Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”
....yeah, I think I’ll fear and serve Him.
The narrow way *is* the Law of love. Most want to pile on the rules and play battle of the doctrines, whereas the rules naturally are followed if love is the foundation and motivation. It's all about paying attention to detail when a person loves another. Love begets diligent *observance* and the desire to be tuned in. No loving person even thinks, "Must I attend to my wife when she is ill?" or, "Does my baby need to be cuddled?"
The divine pun is that the Messiah *is* the Law, because he is the embodiment of all who God is, how God operates. God's word, rounded up into one man who simply DOes it. He shows just how to accomplish that: by his love, by his example. When people experience how this man loves them "just because", and they see how it works and the result (life from the dead zone), well it's amazingly contagious. Dead leaven of the experts, or the live leaven of the Redeemer.
Traditions are pretty difficult (almost impossible) to uproot, though, so even sitting in a pew week after week, year after year, he could go wholly unrecognized, even while being who he is completely out in the open for all to see.
God's funny.
The narrow way is CHRIST, not the law.
Not any law.
“Most want to pile on the rules and play battle of the doctrines, whereas the rules naturally are followed if love is the foundation and motivation.”
________________________________________________________
With all due respect I have to disagree. I can’t tell you how many people have “been on fire for God” in their youth...claiming to believe and be saved, only to slide into complacency and even disbelief later in life. Even those who have not completely fallen in their faith and have merely “backslidden”, merely rationalize grossly unholy living by the assertion that God’s too nice to deny a believing-sinner heaven. That belief is not biblical, and it’s a dangerous game to play.