Outline:

Take the Difficulty Road to Heaven

How?

1. Follow ONLY Jesus’ Teachings
2. Jesus MUST Be Master
3. Jesus Must Be FULLY Obeyed

For each of the following verses identify what we are to DO:

1. Obey: Commands and instructions to obey, sins to avoid, examples to follow or not to follow (if they are clearly taught someplace else in the Bible).
2. Trust: God's promises, key truths, and reasons given to obey the instructions.
3. Sometimes the same phrase will be both an obey and a trust.
4. Where necessary, explain what the do or know means.

Green text are quotations from the Bible. Purple text are quotations from a Study Bible. Red text are questions.

Want God's help to understand His Word? Then tell God you will do Psalm 119:34 "Help me understand your instruction, and I will obey it and follow it with all my heart." CSB

Take the Difficult Road to Heaven - Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. (14) How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it.”  CSB

1. For each verse identify what we are commanded to OBEY or TRUST.
2. Entering Requires Every Effort - Luke 13:23-24 “Lord, someone asked him, are only a few people going to be saved? He said to them, (24) Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because I tell you, many will try to enter and won’t be able”  CSB  

3. Why the Road to Life Is Difficult - 1 John 2:3-4 "This is how we know that we know him: if we keep his commands. [4] The one who says, "I have come to know him," and yet doesn't keep his commands, is a liar, and the truth is not in him."  CSB

   1. Acts 26.20  "I preached that they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds." NIV

4. CSB Study Bible "The narrow gate symbolizes the exclusive nature of Christ’s kingdom. Entrance requires the disciple to do the will of the Father in heaven (v. 21). The gate that is wide indicates that hell grants unrestricted entrance and that many will enter through its gates. ... the narrow road probably represents Jesus’s morally restrictive teaching. The wide road permits travelers to meander and pursue worldly desires, but the narrow path requires travelers to stick to God’s will (Mt 7:21)."
5. MacArthur Bible Commentary: "Christ continually emphasized the difficulty of following Him. Salvation is by grace alone, but it is not easy. It calls for knowledge of the truth, repentance, submission to Christ as Lord, and a willingness to obey His will and Word."

How? 

1. In the next 3 paragraphs Jesus gives the 3 requirements of the Difficult Way to Heaven.

(1) Follow Only Jesus’ Teachings - Matthew 7:15-20 "Be on your guard against false prophets who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravaging wolves. (16) You’ll recognize them by their fruit. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes or figs from thistles? (17) In the same way, every good tree produces good fruit, but a bad tree produces bad fruit. (18) A good tree can’t produce bad fruit; neither can a bad tree produce good fruit. (19) Every tree that doesn’t produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. (20) So you’ll recognize them by their fruit."  CSB

1. For each verse identify the OBEYs and TRUSTs.
2. How to Save Yourself and Others - 1 Timothy 4:16 “Keep a close watch on how you live and on your teaching. Stay true to what is right for the sake of your own salvation and the salvation of those who hear you.” NLT 
3. Why Follow Only Jesus' Teachings - Galatians 2:16b, 5:4 "And we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we might be made right with God because of our faith in Christ, not because we have obeyed the law. For no one will ever be made right with God by obeying the law.”⁠ and Galatians 5:4 "For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God's grace."  NLT
   
   1. Galatians 5:4 happens to everyone who is trying to make themselves right with God by anything except total faith and confidence on what Jesus did on the cross.
   2. Check out "The Good News of Jesus" at www.JesusMainMessage.com to learn more about what Jesus calls his "Good News" (the Gospel)
4. How to Detect False Teachings - Acts 17:11 “Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.”  NIV
5. Proof of Sharing in Christ - Hebrews 3:14 "We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end."  NIV
6. CSB Discipleship Study Bible - "To recognize false prophets, the ordinary Christian must examine the way they live and their message. Do their behavior and character conform to Christ and his teaching? Do they proclaim only what people want to hear that makes life easy and pleasurable while ignoring the demanding and difficult requirements of discipleship?"
7. CSB Study Bible - "The image of cutting down and burning a bad tree portrays the judgment and eternal punishment of false disciples."
8. Will you equip yourself well with Jesus' teachings and work hard on being on your guard to protect yourself, family, and friends from the ravaging wolves?

(2) Jesus Must Be Master - Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. (22) On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, drive out demons in your name, and do many miracles in your name?’ (23) Then I will announce to them, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you lawbreakers!"  CSB

1. In v22-23 some of these people may have started out with Jesus as Lord but then went back to living for themselves. 
2. For each verse identify the OBEYs and TRUSTs.
3. True Lordship Defined - Mark 8:34-37 "Then, calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. [35] If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. [36] And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? [37] Is anything worth more than your soul?"  NLT
4. Who Jesus Loves - John 14:21 "The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him."  CSB 
5. Serve Only One Master - Matthew 6:24 "No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money." ESV
   1. Matthew 4:10 "Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only." NIV
6. ESV Study Bible - "Lord, Lord: An oral confession of Jesus as Lord does not always indicate a repentant heart. ...  Mighty works are not proof of the Father’s will since they can come from sources other than God, including demons and human contrivance ... Jesus says that he will one day exercise the prerogative of condemning people to hell, something that only God can do ... Though these condemned prophets appeared to belong to Jesus, they were never truly saved, for Jesus never knew them" (they didn't have a repentant heart).
7. John MacArthur on Romans 2:6-8  "Although Scripture everywhere teaches that salvation is not on the basis of works ..., it consistently teaches that God’s judgment is always on the basis of a person’s deeds ... The deeds of the redeemed are not the basis of their salvation, but the evidence of it. They are not perfect and are prone to sin, but there is undeniable evidence of righteousness in their lives." 

(3) Jesus Must be Fully Obeyed - Matthew 7:24-27 “Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. (25) The rain fell, the rivers rose, and the winds blew and pounded that house. Yet it didn’t collapse, because its foundation was on the rock. (26) But everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn’t act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. (27) The rain fell, the rivers rose, the winds blew and pounded that house, and it collapsed. It collapsed with a great crash."  CSB

1. For each verse identify the OBEYs and TRUSTs.
2. What We Must Be Careful To Do - Joshua 1:8  “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful." NIV  Study more 
3. The Gospel of Matthew by R. T. France pg 296 "... has left Jesus' hearers with a simple but demanding choice: to hear and ignore, or to hear and put into practice.  It is a make-or-break choice with eternal consequences.  And as we noted in v21, it is Jesus himself who is the key to this choice; it is his words (and not, as one might have expected, God's words) which must be done.  … The total collapse of the house with a bad foundation probably suggests that, as in v21-23, the final judgment is particularly in view, but that setting is not emphasized, and the imagery applies equally to the testing [trials] which discipleship will repeatedly encounter before the final consummation."
4. ESV Study Bible “The evidence of whether one is truly a believer is in whether one does the words of Jesus (cf. James 1:22–23 and 2:20–22).”
5. John MacArthur’s “The Lordship of Christ” sermon “It’s what you do with Jesus’ words that gives evidence of your spiritual condition. ... What is the evidence of true conversion? What is the evidence of true repentance? It is a life of obedience, submission to the lordship of Christ. It’s not a profession. It’s not empty words. It’s obedience. ... “
6. How Many of Jesus' Commands Are We to Obey and Teach? - Matthew 28:19-20 "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, [20] and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
7. Jesus gave 50+ commands/instructions in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew chapters 5-7).
8. How many of the 50+ instructions are you currently obeying and teaching?  
9. This Study will help you fully learn, obey, and teach ALL of them.  
10. Which Title Do You Want God to Call You? - Matthew 5:19 "Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."  NIV