his character. God’s plan for the world is to create a new “culture,” one made up of people from all cultures and built on the virtues of his character and the instructions of his word. God intends to accomplish this work as his people proclaim the gospel, call people to repent of their sins and put their trust in Christ, and gather those who do into local churches where the culture of the kingdom of God takes root, grows, and spreads.
Creating kingdom cultures in our churches is more important than preserving Western culture in our world. While the preservative and promotional work is important because it creates space, opportunity, and freedom for believers to pursue the more important work of proclaiming the gospel (1 Tim. 2:1-4), I don’t think God’s highest aspiration for his people is to preserve Western Civilization. His goal is his glory revealed through the new culture of his redeemed people, found primarily in the church, not society at large.
All People Are On the Same Footing
No culture has special access to God because no person has special access to God. Only those who repent of their sins and turn to Jesus Christ in faith belong to God.
Jesus says this emphatically in the text we’re looking at today, Luke 13:22-30. We’ve talked a lot in the last few weeks about the coming of the kingdom of God in Jesus. Today, we’ll see that the kingdom’s arrival in Jesus has massive implications for the Jewish people. Jesus says it’s time for them to join God’s program and give up their ethnic-based hopes, and that they need to respond quickly before the door of opportunity closes. That door is a narrow and soon-to-be-shut door. Many thought they were good with God because they’re Jewish, or because they saw and heard Jesus. But Jesus says everyone is on the same footing before God. He says that the only passports accepted in his kingdom are the ones stamped with repentance and faith.
The main point of this text is that all people are on the same footing before God, that no one has special access to God. Only those who repent and believe belong to God. In this text, we’ll see a good question (vv. 22-27) and a great reversal (vv. 28-30).
A Good Question
In verses 22-27, we see a good question. As Jesus continues to make his way to Jerusalem, he also continues to draw a line in the sand between those who truly know God and those who think they know God.
Jesus’ words make an impression on at least one person, who asks him in verse 23, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” The Judaism at the time believed that all Israelites would live in the world to come. The Mishnah, or laws that developed around the Law of Moses, used Isaiah 60:21 to defend this view. It says, “Your people shall all be righteous; they shall possess the land forever.” There were some exceptions to the rule, like the one that said that those who read heretical books wouldn’t go to heaven. But for the most part, the Jews of Jesus’ day believed they’d all be saved.
But then Jesus comes along and starts warning about judgment and saying that he came to divide and he calls people to repent. The person who asks the question in verse 23 is trying to square the popular theology of the day with Jesus’ words.
Jesus’ answer starting in verse 24 is a public rebuttal of Israel’s public theology. He clearly and emphatically says that there will be distinctions within Israel, and that ethnic heritage and genetic origin aren’t enough to save anyone. What he says was highly controversial!
Jesus’ Answer
In typical Jesus fashion, he doesn’t really answer the question he’s asked. Instead, he tells people to stop thinking about everyone else and to rather think about themselves. His response is basically that the way to be saved is narrow, the door to enter is small, you have to enter on God’s terms, there’s only a little time remaining until the door closes, and “contact with or racial connection to Jesus is not good enough.”[1]
The idea of “striving” to enter doesn’t mean you can work your way to God. It means to labor hard at listening and responding to Jesus’ message. It’s similar to the exhortation in Proverbs to incline your ear toward wisdom and pursue it (2:1-5).
The “narrow door” imagery suggests that fewer people will enter than people expect. It means there’s no automatic entry. The door into God’s house is “narrow” to show us that we have to come in the right way.
Jesus then says in verse 24 that the reason we should “strive” is because many will want to enter “and will not be able.” As the next verses show, they can’t enter because they didn’t respond to Jesus’ call in time. Many will want in after it’s too late (eg. Esau, Heb. 12:17).
The only way into God’s house is through the door he opens. As one writer says, “The gate of heaven opens only from the inside.”[2] You have to go to God on God’s terms.
In verse 25, Jesus develops this idea further. There comes a point when it’s too late to respond. The door into God’s banquet hall eventually shuts, never to be opened again. Those on the outside will want to get in and will knock and ask to be let in, but the Master of the house will refuse them entrance. This is a graphic and stern warning: if you don’t respond to Jesus now or very soon, you won’t be able to later.
Warnings like these made the Jewish leaders extremely agitated. They thought they had the keys of the kingdom, but Jesus says they’ve got to come in like everyone else. Their system of religion was based on ethnic identity not repentance and faith. They’re so blind spiritually that they think they’re in God’s living room when they’re actually in the local cemetery spiritually.
A Protest
The homeowner’s rejection leads to the protest of verse 26. Jesus says that people will say, “We ate with you and heard you preach in our neighborhood! Of course you know us!” But in verse 27, Jesus says, “Nope, I don’t know you.”
These people had meals with Jesus but didn’t have a relationship with Jesus. They heard him but didn’t respond to him. The point here is simple and eternally profound: contact with the message or person of Jesus counts for nothing, receiving him and his message is everything.
In Matthew 7:22-23, Jesus takes it a step further and says that “many” people who do lots of ministry in his name won’t be saved because he doesn’t know them and they’re “workers of lawlessness.” Only those who “do the will of the Father” will be saved (v. 21). Working for Jesus or hanging around Jesus counts for nothing. Only real relationship with him counts.
Jesus’ point is that he doesn’t know people who’re around him but never responded to him in such a way that he could recognize them as his own.
The appeal of verse 26 is met with a severe rebuke in verse 27. Because Jesus doesn’t know these people, he tells them to depart from him, even addressing them as “workers of evil.” They’re not just rejected; they’re counted as enemies of righteousness.
Jesus’ rejection reveals his authority to judge and his awareness that not all who’re around him are with him. Many were close to him but never responded to his message with repentance and faith. Only those who repent of their sins and turn to Jesus Christ in faith belong to God.
What about you? Have you walked through the narrow and soon-to-be-shut door? Have you truly repented of your sins and trusted in Christ?
In his book Conversion, Michael Lawrence says false repentance is seen in the person who’s excited about heaven but bored by Christians and the local church; thinks heaven will be great, whether God is there or not; likes Jesus, but didn’t sign up for the rest – obedience, holiness, discipleship, suffering; is bothered by other people’s sins more than his or her own.[3]
Jesus answers the question about whether few will be saved by basically saying, “Whether few or many, make sure you’re among them by responding to me, and don’t trust in racial or spatial proximity to me because being close to me or being Jewish will not save you.”
He says the door of opportunity is open for now but won’t be open forever, and once it’s shut it’s bolted shut forever. So people need to respond now and stop assuming that just because you’ve been exposed to the truth that you have the truth. Jesus turns the question from “Will the saved be few?” to “Will you be among the saved?”[4]
A Great Reversal
After the good question of verse 23 and Jesus’ response, he continues in verses 28-30 by talking about the great reversal that’s underway through his ministry.
Jesus says in verse 28 that the place where people go who don’t make it into God’s house through the narrow door will be a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” This describes their emotional and physical reaction to the traumatic news that they’re not getting in. Can you imagine the soul-crushing feeling of being told, “You’re never getting into heaven. You’re never going to taste or see or experience anything good ever again.” And then to realize that the paralyzing despair and agony that begins in that moment will never end?
Oh, how you must respond to the gospel today! What does it profit you if Western Civilization is revived but you lose your soul? Let’s be zealous for good works, but not at the expense of the greatest work, namely, trusting and obeying Jesus the Son of God.
Many assumed that their birth into the Jewish nation would get them in. They didn’t realize they needed a second birth (Jn. 1:11-13). Their close proximity to the promises of God worked against them. Sometimes you can be so close or so familiar with something that you fail to see it clearly. Think about your commute to work. Do you notice the landmarks anymore?
Jesus says the pain of that day will be compounded when those excluded see the patriarchs and the prophets in the kingdom while they’re left out (v. 28). Many in the nation of Israel think they’re in the kingdom of God, but they won’t be. Many church members and church attenders think they’re in the kingdom of God, but they won’t be. And the torture of realizing that you’re outside when all the people you admire are inside will be extreme and eternal.
In verse 29, Jesus takes it a step further and says that, not only will many Jews not be at the table, many Gentiles will be. God will gather his elect from the four corners of the earth. The beneficiaries of God’s grace is much broader than the Jews, much broader than many people today, realize.
It must’ve felt like a smack in the face for this Jewish crowd to hear Jewish Jesus say that the Messiah’s banqueting table would be full of Gentiles. To hear him say that Gentiles would be hanging out with their heroes, while they’re left out. With this statement, Jesus lays the groundwork for the mission of the early church, and every church since, the mission of taking his Word to every nation on the earth. People from all the peoples will be at Jesus’ table – it’s a settled fact (Rev. 7:9-10). Our job, as we’ll see in Luke 14 with the parable of the great banquet, is to go out and get them.
Jesus closes in verse 30 with something he said on several occasions, “Some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.” This is how he summarizes the great eschatological reversal he’s been describing.
He doesn’t say “all” who’re last will be first, but “some.” His point is that some Gentiles who appear far off will be in the house, while some Jews who appear to be in the house will be excluded. Some who think they’re saved won’t be saved, while some we think aren’t or can’t be saved will be.
This passage puts everyone on level ground. No one has an ethnic or racial or monetary or educational or religious advantage with God. No one has special access to God by birth or achievement. Only those who repent of their sins and trust in Christ belong to God. Is that you?
[1]Darrell L. Bock, Luke, Volume 2: 9:51-24:53, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1996), 1234.
[2]Quoted in ibid., 1235.
[3]Michael Lawrence, Conversion: How God Creates a People (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2017), 53-4.
[4]Bock, 1241.