This is the last one.
Donny’s been walking us through the Sermon on the Mount since the beginning of the Surrender All series — week after week, chapter by chapter, through some of the hardest teachings Jesus ever gave. Kingdom heart. Godly character. Sins of the heart. Loving your enemies. How to pray. How to give without needing anyone to notice. How to stop worrying. Where to put your treasure. How to stop judging. The Golden Rule. Love in action.
All of that has been building to this morning. Because Jesus doesn’t end the Sermon on the Mount with a nice summary. He ends it with a choice.
But before Donny gets to Matthew 7, he lines up four voices from Scripture who all said the same thing — centuries apart, different circumstances, same demand.
Moses, standing before Israel on the edge of the Promised Land: “I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live.”
Joshua, at the end of his life, challenging the people one last time: “Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”
Elijah, standing on Mount Carmel with the prophets of Baal: “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him.”
And Jesus, walking along the Sea of Galilee: “Come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
Four moments. Four invitations. One question: what are you going to do?
Then Matthew 7:13-14. “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
Two roads. Two gates. Two outcomes. Jesus doesn’t pretend the narrow road is easy or popular. He just says it’s the one that leads to life.
Then He warns about false prophets. Wolves in sheep’s clothing. And Donny drops a line here that’s going to land: “False prophets do not wear t-shirts that say ‘I’m a false prophet.'” They look right. They sound right. They seek control, influence, power, notability. But you’ll know them by their fruit. A good tree can’t bear bad fruit. A bad tree can’t bear good fruit.
He contrasts the fruit of the flesh in Galatians 5 — sexual immorality, jealousy, selfish ambition, hatred — with the marks of a true disciple: meekness, poor in spirit, mourning for others, hungering and thirsting for righteousness. The genuine desire to be like Jesus.
Then the hardest verses in the whole sermon. Matthew 7:21-23. “Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and drive out demons and perform miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me.'”
That’s the scariest passage in the New Testament. People who thought they were in. People who did things in Jesus’s name. And He says I never knew you. Not “I forgot you” or “you fell short.” I never knew you.
Donny will point to the Pharisee in Luke 18 — praying about himself, listing his accomplishments, thanking God he’s not like other people. That’s what the broad road looks like when it’s dressed up in church clothes.
Then the foundation. Matthew 7:24-27. The wise man who hears Jesus’s words and puts them into practice — he builds on rock. The rain comes, the streams rise, the wind blows, and the house stands. The foolish man hears the same words and does nothing with them — he builds on sand. Same storm. Same rain. Same wind. The house falls with a great crash.
The difference between the two men isn’t what they heard. They both heard. The difference is what they did with it.
Matthew 7:28-29 — when Jesus finished, the crowds were amazed. He taught as one who had authority, not like the teachers of the law. Peter said it best in John 6: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”
Donny closes with three questions.
Do you believe in God?
Are you committed to Jesus?
The decision is yours.
That’s the whole Surrender All series in three sentences. Months of teaching, dozens of passages, and it all comes down to what you do next.
Scripture References:
Matthew 7:13-27 · Deuteronomy 30:15-20 · Joshua 24:14-15 · 1 Kings 18:21 · Matthew 4:19 · Galatians 5:19-21 · Luke 18:11-12 · John 6:68-69
