After the master of the house gets up and shuts the door, you will stand outside knocking and saying, ‘Lord, open the door for us.’ But he will reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.’When once the master of the house has risen up and has shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ then he will answer and tell you, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, open to us; and he shall answer and say to you, I know you not whence ye are;
3 sermons cite this verse
We'd like you to have a seat. So this is our first Sunday back on campus with our students back here. And so our freshmen arrived a couple days ago and our returning students are trickling in. They start school tomorrow. And so I just like a word for them I just have for this weekend is it's welcome and welcome home. The last words I spoke to our students last year, those who are graduating and moving on, or those who are just moving on for the summer were the words of promise that every time they come back, it's welcome home. And so the words to our incoming students this Sunday are welcome to our returning students, welcome home. And either way, it's so good. Like either way, this moment right now is, I love beginnings. Beginnings are so good. Whether that, again, is our freshmen, our incoming students, it's time to begin, or our returning students, it's time to begin again. Because there's so much unknown right now. I mean, obviously, I mean, think about those incoming freshmen, those incoming students, they arrive on campus and they have had to leave everyone who knows them and go to a place like this. They go to a place right here, right now, where nobody knows them, virtually nobody knows them, or those students even who have been away for three months and nobody knows what these last three months have contained in their lives. …
impressed by it. They have been seen to shed tears because of their consciousness of sin— and there have been times when it has been exceedingly difficult for them to continue in the service of Satan. Some of you cannot sin with impunity as others can, and it has sometimes been a question with you whether you dare occupy these seats unless you resolve to give up your darling sins! Well, if the Holy Spirit has thus strived with you, thank God, for this is another instance of His Sovereignty! Yet remember how early in the history of mankind God had to say, "My Spirit shall not always strive with man." In a moment the Sovereignty of God may take away all those melting and gracious influences! And do you know what would happen to you then? Your conscience would be seared as with a hot iron and your natural hardness of heart would be followed by a judicial hardness which would be still more terrible! You might then continue to hear the Gospel, but it would be as though it were being preached to the dead—you would sit in your pews and experience no more feeling than a row of statues could—and you would live only to walk away and forget that you had been listening to the Truth of God. I tremble as I look around upon some of you! I cannot help fearing that you have already reached this dreadful state and that God has said concerning you, "They are joined to their idols, let them alone." I see some here who once made a profession of religion and who would even speak in God's name, but they turned aside! Then they professed to repent, but afterwards turned aside again. And now no message ever seems to startle them. They have listened to the Gospel until they have become Gospel-hardened—that which should have been the means of their salvation has become the means of their damnation! That same Gospel which has been a savor of life unto life to many others, has become a savor of death unto death to them! Take heed, Sinner, for He who melts can harden—and if you have long resisted the strivings of the Spirit, it may be that the Lord will allow you to go on sinning unrebuked—until you have filled up the measure of your iniquity and received the due reward of your evil deeds! …
III. 1. Therefore it is, that our Lord so earnestly exhorts, “Enter ye in at the strait gate.” Or, (as the same exhortation is elsewhere expressed,) “Strive to enter in:” Agonizesthe eiselthein, strive as in an agony: For many, saith our Lord, shall seek to enter in, indolently strive, “and shall not be able.” 2. It is true, he intimates what may seem another reason for this, for their not being able to enter in, in the words which immediately follow these. For after he had said, “Many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able,” he subjoins, “When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without,” arxesthe exo estanai, rather, ye stand without; for arxesthe seems to be only an elegant expletive, — “and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not: Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.” (Luke 13:24.) 3. It may appear, upon a transient view of these words, that their delaying to seek at all, rather than their manner of seeking, was the reason why they were not able to enter in. But it comes, in effect, to the same thing. They were, therefore, commanded to depart, because they had been “workers of iniquity;” because they had walked in the broad road; in other words, because they had not agonized to “enter in at the strait gate.” Probably they did seek, before the door was shut; but that did not suffice: And they did strive, after the door was shut; but then it was too late. …