How Narrow Is The Gate To Heaven?

In the Gospels (Matthew 7:13-14, Mark 8:34-35, Luke 13:24, John 10:9), Jesus describes the path to heaven as being a narrow gate and declares to His disciples that He is the sole means to reach God, being the Way, the Truth, and the Life, as stated in John 14:6. As believers, we know that Jesus is the Way to the Father, but what does it mean per se, that the road to heaven is narrow? I’m going to go over some questions that will normally rise up after hearing this truth, and I hope it encourages you as to understanding the importance of following Christ. The questions I will go over are the following:

• Why did God make salvation a narrow path?
• What does this path entail to enter God’s heaven?
• Why are so many people prevented from entering?
• What is the significance of staying on the narrow path?
• How can I encourage myself and fellow believers to remain on this path?

When we read the Scriptures where Jesus mentions that the road to hell is broad and that MANY will enter through it, it should give us all pause as to how we conduct our very own lives. Jesus makes mention in a few scenarios in Scripture about the importance of enduring whatever the narrow path costs you, carrying your cross daily to follow Him, and it never lets up; it either ends when you pass into God’s heaven or if you quit running the race (which is not an option). Follow along as I go over these questions, and we’ll get a better understanding as we ponder on them; let’s get started!

Why did God make salvation a narrow path?

We can see an example of a narrow gate in this picture above, just on how narrow it is to enter. You’ll notice that in this picture, you don’t have a lot of room to carry things like luggage with you into it; it weighs you down, and you will find yourself having difficulty entering.

Having all that luggage will weigh you down, but do you know what else weighs you down? Sin. Sin weighs you down, and it makes it hard to enter through the narrow gate, but why is it so narrow? To understand why God made salvation such a narrow road begs a question in itself, and the question is this: why is Jesus so essential to a person coming to know God? We can begin with the creation account in Genesis, how God made mankind good and that there was no conflict.

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve, the first created humans, lived with God, but they disobeyed Him by rebelling against His command in their hearts, believing the devil’s deceit, and doubting God’s authority, ultimately ignoring the command of eating the forbidden fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which led to their expulsion from the Garden. Each human being born from a woman (apart from Jesus) inherited what’s called a sin nature, where we are actively against our Creator’s will and at odds with Him, and it has passed down from generation to generation.

God, through His servant Moses, conducted what we call the Mosaic Law (the commandments God gave to His people the Israelites on how to live (we see this in the first 5 books of the Bible – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, known as the Pentateuch). God’s people would live by these laws, and if they broke them by any chance (which was pretty much always), the priest would conduct animal sacrifices to atone for the sins of the people, and this would be a continual thing up until Jesus died for the sins of whosoever is willing to come to Him.

By God’s Law conducted in the Pentateuch of the Bible you had to live perfectly, but the problem is that we have all fallen short; we’ve all sinned in some way, some more than others. The Scriptures teach that Jesus took on the sins of the whole world upon Himself, and when He ascended to heaven, He made it possible for mankind to have their relationship with God restored, back to the way it was during the Garden before the Fall.

When we place our faith in Jesus atoning for mankind’s sins the first and only time, we don’t have to live under the Mosaic Law, conducting repetitive animal sacrifices (remember Jesus said that He didn’t come to abolish the Law but to fulfill it (Matthew 5:17)). That is the entirety of what Christianity is about: having faith in God (through Jesus Christ) coming down to the earth and living amongst humans as one Himself, being born of a woman and conceived by the Holy Spirit, and fulfilling the Law that He established since He knew that we would fail, and was willing to pay the price we deserve, separation from God forever in an eternity of suffering, for what purpose? Because God loves us, and when we believe in Him, we will have eternal life found in Him and not eternally perish (John 3:16).

Why is Jesus essential to coming to know God? Peter the Apostle in Acts 4:12 makes mention that Jesus is the only One who can save people; there is no one else that can save mankind. So why is salvation such a narrow path? It is because not many people are willing to follow Christ all the way; they don’t want to give up their passions for sinful pleasure or repent of any sorts of sins that they are committing. Jesus offers the Way to eternal life, but it is on His terms, and most of the world doesn’t like those terms; they’d rather live in a way that makes them comfortable with their sinful behavior and live in rebellion.

The invitation is available even now centuries later, but there will be a time when it will expire; God will not permit the evil of sin to last forever (it has an expiration date). The reason overall of why salvation is a narrow path is because people don’t like God’s terms for obtaining eternal life, salvation as a free gift given by grace and not of good works; they want to promote themselves as if they can achieve born again status (righteousness) on their own. We can see therefore why salvation is a narrow path.

What does this path entail to enter God’s heaven?

When we think of what it may cost us to follow Christ, we tend to kind of shrink back a little, don’t we? We tend to think of believers in the early church getting brutally executed and tortured for their faith in Christ, so is that something that we should expect? The answer is yes; we must be prepared for any kind of suffering.

Depending on where you live in the world, you might be more exposed to a greater amount of suffering than other places, especially if the hatred for Christians is greater there where you are. Jesus warned that to follow Him means to leave everything and everyone behind if it comes to it, so it’s something we should take seriously. It could mean losing a job or having your career ruined because you stood for Christ; it could mean people betraying and abandoning you when things get rough, and it could be financial or health related problems that come about.

God knows your situation, which is why He wants to have a deep intimate relationship with you. He knows that you’re going to have an increase in suffering (more than normal), because He suffered. Having a deep intimate relationship with God will help you get through those moments of suffering, and I’m not saying that He will remove you from your situation, but He promises to be with you as you endure the suffering.

The encouragement about suffering is that for the believer it is temporal suffering; it does not last forever for those born again. 70-80 years seems like a long time, and at times it can be, but it pales in comparison to eternity, to when time ceases to be and is done away with. We can be encouraged in knowing that things will get better, but they’re going to get worse first – there will be an intensity in suffering on top of what we already go through due to our place in the end times timeline.

Job lost his children and wealth along with his health, King David was hunted by King Saul and was abandoned by many, Stephen was stoned, Paul was persecuted in the utmost sense we can think of, Joseph was sold into slavery and then put into prison under a false accusation, and Jesus suffered more than anyone with the physical and mental anguish that He went through.

These are just some examples in the Scriptures, but the question we can ask ourselves is this: what is it costing us to follow Jesus? I can assure you that God sees what you’ve given up for Him, and He will reward you for it.

Why are so many people prevented from entering?

To ask why so many people are prevented from entering, we have technically covered some of that in the questions above, but let’s go deeper into it: why are so many people prevented from entering the kingdom of heaven?

The Book of Matthew (ch. 7:13-14) has Jesus speaking with some of his disciples in the account of the Sermon on the Mount, where He goes over some teachings on how to live for God, and He also goes over the topic of heaven being a narrow gate. He says overall that the wide gate is broad and represents hell (and many people are on this path) while the narrow gate is going to have few that enter. What does this mean exactly, that few will find the way to life?

Let’s take a look at some statistics for me to show you what I am referring to. The first question we can ask is this: how many people are in the world as of 2026? According to http://www.worldometers.com, they report that there are 8.3 billion human beings living currently today; they report that the world’s population is “growing at a rate of 0.84% per year in 2026” (https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/). We can see how the world’s population is up there in numbers, and it has all sorts of religions and beliefs, but we can then ask ourselves this: how many people out of the 8.3 billion people profess to be Christians?

Jesus says you must be born again to be one of His children, which refers to the Holy Spirit entering in the newly converted believer, and worldly religions teach things contrary to the truth that Jesus is the only Way to heaven. Let’s go deeper into what I am getting at by this question.

Christianity is well known through many places in the West and is spreading out into areas in the world that have not heard the good news of Jesus, fulfilling the Great Commission. There are many people in this world that profess to be Christians, and as of 2020 2.3 billion to be exact, as http://www.pewresearch.org states in their statistic. The statistic shows that Christianity is still the largest faith-based group, but it is closely followed by Islam (https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2025/06/09/how-the-global-religious-landscape-changed-from-2010-to-2020/).

So we can see that Christianity is still pretty big in certain places in the world, but here’s an interesting question to ask: how many of these professing Christians have what’s called a biblical worldview?

A biblical worldview can be summed up as seeing the world through the lens of Scripture; believing that Jesus is the Son of God and is Divine, believing in absolute truth, believing that salvation is by grace through faith and not of works, believing in the Triune Godhead (God in three distinct Persons), etc. We’ll use the United States of America as an example: America has been talked about as being a Christian nation (is it?).

In the words of Barna.com on the statistic of American Christians having a biblical worldview, “9%” of American Christians hold to that. George Barna talks about the statistic by saying that Christians who have this worldview should act the way that Jesus did, but very often they don’t put it into practice; he pretty much points out that many American Christians talk the talk but don’t walk the walk (https://www.barna.com/research/a-biblical-worldview-has-a-radical-effect-on-a-persons-life/).

Even though this is the statistic for professing American Christians, we can safely come to the conclusion that there are many “Christians” in other countries who don’t believe that Jesus is God or that the Bible is inerrant based on the fact that so much evil happens in other countries (if they’re truly born again they would spread the Holy Spirit’s influence and bear a plentiful amount of spiritual fruit) and that Scripture teaches that few find the way to heaven.

When we ponder these statistics and see how a lot of people who profess to be Christians don’t live out their faith, we can see why Jesus mentions that only a few make it. Needless to say this does not mean that heaven won’t have a big population, because in Revelation 7:9, John the Apostle notes that he saw a vast number of believers from every area in the world worshipping God, so we know based on John’s vision and numerous details of Jewish and Gentile believers throughout the two testaments that there will be a lot of people in God’s kingdom.

There will be many in heaven, but as far as every single human that was created and has been born, those who are born again are sadly outnumbered by an even bigger amount of people who do not have a relationship with Christ, and with the way the world is, can we see why that is the case?

If there were more born-again believers in this world than unbelievers, the world would be slightly more of a righteous place to live in than what it is now; but God knows how crafty the devil is and how strong the temptation of sin can be, which is why having a relationship with Christ is the key to entering through heaven’s gates, trusting in Christ and not yourself.

What is the significance of staying on the narrow path?

The importance of staying on the narrow path goes beyond just being saved from hell; it involves growing in godly maturity so that you know how to endure suffering, resulting in giving God glory; it says a lot about a believer’s testimony when they are faithful to Christ during trying times.

Suffering, sadly, is part of the human condition, and whether we choose to follow Christ or not, will not change the fact that we live in a broken world. Knowing that we will go through it can give us mainly two options: we will either choose to place our faith in Christ or we will cave into fear and turn away from Him. Following Christ is not easy, which is why Jesus wants us to count the cost and carry our cross daily towards the end of the race, which is eternity with God.

Personally for me, since I know that this life will have suffering, the thought comes to mind on the fact that as a Christian, there is purpose in my suffering. What I mean is that since I am a believer in Christ, my suffering is an opportunity to give God honor and glory by choosing to have faith in Him. I’m nowhere near the spiritual maturity level I desire to be at, and I’ve tried the other choice (to wallow in self-pity and be miserable), but I can definitely attest to God being faithful to me in my life, and He leaves it up to me to decide where to go forward, and that’s exactly it: forward!

How can I encourage myself and fellow believers to remain on this path?

The most important truth in running the Christian race is knowing Who you’re running to as you traverse through this side of heaven. Knowing Who God is will help you keep a clear focus, instead of playing religion (following Jesus is a relationship spent with Him, growing in knowledge and character of who He is and how to live the way He did).

I find myself looking at 1 Corinthians 9:24-27, where Paul the Apostle is talking to the church of Corinth on how to run the Christian race; he describes it as like a marathon, where only one person wins the prize, which adds the further urgent task of running with everything you’ve got. It’s not easy to follow Christ, but God will be with you as you go through life, so you can have confidence in knowing that He is watching.

You can encourage others to run hard by sharing your testimony of what God delivered you from, and you can teach them how to lean into Christ and let His Holy Spirit work within you; you can teach them how you stayed focused on God during those times, or if you fell a couple of times, what you learned from it.

Sometimes you might need a little extra help with staying encouraged while living for Christ, so seeking pastoral counseling or a trusted spiritual Christian mentor can help; they can offer you advice that the Bible teaches and help you understand why certain things happen, although they will not always have the answers. Sometimes we have to let God be God, and accept our place as the creation (whom He loves dearly) and trust in Him.

The best encouragement to keep running is knowing that He loves you, and that He wants to give you a future that is spent with Him, but we have to be willing to give Him our full attention and devotion; we can’t make room for anything less. Knowing that God loves us and places believers in our lives to help us is a tremendous encouragement; it may even prove to be most useful during moments when we want to throw in the towel, to give up. You can be encouraged in running the race with the truth that God is with you and cares for your well-being.

How do we proceed from here?

When we see so many people choosing to live life apart from Christ, it starts to make sense with Jesus saying that few find the way to heaven. Time flies by, and before we know it, we’ve reached the end of the line, and then what? Bask over accomplishments that didn’t glorify Christ? Brag over all the things we’ve obtained over the years, things that rot and decay?

Following Christ is going to be hard during these times we’re living in, but I want to encourage you that although it is hard to follow Christ, it’s harder to try to find meaning in a life full of suffering and unfair treatments. It’s hard to stay focused with all the distractions that come your way, and it’s hard to remember the good that God has done.

God knows how hard it is going to be with following Him, but you can be rest assured that He has your back; He’ll honor your choice of choosing Him, and when you choose to follow Him, you will find that you made the best choice you could ever make!

When you run the Christian race for Christ, when you pass into eternity, it may very well be that the first person you see is your Lord who was watching from heaven and cheering you on as you chose to be an overcomer instead of giving up; what a joyful time that will be when we see the Savior face to face. What joy you’ll have forever, being at peace and fellowshipping with the saints; it will be joy everlasting and everlasting.