Out of the Ditch 
Jesus told us in Mathew 7:14, NIV.
But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
We all know what a ditch is. We drive on the road to get to our destination. The road is paved and easy to drive on, and the road also has ditches on both sides. While not fit for driving on they do lead to the same place as the road. I was walking on the narrow road when circumstances tossed me into the ditch, a deep ditch. For several years I struggled along walking and sometimes crawling in the ditch along the narrow road. I could see people up on the road walking towards the small gate and I could also hear them talking as they walked on the narrow road toward the small gate. One day while I was deep in the ditch, I heard someone from up on the road calling out to me, saying what are you doing down there? I was startled and looked up, and there was this beautiful person looking down at me and saying to me, something I had had not heard in several years, God loves you and you don’t need to be down there in the ditch. I did not know what to say, so I just kept crawling along. However, the person up on the road was not going away. She kept talking to me, encouraging me, praying for me, and using scripture to show me where I could get up on the road again. At times she would use a bullhorn to get my attention and several times picked up stones along the road and threw them at me. Over a year went by with her verbally and prayerfully speaking to me. One day I finally reached out my hand to her and began my journey up out of the ditch and back onto the narrow road. I have been blessed by an instrument of God’s love. Someone who saw through the eyes of God a need and accepted the challenge of meeting that need. So how did I get into the ditch? For five years I was a primary caregiver for my wife who is struck down by two awful diseases. First, she lost her ability to communicate and became mute, unable to speak, read, write, or understand the spoken word. Two years later dementia set in. Through the years I began to lose my joy and lived in a world of sadness as I watched my beautiful wife disappear. Through it all I still had love, peace, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, and temperance, but no joy. Sadness had taken the place of joy. As sadness overwhelmed me, I veered off the narrow road into the ditch. So, who would reach out to one in a ditch (Luke 10:30-34)? One who has been given by God a supernatural gift of love and a willingness to be used by God almighty as an instrument of his love for one of His children who had fallen into the ditch. So how does one pulled from the ditch respond? By first and foremost giving thanks and praise to God who loves us so very much. And then how could one not have love for the one who remained faithful to God. So as God will have it, we walk on the narrow road together, sometimes hand in hand and sometimes not, but always by faith and the desire to please God. As a result, we are blessed.

The Narrow Gate

Mathew 7:13-14.
13“You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way. 14But the gateway to life is very narrow and the road is difficult, and only a few ever find it.