Let us prayerfully turn, in the word of
scripture, to Matthew chapter 7, and to the
words of our Lord that begin with verse
24.
I think, since they are so important, that
we should read them once again.
And may the Lord, by His Spirit, imprint
them deeply upon our memories.
Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine,
and puts them into practice, is like a
wise man who built his house on the
rock.
The rain came down, the streams rose, and
the winds blew and beat against that house.
Yet it did not fall, because it had
its foundation on the rock.
But everyone who hears these words of mine,
and does not put them into practice, is
like a foolish man who built his house
on sand.
The rain came down, the streams rose, and
the winds blew and beat against that house.
And it fell with a great crash.
When Jesus had finished saying these things, the
crowd were amazed at His teaching, because He
taught as one who had authority, and not
as their teachers of the law.
Our subject, then, the storm-proof house.
If the Beatitudes with which the Sermon on
the Mount began were found to be challenging,
and if the ensuing ethical demands were felt
to be no less demanding, I have no
doubt whatsoever but that all of us will
find these concluding passages, particularly the one before
us today, which is a climax to everything
else, we shall find this to be particularly
exacting.
Jesus speaks frankly and authoritatively.
He does not mince His words.
He addresses the mind, the heart, the conscience,
the will.
And He frankly tells His congregation that to
listen to His words and not to obey
them is to build on sand.
And building on sand means that sooner or
later the house of our lives will crash.
We may feel at the moment that our
strength is great.
We may be tempted to believe there is
wisdom in the way we live.
But sooner or later, unless we put into
practice the words of God through Christ His
Son, which we have heard, ours will be
the situation of this house built on sand.
So Jesus is very much addressing us personally
today.
You see, we have heard His word.
Most of us gathered here today can say
very much like the early group of disciples
who first heard the message, we too have
heard, we too have read.
And His message is known to us.
Most of us could now go and work
our way through the Sermon on the Mount
and tell others what it's all about.
But if we can, if we are able
to do that, we must be very careful
that we now move forward and put these
teachings into practice.
Otherwise, our disaster will be great.
You see, our Lord Jesus is now turning
away from false prophets, who by some nefarious
means are able to divert people who make
their way towards the narrow gate, the straight
gate, in order to move on to the
narrow way that leads to life.
He turns away from the false prophets that
divert people from the way of life and
false pretenders who will say to Him, as
He indicates here at the last day, Lord,
Lord, haven't we prophesied in your name?
And haven't we cast out demons in your
name?
And in your name done very many wonderful
miraculous things.
He turns away from such pretenders to whom
He will have to say at last that
He never knew them.
And He looks us straight in the eye
and He touches us at the very raw
spot of applying to our lives the word
and the words which we acknowledge to have
come from Him and from God through Him.
I find this exceedingly challenging.
You see, Jesus is not referring here to
out-and-out profligates and saying that they
are lost.
The New Testament would say that elsewhere, not
here in this context.
Jesus is not talking about murderers and adulterers
and fornicators and the worst scum of human
society, whoever they may be.
I don't know.
But you know what He's saying?
You may have heard my great sermon and
you may believe that I have uttered in
your presence the word of God and you
may be able to repeat it all.
You've grasped it intellectually.
But I have to say to you that
you're still building on sand and your house
will fall unless the words that you have
heard you will put into practice.
Now, as we all stand under the glare
of this very challenging word this morning, may
the Spirit of God help us.
I do not want to lead anyone on
a guilt trip that is not born of
the Holy Spirit.
But I do nevertheless invite every man and
woman in our morning's congregation honestly and squarely
to face up to this fact.
Now let's proceed then.
And our message is very simple, though very,
very personal.
Note first an apparent similarity between people whom
Jesus later distinguishes into the opposing categories of
wise and foolish builders.
So the first thing we're going to notice
is the apparent similarity between people who are
really not similar but dissimilar.
There is a common denominator between the wise
and the foolish here.
If you've got your New Testament out, you
can see what it is.
In verse 24, Jesus refers to one segment
of the community that first heard these words,
and he says to them, everyone who hears
these words of mine and puts them into
practice, so and so.
Then in verse 26 he says the same
thing.
Everyone who hears these words of mine and
does not put them into practice, there are
the two categories, those who put them into
practice and those who do not.
But you see the common thread.
You see the apparent similarity, the evident similarity.
Both groups have heard.
So this morning we are not discussing the
plight of those who have not heard the
gospel.
We are not thinking this morning of those
who've never known the name of Jesus, never
even heard it.
But we're thinking this morning specifically of those
who have heard, and who having heard have
a grasp of it, but they've gone no
further.
And actually you notice we have a contextual
illustration of the principle to which I'm referring.
Look at the picture.
Do you remember how this sermon on the
mount began?
Well, let Matthew remind you.
In verses 1 and 2, those who first
heard Jesus' words were the 12 disciples.
Let me read verses 1 and 2.
Now when he saw the crowds, he went
up on a mountain side and sat down.
His disciples came to him, and he began
to teach them, saying, and the sermon began.
So you see, there's a little circle around
our Lord.
If we can for a moment imagine our
Lord in this pulpit, there's a little circle
around him.
And the circle around him that he has
called apart from everybody else is the circle
of his 12 disciples.
Jesus had apparently tried to get away from
the crowd that was then pursuing him.
You remember at this point in our Lord's
ministry, he was quite popular.
There came a time when he became very
unpopular, but now at this point he was
popular, and the crowds were following him.
And Matthew tells us that they had come
from as far afield as Galilee, the Decapolis,
Jerusalem, Judea, and the region across the Jordan.
That's Matthew 4.25, the end of chapter
4.
It would seem then, you see, it would
seem that the intention of our Lord in
climbing up the mountain side with his 12
was to get away from the crowd.
Because his message was going to be particularly
relevant to his disciples.
He wanted to teach his disciples.
But now you remember how the sermon closed.
You remember how Matthew's record goes.
Chapter 7, verses 28 and 29, concluding his
record of the sermon, Matthew tells us, when
Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds,
aha, the crowds were amazed at his teaching.
Because he taught as one who had authority
and not as the teachers of the law.
So you see, something has happened in the
course of the preaching of this sermon.
The congregation that began as a little nucleus
of disciples, gradually got bigger and bigger.
And the crowds that Jesus had left at
the bottom of the mountain have gradually come
up, one a few at a time, a
group at a time probably, or all together,
I don't know, but they've arrived.
And there they are, behind these few disciples.
So that now, what you have, now let
me ask you, if you had passed that
way that day, and if you had looked
down and seen Jesus teaching that group, what
would you have said about them?
Would you not have said something like this?
If someone asked you, who are they?
Would you not have been tempted to say,
oh they are the followers of Jesus of
Nazareth?
Seems like it, doesn't it?
It seems that they're all one.
They're all listening to him.
And the sermon goes on, it's quite a
long sermon.
And as the sermon goes on, apparently no
one no one leaves.
So there they are, you see, they're all
with their eyes fixed upon him and their
ears open, and they all hear.
And we who can only judge superficially at
best would be tempted to say they're all
one.
They're all his disciples.
They're all wise builders.
And of course, it would be the same
if someone were to ask an onlooker as
we go out of church this morning, oh
who are these people?
I guess it could be said, oh well,
these are Christians.
These are the people who've been worshipping God.
These are the followers of Jesus of Nazareth.
These are the people who've been hearing his
word.
You know, it's not necessarily true.
This first congregation was divided.
Some were building on rock.
Others were building on sand.
And it could very well be the case
that right here in this lovely old edifice
this morning, there is the same division.
Some of us building on sand whilst others
are building on rock.
An apparent similarity.
Not next to the unfolding tragedy foreseen of
course and foretold only by the discerning Son
of God.
The similarity to which we've noted is only
apparent and utterly superficial.
All were privileged to hear, but not all
are building in the same way.
Now, I want you to look particularly now
at the analogy used by Jesus.
It's a very forceful one when we come
to think of it.
It's an analogy.
It's a metaphor.
It's a parable that would be meaningful in
almost every part of the world.
There's no difficulty anywhere in understanding what Jesus
is saying here.
He speaks pictorially and he speaks parabolically as
he proceeds to compare and contrast these two
groups as builders of a house.
Now, look at verses 24 and 26 again
and you see this coming out.
Everyone who hears these words of mine and
puts them into practice is like a wise
man who built his house.
That's the metaphor.
That's the picture.
And again in verse 26 of the other
type.
Everyone who hears these words of mine and
does not put them into practice is like
a foolish man who built his house.
The disciples close to Jesus and the crowd
around the disciples were that day all of
them involved in the business of building the
house of their lives.
The business of building the house of their
lives.
Just as all of us in this building
this morning are involved in the same affair.
Life is a serious and an ongoing business.
There are no pauses.
You may sit down and I may sit
down but life goes on by day and
by night from day to day and week
to week and month to month and year
to year.
You and I are engaged in a very
serious business.
We're building the house of our life.
Jesus refers to these two groups then who
are superficially similar as being actually and fundamentally
different.
Some are wise, some are foolish.
Some are building on rock, some are still
building on sand.
They're utterly different.
And though there may be differences in the
superstructure that they build, in the material they
put in, etc.
etc.
Jesus points to something which is more fundamental
even than that.
He says that the main, the most fundamental
distinction is this.
Some of these builders have never really got
onto a rock which they may have as
a firm foundation for their lives.
They're building on something that is superficial, on
the sand.
They haven't dug down.
They're building on things as they find them
and they've never really dug through in order
to come to the rock underneath.
Now against this background our Lord tells us
of the impending tragedy that he foresees and
herefore tells.
The house that is built on sand is
destined to crash and to crumble.
It's not, it's not, not a nice story.
It's not a pleasant thing to tell.
No preacher can take, can find great joy
in announcing to people that they're destined to
crash, to ruin.
But if it is true it has to
be told.
Jesus, the Son of God, and here of
course we're back with a question of his
authority.
Who was he?
What authority did he have to say this
kind of thing?
Was he a false prophet or a true?
Was he misleading or was he really the
mouthpiece of God?
Jesus foresees a time of testing in which
the realities of the two situations will be
clearly revealed.
He says there's a storm coming that will
test both houses.
Those of you who are Christian this morning,
those of you who are believers in our
Lord Jesus and are building on the rock,
let's be clear about this.
We're all going to be tested.
We're all going to pass through storms, every
one of us present today.
Sooner or later the clouds will gather around
our lives and there will be storms.
And the storm is going to show up
whether or not we are built upon the
rock.
Now whether Jesus is referring to the storms
of this present life, of which there are
many, and we all have to share in
them, or whether he's referring to the ultimate
storm of the final judgment, I don't know.
He may be referring to both.
But the fact of the matter is this.
Sooner or later, whether you and I are
building on the rock as our foundation or
building on the sand, it's going to be
made evident.
And if we're still building on sand that
final day of testing, it'll be too late
to gather the pieces together.
Oh let me not miss this.
Both buildings are to be tested.
Let me read again verse 25 about the
one.
The rain came down, the streams rose, the
winds blew and beat against that house.
It did not fall because it had its
foundation on the rock at one.
But look at verse 27.
Exactly the same words.
The rain came down, the streams rose, and
the winds blew and beat against that house.
And it fell with a great crash.
In his commentary on the synoptic gospels, the
late Dr. A.
B.
Bruce, you don't need anyone to tell you
where he's from, he very picturesquely describes this
storm.
Some people do have insights, don't they?
What all of us have read we might
never have seen, but he sees the three
dimensions of it, and he expresses it.
He concentrates first of all on the rain
coming down on the roof.
Some of you have been having trouble with
roofs of late, I know that.
It's a bad sign when rain's coming through
the roof.
But there's a storm coming ahead of us
when it'll be difficult to keep the rain
out of the roof of the house that
is not built upon the rock.
The rain comes down upon the roof, but
notice the rivers are in spate, and the
tides and the current are high, and the
water of the rivers are seeping into the
houses and into the foundations, and they're digging
at the foundations of the houses.
So as well as the rain coming down
on the roof, there is the water seeping
at the foundation to see if it'll stand.
And then says Dr. A.
B.
Bruce, the wind is howling like a mad
gale upon the walls.
There's a storm for you.
There's no getting away from this.
It's coming from above, and it's coming from
beneath, and it's coming all around.
You're in the hands of God the judge,
and so am I.
And the house built on sand will not
stand that test.
I find this very challenging.
I've said that once or twice before.
You see, simply to know the Sermon on
the Mount, simply to have an intellectual grasp
of the teaching of the Gospels, simply to
be able to repeat the main doctrines of
Scripture, simply to know them and even to
be able to correct others because we know
them.
See, all that makes sand, nothing more than
sand, until the teaching is put into practice.
And the moment you begin to put into
practice the Word that you've received, that moment
the sand becomes rock.
Not until then.
This is what James meant, of course, when
he said that faith without works is dead.
When faith directed toward Christ rests in him
for salvation, that same faith sets the wheels
of life going in obedience to his teaching.
That's saving faith.
We are not saved by good works, but
we are saved for good works.
And the Savior who saves us without good
works, working his salvation in us, makes us
work well.
You see, the more we know of the
truth of the Gospel, the more tragic our
situation, according to Jesus.
So an apparent similarity and identity is proved
to be unreal and false, and the solemn
tragedy overtakes the largest section of that community
before Jesus as he uttered the Sermon on
the Mount.
Now that leaves us with one other matter,
the one urgent and paramount necessity to avoid
such a disaster.
At the last judgment, when the last great
storm breaks loose, if not before, the reality
or unreality of our profession will be exposed.
A whole passage before us is based on
that assumption, even though so many of our
intellectuals today are so adamant that this is
just nonsensical, and you cannot believe this kind
of thing.
It just doesn't make sense.
Jesus says so.
And those of us who accept the divinity
of the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and see what marks and evidences there are
of the fact that he was and is
indeed the eternal Son of God, we must
take these words seriously.
What then can we do to avoid the
kind of tragedy that he foretells?
One thing, and one alone, will suffice.
Oh, I'm repeating myself, but I hope no
one will say that it is in vain.
Hearing God's truth as revealed in his Son
must be transposed into obedience to God's truth
as revealed in his Son.
We must begin to believe in such a
way that we begin to obey.
Now, what does that mean?
Is there a way of spelling it out
so that we make no mistake here?
How do we build such a firm foundation
as will not crumble?
Oh, brothers and sisters, the Bible is a
wonderful book, and here it tells you and
tells me exactly what we need to do.
There's no need to ask questions to which
there are no answers.
First of all, we must learn to dig
deep in order to lay a firm foundation
on the rock.
Now, we began this sermon by stressing the
apparent similarity and unity of all those who
heard our Lord's words originally.
What actually happened to divide and distinguish those
building on sand from those building on rock?
What was it?
What actually happened?
Now, if you turn to Luke's Gospel, Luke
tells us that Jesus preached this sermon probably
more than...
I mean, I shouldn't have put it like
that.
Luke doesn't specifically say this, but I think
Luke's implication is that Jesus preached this sermon,
or parts of it, more than once, and
he did not always use exactly the same
words.
And so, when he's referring to what it
is necessary for us to do to find
the true foundation, Luke says something that Matthew
doesn't, and he gives us a clue.
Let me read to you from Luke 7,
verses 47 and 48.
I will show you what he is like
who comes to me and hears my word
and puts them into practice.
What's he like?
Well, Luke says, quoting Jesus, he is like
a man building a house who dug down
deep and laid the foundation on rock.
When a flood came, the torrent struck that
house but could not shake it because it
was well built.
Now there you have it.
Dig down deep.
I wonder whether Jesus is quoting Jeremiah here.
Jeremiah had a lot to say about dwelling
deep in God.
What have we got here?
What does this imply?
Though ostensibly building on the same site or
location, generally speaking, and possibly using much of
the same materials, some of the builders, not
others, some of the builders had dug deep
down and laid the foundation on rock.
Now that is but another way of saying
that some builders were not content simply to
hear our Lord's great teaching.
They did something about it.
They began to dig.
They listened to it, and they considered it,
and as they did, they recognized the divinity,
the deity of the preacher and his authority.
And recognizing his authority, they began to feel
that they must not only believe but do
what he bade them.
And this is Jesus' way of saying how
they came to build upon the rock.
They dug down deep.
In other words, my friends, they came to
commit themselves to the Christ, to preach the
sermon, not just to believe his words but
to obey him in his words.
Because the obedience is a personal one to
the preacher, to the Lord, and to the
God whom he represents.
And that is what happens here, you see.
To lay the foundation on a rock is
to hear the word of God coming through
his Son and to give my commitment, to
make my covenant with him who thus speaks,
to trust and obey.
Scripture is very fond, you may remember, of
reminding us of the fact that the one
who was to come into the world, the
Messiah, would be called also the rock.
I can't pursue that thread this morning.
Some of you can do so, but let
me remind you, or let me give you
a good place to start from if you
want to.
You can work back from the New Testament.
Start from 1 Corinthians 10 verse 4, where
the Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians that the
rock in the wilderness that followed the children
of Israel was Christ.
That strikes, doesn't it?
That's strange.
Well, you find it out.
The rock was Christ.
And so Paul is able to tell the
Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 3.11, no one
can lay any foundation other than the one
already laid, the rock.
And that is Jesus Christ.
Yes, Jesus is the rock in a weary
land.
Jesus is the only firm foundation to build
the superstructure of our life upon.
But now we've got to go further.
Not only must we dig deep, but we
must build well.
You say, what do you mean by that?
Let me explain.
At least two things.
We must build our house from a basic
and underlying union with Christ, the foundation.
You see, we do not just build on
Christ.
How can I illustrate that?
Let's say that this marvelous slab of wood,
making the pulpit base this morning, right here.
Let's say that this is rock.
Let's say that this represents my house.
Now, it isn't adequate just to put my
house on the rock like that.
The gale may be strong enough to blow
it off.
You see the point?
I must not only build on Christ, I
must build into Christ.
The superstructure of my house must be integrated
with the foundation.
There must be a living link that binds
my soul to the Christ of God, so
that the superstructure that I build with my
life is one with Him.
Now, you remember, last time we were considering,
though we didn't dwell upon it, and we've
made reference to it today in our readings,
there will be folk who will come to
our Lord at the last day and will
say to Him, Lord, Lord, didn't we prophesy
in your name?
And didn't we cast our demons in your
name, and in your name done many miraculous
things?
And I will have to tell them that
day, He says, away from me, you workers
of iniquity.
I never knew you.
That verb to know is used in many
ways in the Bible, and it is used
for one thing of the most intimate relationship
between two people.
Of course, Jesus knew them all.
He was their creator.
He made all things, and without Him, nothing
was made that was made.
He knows all about us in that sort
of a way.
But spiritually, though they've prophesied in my name
and cast out demons in my name and
brought miracles in my name, I have to
say to them spiritually, you're strangers to me.
There's no fellowship.
There's no real link of spirit.
There's no binding.
You and I are not one.
Brothers and sisters, we must dig deep until
we know that we have touched reality.
That our faith has fused us to Christ,
and like the branches of the vine, we
are one with Him, and we drink of
His Spirit, and we feed upon His breasts.
I'm changing the metaphors, but the truth is
the same.
You see, the house must be built on
the foundation so that the foundation and the
house belong the one to the other.
Indeed, and this is the other thing, the
superstructure built upon the foundation must be of
the same character as the foundation itself.
Having a foundation like this, you and I
must have a superstructure of life that is
consistent with the foundation, if the house is
to stand.
And of course, that's what the Sermon on
the Mount is all about.
That's what it's all about.
Building out of union with Christ, we must
by His grace begin by forming a character
that is consistent with the Beatitudes.
Having the elements of sorrow for sin, meekness,
hungering and thirsting after righteousness, being merciful, purity
of heart, being peacemakers, reckoning that suffering for
Christ's sake is blessed.
These qualities must more and more mark our
lives.
You see, the character of the superstructure on
the foundation must match the foundation in quality,
if the house and the foundation are to
stand as one in the day of the
storm.
Not only must we have a character that
matches the Beatitudes, but we must have a
conduct that matches the character, and that's what
the rest of the ethical teaching of the
Sermon on the Mount is about.
It tells us the ethical norms required of
us that we must operate upon.
It tells us we must be salt and
light in a depraved and dark world.
We must not only refrain from murder, but
also from such words and attitudes as can
lead to murder.
We must not look lustfully at anyone, let
alone commit adultery.
We must diligently respect the commitment which is
marriage.
Our very words must be our bond.
Yet your yea be yea and your nay
nay.
There should be no need for anything more
than that, says Jesus.
Your word should be your bond.
And on a person-to-person level we
must not resist evil, but love our enemies.
And in all our acts of righteousness, as
Jesus calls them, giving to the needy, praying
to the Father, and fasting.
These are the three things he mentions.
We must have our eyes squarely fixed first
of all on pleasing God, not advertising what
we're doing as the hypocrites did, not calling
attention to the fact that we are men
and women of prayer, that we give our
tithes or we give towards the poor.
Not at all.
Let not your left hand know what your
right hand is doing, says Jesus.
Do it unto the Lord.
That's how Jesus did.
And this we must do out of faith
in God as our Father.
We must lay up treasures in heaven, not
upon earth, and doing it all out of
confidence that God is our Father and will
remain our Father.
Even the birds are telling us that, but
over and above what the birds say, Jesus
says it.
You may come and you may pray to
him, our Father who art in heaven, and
you may ask him to give you your
daily bread as well as daily forgiveness.
And his is the power and the kingdom
and the glory forever and ever, and he's
your heavenly Father.
Now that's what it is to build on
the rock.
That house will never fall, never fall, never
fall.
There is no storm that even God himself
can unleash which will bring that house down,
because Christ, who is God, is its foundation.
And the Spirit of God, the Father and
of his Son, is in the superstructure, and
it is according to his Word, and therefore
it must stand.
God could not demolish that house without contradicting
himself.
How firm a foundation, ye saints of the
Lord, is found for your faith in his
excellent Word.
And brothers and sisters, are we on the
rock or on the sand?
I am therefore not asking you as we
conclude whether you are familiar with the Sermon
on the Mount, but what I am asking
for the last time this morning, are you
quite sure that you are not simply depending
upon your familiarity with the truth, and that
you have dug deep and you've touched the
reality who is Christ, crucified, risen, reigning, the
giver of the Holy Spirit, and the Father
in Christ.
If you have not, I ask you where
you sit this morning, by the grace of
God, to make this your moment of covenant,
your moment of commitment, your day when you
say, by the grace of God, I will
dig deep, I will dig down until I
get to that firm foundation and nothing will
satisfy me, all that I might know him,
nothing will satisfy me less than the knowledge
of God in Christ his Son.
Let us pray.
Lord God, most high and glorious, O how
we thank you for your grace.
We stand this morning in the glare of
this word of yours, and it may well
be that all of us have a trembling
heart.
Some of us have.
Draw us, our Father, closer to yourself.
Draw us into that union with you in
Christ, that it may be said of us,
as Paul told the Colossian believers, that our
life is hid with Christ in God.
O Lord, impart to us of the strength
and solidity of your own character, that we
may live in hope and rejoice in the
hope of the glory of God, rather than
dread the ruin of our house.
O grace of God, pursue us then as
we go our homeward way, and so deal
with us and so bless us, that we
may be wise builders, building the house of
our life upon the foundation of rock.
Christ Jesus, your Son, our Lord, we ask
it in his holy name.
Amen.