On Christ The Solid Rock

What is the coolest achievement you’ve ever had? Now how would you feel if it was taken away/destroyed?

My senior year of highschool with DDL...

How awful would it be for us to spend our whole lives building up something that would just crumble in the end? That is the topic that we are going to look at today. But it’s not simply the building of housing, or cool projects, it’s the building up of the soul.

As you all know, we are close to finishing up our series in Matthew 6-7, and as we have see in the last few weeks, Jesus is teaching with a series of twos. We’ve seen two gates, two vines, two testimonies, and today we will see the tale of two houses. It is through this parable that Jesus is going to teach us that if we build our houses upon our own self-righteousness, we will be swept away in God’s judgement because we all have sinned. It is through this shocking truth, that Jesus points to Himself as the reliable foundation for us to build our hopes upon because He is the One who kept the law for us.

Now, we’re going to learn that as we look at this text in five different points which are: (1) The Duty of Man, (2) The Disposition of Man, (3) The Destruction of Man, (4) The Safe Dwelling of Man, and (5) The Delight of Man.

With that said, lets go ahead and read Matthew 7:21-27

Matthew 7:21–27 NKJV

21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’ 24 “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: 25 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. 26 “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: 27 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

The Duty of Man to Hear and Obey

As we look at this text, Jesus says, in verse 24, that if we hear and obey His commands, we will live even in the midst of judgments; but if we refuse to hear and obey, we will come crashing down like a house in a bad storm. As we consider that, we come to understand that Jesus is announcing that we have a responsibility, a duty, to obey the Word of God. But not just us, all of man kind from the forest of the Amazon to the cities of New York, we all must obey Him or we all will fall to His judgment.

See, the Sermon on the Mount is not a sermon on grace, but a sermon on Law. Jesus is taking the hard things that Moses preached from Sinai and is intensifying them to show how holy God is and just how sinful we are. Are you always aware of your need of God? Are you always mourning your sin? Are you always meek, merciful and pure in heart? No, but why? Well, because we are sinners but if that’s the case, why don’t we all run to Jesus?

This leads us into our second point, which is:

The Disposition of Man to Trust in Himself

Notice how Jesus uses the word, “Therefore” in verse 24. Remember how last week we saw how Jesus will not be merciful to those who rely in their own self-righteousness? Well, He is connecting that truth to this parable. And when we combine them together, we learn that if we are going to trust in our own works, we better make sure that we are perfect in our obedience or we will face the wrath of God in judgment and we will not be able to stand against it because of our sin. We want to trust in our own ideas, our own efforts, our own good works, but if we are going to do that we better remember the shocking statement that Jesus made in Matthew 5:20

Matthew 5:20 ESV

20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Where are you looking today? What are you building your hopes on? Who’s voice are you following? And what happens to those who don’t listen to him?

The Destruction of Man in His Self-Trust

Well, according to Jesus, if we build our lives upon sand, it will not face trials and ultimately judgment. Notice the language that He uses here as He uses words like, “rain fell, floods came, winds blew, and beat against the house...” This isn’t just a nice little shower, this is a massive storm and when it came, the quality of the house was tested and it couldn’t stand the test.

I believe that Jesus is teaching us a few things here. First, the foundation of our self-reliance can’t stand against the trials of this life. We need something better than ourselves. And second, I believe He is not only talking about hardships in this life, but He may also be referring to the wrath of God when we stand before Him. And how the quality of our works, if not build on the right foundation, will fall.

So, what is our hope? Where do you place your hope? What do you build the foundation of your life upon?

The Safe Dwelling

Well, Jesus tells us that there is a hope in the storm. Not everything fails. The hope is for those who build their lives upon the rock as it’s foundation. Notice the difference between the two? One foundation is sand and the other is rock. Now what does sand do? It shifts, it’s unstable. But a rock is reliable, it’s not moving.

Jesus is calling you to place your foundation upon Him. You can’t trust yourself, you can’t hold up in the storms of life, and you won’t stand up to the judgment of God. But just look at Jesus. He is God, He is unchanging, He won’t fail, He won’t forsake you, He won’t crumble under the pressures of life’s trials. Build on Him, listen to Him, trust in Him!

It is in Him that when the storms of life are raging, we can rest as we trust in the truth’s of His goodness and faithfulness. It is in Him that the wrath of God is satisfied. In Jesus we have everything and can withstand anything, not in ourselves, but in Him.

Now, I want to make one more point which is important which is

The Delight of Man to Hear and Obey

Now that we are in Christ, His word is our delight. We follow His word, trust His word, and strive to obey His word. Let me read you a few verses about the heart of Christians about His word:

Jeremiah 15:16 ESV

16 Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name, O Lord, God of hosts.

Psalm 119:111 ESV

111 Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart.

Psalm 119:92 ESV

92 If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.

So, what we learn from this passage is that we are to be a people who’s faith is in Christ and through Him, we have the power to love and obey the Word of God.

In Conclusion, I want to consider three points:

Where are you building?

Who are we following?

How are we holding up?