John Calvin Commentary Matthew 7:13

"Enter ye in by the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many are they that enter in thereby." — Matthew 7:13 (ASV)

Enter in by the strait gate. Since nothing is more opposed to the flesh than the doctrine of Christ, no one will ever make great progress in it who has not learned to confine his senses and feelings, keeping them within those boundaries which our heavenly Teacher prescribes for curbing our unbridled nature.

Because people willingly flatter themselves and live in frivolity and self-indulgence, Christ here reminds His disciples that they must prepare to walk, as it were, along a narrow and thorny road. But since it is difficult to restrain our desires from wicked licentiousness and disorder, He soothes this bitterness with a joyful reward, telling us that the narrow gate and the narrow road lead to life. To prevent us, on the other hand, from being captivated by the allurements of a licentious and dissolute life, and wandering as the lust of the flesh draws us,⁴⁶⁹ He declares that those who choose to walk along the broad road and through the wide gate rush headlong to death, instead of keeping to the strait gate and narrow way, which lead to life.

He expressly says that many run along the broad road, because people ruin each other by wicked examples.⁴⁷⁰ Why does it happen that each of them knowingly and willfully rushes headlong? It is because, while they are being ruined in the midst of a vast crowd, they do not believe they are being ruined.

The small number of believers, on the other hand, makes many people careless. It is with difficulty that we are brought to renounce the world and to regulate ourselves and our lives according to the ways of a few. We think it strange that we should be forcibly separated from the vast majority, as if we were not a part of the human race. But though the doctrine of Christ confines and hems us in, reduces our life to a narrow road, separates us from the crowd, and unites us to a few companions, yet this harshness ought not to prevent us from striving to obtain life.

It is sufficiently evident from Luke’s Gospel that the instruction we are now considering was spoken by Christ at a different time than when He delivered the paradoxes⁴⁷¹ about a happy life (Matthew 5:3–12), which we previously examined, and when He laid down for them the rule of prayer. This is what I have repeatedly pointed out: the instructions that are recorded by the other Evangelists at different times, according to the historical order, were here collected by Matthew into one summary. He did this so that he might show us more fully the manner in which Christ taught His disciples. Therefore, I have thought it best to introduce here the whole passage from Luke that corresponds to this teaching. Although I have been careful to inform my readers about the chronological order Luke observes, I hope they will forgive me for not being more precise⁴⁷² than Matthew in the arrangement of the doctrine.

⁴⁶⁹ (“Comme facilement les appetits de la chair nous tirent en leurs filets; ”) —(“as the appetites of the flesh easily draw us into their nets.”);”) —(“as the appetites of the flesh easily draw us into their nets.”)

⁴⁷⁰ “Pource que les hommes se poussent les uns les autres au chemin de damnation par mauvais exemple;” — “because men urge each other on in the road to damnation by bad example.”;” — “because men urge each other on in the road to damnation by bad example.”

⁴⁷¹ “Quand il a prononce ces sentences que nous avons veues par ci de-vant, monstrant tout au contraire de l’opinion commune;” — “when he pronounced those sentences which we have formerly seen, showing it to be altogether contrary to the common opinion.”;” — “when he pronounced those sentences which we have formerly seen, showing it to be altogether contrary to the common opinion.”

⁴⁷² “Si je n'ay pas este plus scrupuleux ou curieux en conferant les passages tendans a un mesme poinct de doctrine;” — “if I have not been more careful or exact in comparing the passages relating to the same point of doctrine.”;” — “if I have not been more careful or exact in comparing the passages relating to the same point of doctrine.”