Clowns and Jokers Through The Narrow Door / Luke 13:22-30 / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday August 24th 2025 / Season of Pentecost / Mount Olive Lutheran Church

Mount Olive Lutheran Church / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday August 24th 2025: Season of Pentecost / Luke 13:22-30 “Clowns and Jokers Through The Narrow Door”

[Jesus] went on His way through towns and villages, teaching and journeying toward Jerusalem. And someone said to Him, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” And He said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the Master of the House has risen and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, open to us,’ then He will answer you, ‘I do not know where you come from.’ Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets.’ But He will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come from. Depart from Me, all you workers of evil!’ In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God but you yourselves cast out. And people will come from east and west, and from north and south, and recline at table in the kingdom of God. And behold, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.”

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in Your sight O Lord. Amen.

Grace peace and mercy to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Good Christian Friends in the year of our Lord 1973 a song hit the radio air waves with the lyrics “Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right, Here I am Stuck in the middle with you,”[1] this memorable, and pretty humours line, from the Scottish folk-rock band Stealers Wheel paints a picture of someone who doesn’t really know how or why they have arrived where they are.

Have you ever felt this way? Have there been times in your life when the question, ‘why am I here?’ or ‘how did I even get here?’ becomes top of mind for you? In our Old Testament Reading the Lord says through His prophet Isaiah, “I know their works and their thoughts, and the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and shall see My glory, and I will set a sign among them.”[2] This great multitude of clowns and jokers that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, who are gathered together by the Lord[3] may also have been asking the same question? ‘Why am I here?’ or ‘how did I even get here?’ ‘Why should I be so fortunate to be brought to see the glory of the Lord?’

Jesus in our Gospel reading today from the Gospel of Saint Luke says that, “people will come from east and west, and from north and south, and recline at table in the kingdom of God.” All of these gathered in together, ushered through the narrow door of salvation, they too might ask, ‘Why am I here?’ or ‘how did I even get here?’ ‘Why should I be so fortunate to be brought to see the glory of the Lord?’

And so today you may ask yourself these same questions and perhaps a voice quickly says, ‘well it was my parents that brought me’ or maybe ‘it was a woman that brought me’ or ‘a man that brought me,’ and you quickly think ‘had it not been for my mother or father or maybe some other family member or my boyfriend or girlfriend or my fiancée/fiancé or my wife or husband perhaps I wouldn’t be here.’ Or maybe you think ‘it was my poor health,’ or ‘the bleak and dark nature of my life, had I not been at the end of my rope would I have gone seeking for that pin prick of light in the darkness?’ On the surface some of these things may seem true enough but is that the whole of your story? Is that the answer to this question for every clown and joker ushered through the narrow door of salvation? Or is there something more to this?

In the Gospel of Saint Matthew Jesus puts it like this, “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”[4] Here then — with Scripture interpreting Scripture — we see that the few ushered through the narrow door are also described as “a great multitude that no one could number,” because that is the vision given to Saint John by this very same Jesus in the book of Revelation;[5] which then means those who fail to entre by that narrow door, the ones who choose the wide and easy path, are likewise not few in number. There will be many who will not struggle to enter the narrow door while it is open to them, ones who run off in every other direction as the Lord is gathering multitudes. Jesus says that these who chart their own course, who make their own way through life, that march to the beat of their own drummer, may indeed finally come to their senses only to find that it is too late to enter once the door is shut by the Master of the House. So you have songs like “When the saints go marching in” where even Christian are encouraged to sing “Oh, when the saints go marching in Oh, when the saints go marching in, Oh Lord I want to be in that number When the saints go marching in.” Some in our world capitalise on the believer’s anxiety over this question of whether they’re in that number or not, whether or not they’re genuinely being marched in, whether or not they’re one who truly sits at the seat of Salvation, who sits at table with the Lord, in the Lord’s House. On the one hand such manipulative preachers and teachers—to their own unfruitful ends—may pressure you with the worry that you haven’t done enough good works to make it through the narrow door, or on the other hand that you’ve done too much sinning to entre in through the narrow door, putting it all on you, putting your salvation all on you. Knowing the true nature of the door makes a world of difference for you in your Christian life.

Earlier in the Gospel of Saint Luke there was a day when Jesus, “went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And [the Lord] said to him, “Follow Me.” And leaving everything, [Levi who we also know as Saint Matthew the tax collector] rose and followed [Jesus]. And [Saint Luke tells us that] Levi made [Jesus] a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them. And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at [Jesus’] disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”[6] Jesus calls all sorts of Clowns and Jokers to His table, and you dear ones are among them; you may even be one yourself: “Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right, Here I am Stuck in the middle with you,” Stuck in the middle with Jesus, in the very best way of being stuck. The table of the Lord is full of sinners, full of Clowns and Jokers, but Jesus is the one who reclines at this table with us as the one who has no sin, who is not a sinner or a clown or a joker, who is the very Son of God in whom the fullness of the glory of God is revealed. The table of Levi, our dear Saint Matthew, is a foretaste of the table that this same Matthew would sit at on Maundy Thursday — the night in which Jesus was betrayed — the night before Jesus’ crucifixion. And when we celebrate the Lord’s Supper at this table here at Mount Olive it is likewise as foretaste of the Table of the Lord in the Lord’s House. For men like Levi, our dear Saint Matthew, his table was a foretaste of Holy Communion that Jesus was to institute during that first Holy Week, while for us Holy Communion is now both a remembrance of that first Lord’s Supper and a foretaste of the eternal banquet where the table is set and we sit down to eat together once the door is shut by the Master of the House. The past and the present, the here and the now, all come together at the Communion rail and Jesus gives of Himself the very fruit of His cross and passion. And in this way we begin to see the true nature of the narrow door.

In the Gospel of Saint John Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.”[7] The Door is narrow because Jesus later said to them on that same night in which He gave them Holy Communion for the first time these words about Himself, “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”[8] In His passion, in His death upon the cross of His crucifixion Jesus makes for us the way, provides for us the sign, opens for us the narrow door, the narrow gate, and it is upon the cross that we are brought to see the glory of the mercy and grace of the Lord for us, for a world full of clowns and jokers, for a world full of sinners in need of redemption. In all of this we see that there is only one Door into eternal life, not many, and The True Door we seek, among many false doors, is Jesus Himself.

So as ones being saved, who are being ushered through the narrow door, for ones who even still are left at times asking, “Why am I here?” or “how did I even get here?” “Why should I be so fortunate to be brought to see the glory of the Lord?” there is an answer. Think back upon what you’ve learned in your catechism, where in the explanation of the Creed in the third article we confess,

I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. In the same way He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith.

Now that you know, why you are here, and how you have come to be here surrounded by all of these redeemed Clowns and Jokers, counted among these saints marching through the narrow door that leads to eternal life in Christ, the next question is ‘what do I do now?’ ‘what is my life to be like?’ ‘as a Christian what am I to be like in the world?” Our Epistle Reading encourages us saying, “In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood,” meaning each and every day take up the work of resisting sin, avoid being an unredeemed clown or chaotic joker bent on breaking the Ten Commandments who revel in their foolishness and sin and rather be strong in the Lord and put up a fight. “Consider,” the Book of Hebrews says, “Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.”[9] The one you are called to consider is Christ Jesus Himself and what we’re to consider is how He stood up to the temptations to sin right to His last breath upon the cross. We do this seeking mercy from the one who is merciful as we “Strive to enter through the narrow door.” The “striving” then is the continual life of repentance; the “struggle” then is the daily baptismal fight against sin for your good and the good of your neighbour and to the glory of God! 

Our first hymn today started with these words which speak of Jesus’ attitude towards us, “Today Your mercy calls us, [the ‘You’ there is Jesus] To wash away our sin. However great our trespass, whatever we have been, however long from mercy our hearts have turned away, Your precious blood can wash us and make us clean today.”[10]

One of the basic features of a door is that it opens and it closes. Today the door is open, Jesus has opened it to you, for you, Jesus is the door. On The Last Day all those who believe and are baptised will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned, the risen Lord Jesus teaches this in the last chapter of Gospel of Saint Mark.[11] Those who stand condemned in their unrepentant sins may know who Jesus is but that doesn’t mean that they trust Him or that He knows them in the way He knows you in your baptism into Him.

Because we do not know the day or the hour in which the door will be shut we need now to act with all urgency to show every clown and joker we know The Way through The Door lest they be stuck knocking on The Last Day calling out ‘Lord, open to us.’ So when the question bubbles up in your life ‘Why am I here?’ or ‘how did I even get here?’ first ask yourself ‘am I somewhere I shouldn’t be right now?’ This question can come anywhere you find yourself, ‘did I get somewhere stubbornly on my own,’ or as one enticed by sinful desires, ‘am I like a lost sheep fallen down a hole or caught in a thicket?’ Or when you ask ‘Why am I here?’ or ‘how did I even get here?’ is it because you have found yourself, by the grace of God, as one on the narrow path that leads through the narrow door? This is where you are today as you hear these words, today you are one on the narrow path being led through the narrow door of Christ Jesus and as such when you ask, ‘Why should I be so fortunate to be brought to see the glory of the Lord?’ The answer is, because He loves you and has provided grace for you out of His abundant mercy.

Now let’s flip these questions all around; as Jesus is stuck hanging on His Good Friday cross with a clown to the left of Him and a joker to His right the question emerges, ‘why am I here upon this cross suffering and dying, and how did I get here?’ Jesus’ answer is, ‘because of My great love for My heavenly Father and for all the clowns and jokers and sinners of the world in need of redemption and salvation.’[12] The Last Day and the narrow door need not be a frightening mystery to the Christian who knows the grace of God. Dear ones the door may be narrow but today it is open, share this good news and “be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken.”[13] Amen.    

Let us pray: Lord have mercy on us, Christ have mercy on us, Lord have mercy on us, “take our minds and think through them, take our lips and speak through them, take our hearts and set them on fire; for the sake of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, Amen.

[1] “Stuck in the Middle with You” (1972 – released as a single in 1973) the song hit No. 8 on the UK Singles Chart. Quickly becoming an international hit, reaching No. 6 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
[2] Isaiah 66:18
[3] Revelation 7:9
[4] Matthew 7:13–14
[5] Revelation 7:9
[6] Luke 5:27–32
[7] John 10:7–9
[8] John 14:6
[9] Hebrews 12:3–4
[10] Today Your Mercy Calls Us, Lutheran Service Book, Concordia Publishing House 2006, 914 stanza 1.
[11] Mark 16:16
[12] John 14; Romans 5; Galatians 2 and Ephesians 5
[13] Hebrews 12:28

Photo Credits: Main photo design of the narrow door by Rev. Ted Giese utilsing a mirrored jester illustration from rawpixel.