Here is the question that I want to ask right now: Why is repentance and faith so hard? Why is there so much violence involved? Why are there a lot of people seeking to enter in, who won’t be able to? Why?!
Now listen very carefully, I am going to tell you another verse. This verse comes from the very end of the Bible and listen very closely as the Bible is finished up and the last book of the New Testament is coming to completion. And the last thing that the Lord Jesus Christ wants to leave with this world is this: Let the one who is thirsty come! Let the one who desires to take the water of life without price.
Let me tell you something, is the door into heaven, the Kingdom of God, is it narrow? Yeah it is narrow. It’s very narrow. But I tell you this: It’s wide enough and broad enough and open enough for every single person who desires to go through it, to go through it! Guarantee folks! Everyone, if you are thirsty go through and drink. God hasn’t shut the door from you for been saved. Just the opposite, He throws it wide open for all who are thirsty. He says, If you have a desire to come in, Come in! Here’s the thing, Does He say that? He does say Come in. If it’s so easy .. Don’t you wonder about this? If it’s so easy why does it sound so hard? Right? If it sounds so easy?
Here’s the door, we are beckoned to go through, Kingdom of God in our midst. All who desire can go right through. So easy and yet, [phew!] and it sounds so hard! Here’s the thing, the door of the Kingdom of God is like a monkey trap. Now I know that some of you have heard about this. Listen to me, this monkey trap deal that I am going to tell you about is no urban legend. This thing is real. This thing is real and monkeys are really like this. Now listen, trappers, you know, obviously if you want to kill and monkey because you want to eat the monkey. You don’t have to be concerned about preserving the monkey. Just stick a arrow through it and put it on your plate but for those who want to capture monkeys for zoos and that type of thing where they want monkey unharmed. They have a way of trapping them. Well how? Well basically they take a gourd or a coconut or a bottle. Let’s use the bottle in the illustration, it’s a good one. They basically get a bottle that has an opening to it where the monkey can get his hand in and they put nuts inside delicious nuts. Just the kind the monkeys love to eat. Well what happens? The monkey puts his hand through the neck of the bottle where he can fit, and he reaches in there and grabs hold of one of the nuts. Well there’s a problem now. Now that the nuts in the hand, his close fist; it’s too big to come out of the neck of the bottle. Now you would think, Okay, monkey drop the nut, monkey goes free! That’s exactly right but guess what they found, the monkey will never drop the nut. And so, even when the trapper comes, the monkey sees him and is just going crazy trying to get away. He still won’t drop the nut! Trappers got him, in the bag he goes. And you know, I’ll tell you again, this is no urban legend. This is how they trap, I read about it on the Internet, I’ve never seen it done but I take it on good account that this actually happens.
The door way to the kingdom of God is just the same, it’s big enough for you to get through if you tear out these eyes and drop those nuts of repentance that Christ calls you to drop. That’s the whole point. If you don’t tear out the eye you don’t fit through. If you don’t drop the nut, you don’t go through. Listen, everyone of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple(Luke 14:33). It’s big enough for you to get through if you dump the stuff. But if there’s even one thing in your life that you are not willing to get rid of, one idol in your life that you won’t give up. You can’t go through. Idols and sin are too big to go through that door. You are willing or you are called to go, you are asked to go, you are bid to go, you are pleaded with to go, you are commanded to go. You are commanded to repent and believe. You’re commanded to go through that door. In some places, God pleads with the sinner to go though that door. In some places, God pleads through His servants, to you to go though that door. He bids you. He does it in commandment, He does it in some most affectionate terminology imaginable. He says. He actually comes down to the level of the sinner and says, “Come let us reason together!” I mean He is, He will even reason with sinners. He bids us “Come.” He provided a way in. The problem is, look folks, God hasn’t shut the door on anybody. The thing is, there’s a nut that most people have and you know what the thing is? The thing is, most people will give up many things to have heaven but they won’t give up everything. They have that one or two special nuts and the won’t given up. They will not let go! And even if they hear that there is danger. Even if they hear that there is such a thing as hell. Just like the monkey when he sees the trappers coming. I mean there’s the danger right in their face. and this guy will take me away, he is going to throw me in a place that I don’t want to be! And even when the sinner sees God is going to come for me and He is going to throw me in a place that I don’t want to be. Even when they see the danger, they won’t let go! Why won’t they let go? That’s the thing, why will the sinner not let go? Because as we find in Hebrews, what is it? Hebrew 3:13, the deceitfulness of sin.
You know what folks, when you really boil it down, you know why people won’t repent? Because they don’t believe. That’s the issue, they don’t really believe. You see to believe a lie is to be a unbeliever. Sin is deceitful. Basically every sinner that will not enter. Why do you have all these crowds of people that are seeking to get in and can’t get in? I will tell you why because they have a nut in their hand. They will come around and say, “I am trying to be saved. I calling upon God to be saved.” Let me see your hand. Yup that’s what I thought, can’t get their hand out because they have a nut in their hand and they will come around and they will be in tears and saying “You know I am calling upon the Lord and you know, He won’t save me. And I am doing this, and doing that and I coming to church and He won’t save me.” You know why? You got the nut in hand. If the monkey will let go of the nut he is out right now! You know what, 19 years ago, I had certain sins in my life I didn’t wanted to get rid of and I knew, I knew God showed me “You are going to hell for these sins.” And I knew that I deserved it and I sought and danger stared me at the face but there were certain sins that I did not want to get rid of. Now I will tell you this, that very night on the 4th of July 1990, when I opened my hand, BANG!, like that I was saved. That fast!
