Only two paths: How shall we lead the sheep to follow the right one?

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world…
Ephesians 2:1, 2

When you come right down to it, there are only two paths along which a person may conduct himself in this life. As Jesus taught, there are only two roads, one broad and very populated, one quite narrow, where only a few make their way.

In our text the Apostle Paul outlines the course most people choose, the one that is the easiest to detect and provides the most immediate gratification. He refers to it as “the course of this world” and says that every believer in Jesus Christ at one time walked that path. But in the riches of His goodness and grace, God has rescued those who believe in Jesus, and set them on a different path, an unseen path, which, while it may be more difficult to discern, and is certainly a harder row to hoe, nevertheless provides deeper and more abiding satisfaction, together with the assurance that the end of this road is the home for which we have been created anew in Christ Jesus.

Paul notes four characteristics of the course of this world. I’ll try to put them in something of a logical order.

First, the priority of this world’s course is the gratification of the flesh. Everything the pilgrim on this road chooses is designed to carry out the desires of the body, to provide sensate pleasure in one form or another (v. 3). Scriptures talk about this objective in a number of ways: the lust of the eyes, the god of the belly, the desire for riches, the exercise of power over others, and so on. In a certain way it’s easy to see that our entire society is geared up to reinforce this priority. Schooling trains young people to maximize their material desires by preparing to take their place in the debt economy of American capitalism. Advertising plays on every conceivable bodily pleasure, the gratification of all the senses, and outlines paths designed to ensure that nothing gets in the way of the consumer resolved to maximize his own ease and wellbeing. Politics focuses so earnestly on material needs that it resents the voice of religion as it tries to recommend another perspective. All the heroes our young people adore are those who, by the exertions of their bodies in sports, film, music, or other pop forms, have acquired the ability to satisfy all their fleshly desires, and do so.

So we don’t need to argue the point too fervently that the top priority of the course of this world, the destination to which all its side roads, alleys, and convoluted paths lead, is bodily pleasure and the gratification of the senses.

Second, and following on this, the motive force of the course of this world is passion. “If it feels good, do it” as the old TV comedy series used to say. The main thing about any choice, decision, or course of action is that it should “feel right,” that is, it should set off all the right bells and whistles of emotional gratification, stirring up excitement, anticipation, and profound desire (read: covetousness), and preparing all the rest of the soul and body to get on board with whatever course of action will bring those affections to greater heights. The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, the prophet reminds us (Jer. 17:9), but the person resolved on the course of fleshly gratification hears such words and responds, “If this be deceitfulness, make the most of it!”

Jesus warned of the dangers of a heart given over to every wicked, unbridled impulse (Matt. 12:33-36), and this heart is the motive force, the guide and pilot of all who journey the course of this world.

Third, for those who travel this course, the mind is the slave of the heart, rather than its colleague. In a well-balanced soul the mind (thought life) and heart (affections) interact under the governance of the conscience (priorities, will) to generate actions pleasing to God and beneficial to man. But among those who travel the course of this world, the thought life is slave to the passions, and in spite all its “good reasons” and “caveats” will get in line behind the priority of the flesh and let the passions call the shots. The role of the mind is then to generate rationalizations, excuses, deceptions, and lies in order to conceal, justify, or excuse any behavior that others might regard as unseemly (“It all depends on what you mean by ‘is.’”).

Finally, it is important to note that those who are chugging along on the course of this world, passionate, clever, scheming, and indulging their every whim, are really servants of the father of lies, the prince of the power of the air. For the devil is the tour guide on the course of this world, and he is leading every flesh-loving lemming to a precipice of eternal doom.

Yet this final outworking is part of the unseen realm which only those on the path of life are able to discern. Nevertheless, Paul says that those who travel the course of this world are under the wrath of God, and, happily, this is something anyone can see, as long as someone is present to point it out.

In Romans 1:18-32 Paul describes those who are on the course of this world as under the wrath of God, such that they spiral out from proximity to God and His Truth in an ever-widening gyre of separation and increased sin. Like the falcon in Yeats’ poem, “The Second Coming”, they are no longer able or willing to hear the voice of God calling them to their senses. Instead, they drift farther and farther from him into deeper and deeper quagmires of sin, leaving in their wake on the path of this world the tattered lives and savaged souls of many of their fellow travelers.

This is something we can observe and point out to those who are under the wrath of God, in the hope that, somehow, by some means, they might be brought to their prodigal senses and make their way to the Father Who waits to receive them.

The work of preaching and disciple-making must proceed ever cognizant of the fact that the allure of the world is great, and most Christians struggle to resist it. Indeed, we are all compromised in some ways by our dalliance with the lusts of the world. We think we can walk that path without becoming sullied by the slime or dulled by the darkness that awaits us along that route. The preacher’s task is to sound the alarm, mark out the guard rails of the path of righteousness, and loving lead the sheep back to their proper path. But we will only be able to accomplish this when, like the sons of Issachar, we understand the pressures and enticements of our secular age and know how the followers of Christ should otherwise invest their time and strength (1 Chron. 12:32).

Pray for compassion for those who walk the visible path. Live before them the life of the unseen realm with such hope and joy that they might be inclined to look up from their perilous journey and query about the Way that makes your life so much more commendable than theirs. And preach with power the glories, joys, and exceeding abundant blessings that lie along the path that leads ever more deeply and securely into the way of everlasting life.

For more insight into this topic, get the book, Keep in Step with the Spirit, by J. I. Packer at our online store. Or read the article, “Leading by Following” by Chuck Colson.