“The disciples were astonished at these words. But again Jesus said to them, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!…..Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, there is no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the gospel who will not receive in this age a hundred times as much – homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, fields, all with persecutions – and in the age to come, eternal life.” Mark 10:24, 29-30 NET https://bible.com/bible/107/mrk.10.24-30.NET

Jesus is God. God tells us while living among us as one of us so that we can hear Him clearly and know with certainty that going to heaven is not easy. We live as if God were not telling us the truth. God must call us to love Him first and foremost, lest He be less than God. God can require nothing less of us than complete and total commitment and loyalty to Him and His ways. What does that look like? Absolute commitment by obedience to His commands. What does He command? To love Him and love others by teaching all people everywhere to obey everything He has commanded. This love is not acceptance of sin but rebuke of sin. So many Christians have not left family for Jesus because they have approved of the LGBTQ lifestyle of their children. Loving our children means walking in the difficult balance of staying in a relationship with them while praying for them and gently but continually as the opportunity exists to remind them that they will not enter the kingdom of heaven unless they, too, repent. Persecution comes to those who diligently share Jesus and live in obedience to His commands in a world that is moving further from those commands because the Church is increasingly less willing to suffer for His Name’s sake by loving Him more than all else, proven by our consistent efforts at making disciples of all people which is the obedient following of Jesus always.