I just hired a director of charity for my ministry, because the product sales were going so good, that we were giving so much to these orphanages, that my lawyer said: it's actually irresponsible for you not to have someone looking after this. So I went to the Board of Directors, they agreed, so we ended up hiring this girl.
Now the problem was, we knew who we wanted to hire from the get-go. The problem was when she was 19 years old, she made some really, really, really, really, really, really, really bad financial decisions, and so she was sitting there with a mound of debt.
So what happened to her, is when she was 24 years old, she'd had enough, and she said: I will end this now! She made a plan, and her plan was that by December of 2012 that she would be completely debt-free; and the power of that goal, the power of keeping that vision in front of her, the power of every day waking up saying: today I'm going to be more debt-free than I was yesterday, tomorrow I'll be more debt free than I am today.
Every single day was an effort to get the debt taken care of. You know what happened? The power of yes, gave her the power to say no to frivolous spending, to doing things that didn't meet that goal; and what happened was, by October 2012, she was completely debt free!
By December 2012, she had $6,000 in the bank, and now she's fully prepared to be a missionary in the world, without the financial pressure of paying debts off, to pay for drinks she bought six years ago on a credit card.
Now she's standing tall, and she's got a fully-funded emergency fund in case something happens; and that is the power of strategy, and intention, and fully intending to make a goal, and go for something.
Jesus, in one sense, is teaching us that - that most people fail, not because they're bad. Most people fail because they fail to plan, the fail to make a strategy, they fail to make a goal. They don't live with intention.
They wouldn't even know, if they got what they wanted, if they had it - because they're not even sure about what they want. Most people live willy-nilly, sort of like a fire. If a fire is broad, it can sort of burn down a lot of bush; but if you harness the same fire into an acetylene torch, it can cut through steel. That is the power of desire, and intention, and living with full goals, and full intention; instead of trying to live accidentally.
That's gates. Gates is a challenge to keep in mind our role in the world: to be light and darkness, and choose the higher road; but the only thing that gives you the power to choose the higher road, is to live with full intention to do it.
Nobody wakes up in the morning, and accidentally chooses the higher road. Nobody wakes up in the morning, and just accidentally forgives. No one wakes up in the morning, and just accidentally chooses to feed the poor. No one wakes up in the morning, and chooses to live for the betterment of others. No one does that.
That requires full-fledged intention. There are a lot of good people who are living selfishly, a lot of good people. Let me prove it too you. In the last 30 days, whose life is fundamentally better, because you're in it?
How many orphans have you fed in the last 30 days? How many blind kids in the Third World, are not blind now, because you went to Fred Hollows Foundation.com, and gave them $30 to take the cataracts off their eyes? What's the last thing you spent $30 on? Was it more important than a four year old girl seeing? How many of you would believe, with all your heart, that we should be engaging in things like that? Right - oh everybody? Wow, good! How many of you have actually done it? Oh good, half, good. So what's wrong with the other half of you? Are you bad? No, you're not bad.
It's just what happens is, that if we don't live with the full intention of doing something, the urgent things right in front of us take precedent, and we lose sight of bigger-picture things. It's not that you're bad.
You want to beat fear in your life; you got to make some intentions. You want to beat guilt in your life; you've got to make some intentions. You want to beat anger in your life; you've got to live with full intention to do it. You want to beat that tendency to call people idiots in your life? You've got to make full intention to do it. You want to quit fearing man, instead of fearing God, you've got to make full intention to do it. You want to beat that unforgiveness thing in you, you've got to make full intention to do it. None of these things handle themselves accidentally. It's a broad road, and a narrow way. It's a broad road and a narrow way, so the first image is gate.