The dream of God is to save all of us and to make us agents of His salvation and love. Jesus is the fulfillment of that dream by dying on the Cross. He goes to Jerusalem to give His life and love to the end. There in Jerusalem that He shows His, zeal, passion, determination and undivided love. Only love saves In the Gospel of Luke (Lk 13:22-30), someone asked Jesus, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” Jesus did not directly respond to the question. Instead, He said, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate.” The question is not how many will be saved but how am I living as a disciple now. Am I living fully in the present? The hour of salvation is now not tomorrow. Therefore, the narrow gate is demanding. We cannot walk through it casually. We cannot carry everything with us. We are called to travel light. The narrow gate calls us to make a choice: what will I bring and what must I leave behind? It calls us to an attitude of detachment. Jesus said: “deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me”(Matthew 16:24). Pride, resentments, complacency will not pass through. Only humility, trust, love will pass through the narrow gate. The doorway, passport to life can be summed up in one word: love. What we bring with us to the next life is not what we possess but what we have given away on earth. Jesus reveals that beyond the gate is a feast, banquet of the kingdom of God. Isaiah saw it (Is 66:18-21). He declared that people will be gathered from every tongue and nation. Jesus affirms it. He says that people will come from the east and the west, from the north and south and will recline at table in the kingdom of God. But the way is not easy. The letter to the Hebrews (Heb 12:5-13) reminds us that for whom God loves, He disciplines. He is our Father and we are His children. Loving parents discipline their kids. God’s discipline is not punishment but preparation, cleansing, healing, purification, conversion, liberation. Like an athlete who trains and shows determination to obtain the victory’s crown or a tree that is pruned to bear fruits, God shapes us for joy through discipline. Gold is tested by fire. But our faith is more precious than gold and faith is tested by fire so that we make God shine in our lives. Therefore, the dream of God is a call for us to be imitators of Christ, to be His disciples and to learn to strive, to let go and to accept the discipline of love. The gate is narrow but it is not closed. The way to life is demanding but it is not impossible. God wants us to live with Him forever because the goal of our life is union with Him. But He wants us to be builders of His kingdom here and now: a kingdom of truth, justice, peace and love. He calls us to be agents of His universal and inclusive love today.
THE DREAM OF GOD
