For millennia the world has been groping for the portal to the afterlife – like the blinded citizens of Sodom, who floundered in the darkness of uncertainty, they were seeking to locate the true path to the other side. Over the years there have been myriads of human systems and conventions of deception intended to mimic the gracious call of the True Shepherd.
In John 10:9 Jesus, the True Shepherd claims, “I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.”
And yet, for years the impostors persist:
Pluralism: Has asserted, “I am the door!”– that there are many doors from which to choose, all of which will satisfy the soul to blissful afterlife.
Paganism: In similar fashion promotes “I am the Door!”– that many different sacrifices are available for the atonement of sins to court the favor of a distant deity.
Moralism: Demands that she is the door through which those who subscribe to a codified moral list can turn away the fury of a holy God – that each person holds within themselves the ability and choice, a behavioral righteousness to grasp their personal understanding of salvific piety: “Be kind. Be good. And the power is yours to usher yourself through the portal.”
Intellectualism, modernism, and nihilism all contend, “There is no door! It is a myth!” They argue that mankind has ascended to greater knowledge and understanding than to embrace a fictional deity. Therefore, no such portals even existed… ever.
Universalism says, “The door is open to all, regardless of choices or behavior – No one will be left behind or forgotten.”
And synergism promises that a little bit gleaned from many doors will yield entry.
Denominationalism, Ancestry, Generosity, Titles and Pedigrees all boast similar illusionary promises.
And the list will continue to grow from here until glory.
Still, other than Christ, all of these asserted “doors” are counterfeit, seeking to distort, or mimic the passage which is granted only through faith in Christ. All are ways to define their own righteousness, or outright futility as they seek to imitate hope or understanding – but in the end, they lead to death.
“There is a way which seems right to a man,
But its end is the way of death.” Proverbs 14:12, 16:25
Christ declared in John 14:6, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me.”
In no uncertain terms, Christ asserts Himself to be not only a door, but the exclusive door through whom God could be met. Sadly, there are those, … many, who have traveled through another door, a bogus entry, and would expect that a favorable eternity is securely in their grasp. Not until the judgement will they discover they have found themselves on the wide road that led them to destruction.
The first verse of John 10 tells us that the Door is the entrance to the sheepfold–the safe harbor for the Flock of God. Salvation, eternal life is exclusively granted by divine right to those who are in the fold. That Door, that narrow gate is wide enough to grant entry to all those whom God has called to Himself. It will not permit, however, the admittance of unrepentant sin, nor other gods.
To pass through the Door is to be saved.
To be saved is to be redeemed.
To be redeemed is to be restored.
To be restored is enjoy a relationship with the Creator.
Forever!
Have you entered through the Door? Have you entered through Christ?
[The Shepherd’s Echo is a previously published TheShepherdsPen]
