In 1973 Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid hit the silver screen. The movie received mixed reviews, but the soundtrack, written by Bob Dylan, was nominated for two BAFTA Awards for Film Music and a Grammy Award for Best Original Score. The most iconic track in the film is Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door. The song plays when Sheriff Colin Baker, an ally of Pat Garrett, is mortally wounded in a shootout while hunting for Billy the Kid. (Chara plays softly in the background) As the sheriff staggers to the bank of a nearby river, the haunting cords of the song begin to play. The sheriff’s wife, seeing her husband stagger off, races after him. With the sun setting in the background, the two sit by the river preparing themselves for his death. As they look at each other with tear stained faces, Dylan sings, “Mama, take this badge off of me I can’t use it anymore It’s gettin’ dark, too dark for me to see I feel like I’m knockin’ on heaven’s door”. As the scene fades to black the chorus sings, “Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door”.
The lyrics themselves convey a sense of uneasiness, but what makes this song so fitting for a death scene are the so called “unresolved chords”. I didn’t understand what that meant when I read it, so I texted Chara about it. She explained some chords have a happy sound and some chords have a sad sound and the progression of these chords have either a resolved or unresolved cadence. -- Chara can you play us an example of a happy chord with a resolved cadence? (Chara plays) Thank you. That made me feel happy and resolved. Now, could you play the chords Dylan used? (Chara plays). Those chords made me feel sad and unresolved. -- The chords of this song have left us hanging, they don’t resolve the line of music. They are the musical equivalent to a cliff hanger. Death is near, but we are left unsure and uncertain about what to expect, what’s going to happen, when, where, how, why? Its unsettling.
You can almost hear the unresolved chords of Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door playing in the background as our lesson for this morning begins. In Luke 13:22-23 we read, “22 Then Jesus went through the towns and villages, teaching as he made his way to Jerusalem. 23 Someone asked him, “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”” Jesus has been traveling along the border between Samaria and Galilee. Along the way, He has been calling the people to repentance and telling them to bear fruit in keeping with repentance. Jesus knows His time is short. We are only 9 chapters away from Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial. Soon Jesus will be, and I will use His words, “betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him.”[1] Death is in the air. So, it does not surprise us that someone would ask, “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?” You can hear how unsure and uncertain this nameless person is. You can almost see them standing unsettled at the edge of a cliff wondering what is going to happen when they die.
In His reply to the question, Jesus seeks to resolve the unresolved with a description of heaven’s door. Jesus tells us heaven’s door is narrow and eventually it will be shut, but today it is opened for you.
The door to heaven is narrow. Jesus says to us, “24 Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.” Heaven’s door is narrow. It is only about this wide (stretch arms out in the shape of a cross); it is as wide as the outstretched arms of our Savior as He was nailed to the cross. You see, the “door” that Jesus is referring to is Himself. Elsewhere Jesus makes this incredibly clear when he says things like, “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.”[2] and “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”[3] Jesus is the narrow door that we must go through in order to get into heaven.
Jesus tells us to “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door”. In order for us to fit through heaven’s door we must get rid of our sinful baggage. As I tried to explain to the children during the children’s lesson, sin makes us too bulky to fit through heaven’s door. With the children I used luggage to make this illustration, but you and I know that a better representation of our sin would be a steamer trunk or a cargo container. Sins collected over a lifetime, pack our cargo container full. As long as we continue to indulge our appetite for these sins, as long as we make compromises to our faith so that we can keep doing these sins, as long as we try to rationalize reasons why our sin is not so bad, as long as these sins remain unconfessed and therefore unforgiven, we will be too bulky to fit through heaven’s door.
Only when we confess our sin; when we recognize that what we have thought, said, and done is a violation of God’s holy law and as a result we deserve to have heaven’s door slammed in our face, when we unpack our sins at the foot of the cross trusting that Jesus will carry them away from us, when we pray for the strength to leave our sinful baggage behind us and stop indulging appetites, compromising our faith, and rationalizing our reasons, only when we confess our sin are we able to fit through heaven’s door. Only through the forgiveness that Jesus offers are we able to pass through heaven’s door.
The door to heaven is narrow and eventually it will be shut. Jesus warns, “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ “But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’” A time is coming when heaven’s door will be shut. Elsewhere Jesus tells us “no one knows about that day or hour”[4] that is no one knows when the time will come but come it will. “Like a thief in the night” it will come. “While people are saying, “peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman”[5] And when the day comes that heaven’s door is shut, there will be people who will be standing on the outside knocking on heaven’s door.
It begs the question, does it not, who are these shut out people? They are people who claim some familiarity with Jesus; they will say to Jesus, 26 “We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.” They are the people who know who Jesus is. Some of them learned about Him when, as little children, their parents brought them to church. These days, except for the occasional Christmas or Easter service they have been largely absent from worship, but they still recognize Jesus as a good moral teacher, and they try to live clean and decent lives, at least compared to most. They don’t necessarily know what it says but they still swear by the good book and maybe even have a cousin who is a preacher and so they assume they know Jesus. Others believe they have known of Jesus their whole lives. Their names are listed in the directory, they have a mailbox among the members, and they even have their own set of envelopes for the offering. These people have always had the pure gospel around them. But despite their spiritual advantages they have not been faithful eager users of word or sacrament. Week after week they sit in church apathetically going through the motions of membership. They have taken the means of grace for granted, but still they assume they know Jesus.
“We know you, Jesus!”, they will plead as they weep and gnash their teeth. 27 “But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’” “I don’t know you. You who saw me as nothing more than a teacher of morality and you who confused church membership for discipleship, you never really knew me, so now I choose not to know you. Away from me, all you evildoers!” All who fail to know Jesus in life will be unknown by Jesus in eternity. They will be shut out, doomed to be forever knocking on heaven’s door. Talk about an unresolved chord. Martin Luther said of this warning, “it is enough to frighten the greatest saints.” Is it enough to frighten you?
The door to heaven is narrow and eventually it will be shut, but today it is open for you. Jesus tells us, 29 “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God.” By the grace of God the Father who chose you from eternity to be His own, by the sacrifice of God the Son whose blood paid the price of atonement, by the work of God the Holy Spirit who in time called you by the gospel, sealed you with the waters of baptism, and continues to strengthen you by the word, you are the people who have come to take your place at the feast in the kingdom of God! Today heaven’s door is open to all who believe. Today heaven’s door is open to you. Heaven’s door is narrow, but you know who Jesus is; He is the one to Whom you confess your sins and He is the one from Whom you receive forgiveness. You know who Jesus is and as a result heaven’s door will never be shut to you.
When the time comes, when you find yourself staggering off to the riverbank in preparation for your death, it will not be the unresolved cords of Bob Dylan that you hear. Rather, it will be the resolute sound of 10,000 times 10,000 angels singing praises to our heavenly King. It will be the sound of the heavenly hosts rejoicing as they prepare to usher yet another saint to their seat at the feast in the kingdom of God.
The door to heaven is narrow and eventually it will be shut, but today it is open for you. Amen
[1] Mark 10:33-34
[2] John 10:9
[3] John 14:6
[4] Matthew 24:36
[5] 1 Thessalonians 5:1-3