Luke 13:27 Commentary and Bible Study

This will be his final word, and there will be no further reply to it. He repeats that final word which they should have taken note of, and then he goes further. Those terrifying and unanswerable words are pronounced, ‘Depart from me.’ Depart from the one who is good, from the one who is the source of life and of all blessing. But to depart from him is to lose all hope of ever obtaining these things. It is to go into outer darkness from which there is no return. He does not want them to be with him, and he has made up his mind and it will not be changed. It is solemn in the extreme that these words can come from the mouth of the same one who says to his children, ‘Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world’ (Matthew 25:34), ‘Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee’ (Jeremiah 31:3). Certainly, the Lord makes a difference between one and another.But his emphasis is on the other side of this. Yes, they never truly knew him, but more importantly he did not know them – ever (Matthew 7:23). That is an even worse obstacle to their entering into his kingdom; that is an obstacle that cannot be removed. This is the ultimate explanation for their being shut out. Consistent with this is the fact that they are workers of iniquity, wrongdoers. In spite of their desperate pleas, and they apparent earnestness to enter in, their character is still unchanged. No one comes to Christ for salvation without being transformed in the inner man. There must be a new birth; sin must be put to death. That has not happened in the case of these ones who plead with Christ. There has been no repentance. At best there has been a superficial outward change of behaviour, but the heart is unaffected, and Christianity start in the heart. Christ sees through that, and he is unconvinced. The witness against them is within these men and women who are pleading too late.