A Strong Home (MS: Matthew 7:24-27; SS: Proverbs 3:33; 1 Corinthians 15:58)

Capture: Grab their attention with an illustration.

• Illustration/Story: Have you ever been to the beach and built sandcastles? It’s such a

fun experience, but if you’re not careful, the waves will destroy all your hard work!

Explain it and tell how bad I did sand castles. 

How frustrating is it to build a massive sandcastle only for it to be washed away?!

• A lot of times, we build our lives on a lot of things that aren’t solid! Like we

mentioned 2 weeks ago, what things do you rely on to establish your life? If it’s a relationship, entertainment, food, or anything besides Jesus, it’s going to crash!

Context

The Book Matthew

Matthew is the first gospel, one of the disciples of Jesus, a tax collector, and wrote this book as an apology to the Jews, and the book we have been doing a series on with pastor James for the past 15 years. 

Matthew concern was giving convincing proof that Jesus was the messianic King whom the Jews were anticipating and whom the world needs. 

Matthew presented Jesus’s kingdom discourses, teaching, and miracles as proof of his messianic claim. Jesus the Messiah. 

Context to our scripture

Verse 12 of chapter 7 concludes the Sermon on the Mount. 

Now Jesus gives us 4 warnings that Matthew talks about in verses 13-27

1. A caution to the lost about where they are headed (V. 13-14)

2. Caution to His followers about “pretenders” This is meaning fruit that refer the action of false prophets, and their actions will betray them. (v.15-20)

3. Directed at those who claim to be a part of Jesus' community but who are not (v.21-23)

4. Actions upon the words of Jesus (v.24-27)

We are talking about the last one in today's message. This warning is that there are wolves among the sheep and that tares are among the wheat. So do the houses of the wise and the foolish stand side by side until the Son of Man comes to judge and takes His throne. This is mainly about behavior. 

So, the house represents a person who has heard Jesus' words, and the rock represents the teachings of Jesus that, as one does them, result in withstanding the storm, whether it be judgement or life trials. 

So you hear the word, the difference is whether you put them into practice in your life?

This shows division by who really belongs to the Jesus circle. When you are a follower of Jesus, does that mean you are all in or you are out? 

It is not just this last warning that we are focusing on today; all four warnings are for us to consider whether this is based on a genuine relationship with our Lord and Savior Jesus and also issues in our lives as true disciples of Jesus. 

So the question is, are you truly obeying the Word of God or are you not? 

1. Build Your Lives on the Firm Foundation of Jesus! 

• Tension Question: What are you building your life on? Is it something solid like rock,

or destroyable like sand? Tonight, Scripture wants to show us exactly how to build our

lives on the firm foundation of Jesus.

Scripture: Proverbs 3:33 — 

33  The Lord’s curse is on the house of the wicked, 

but he blesses the dwelling of the righteous. 

Solomon, here, the wisest man in the Bible, says that the Lord curses, mocks, and dishonors the wicked and the fool. But the righteous, humble, and wise receive God’s blessings, grace, and honor. 

When you continue reading, God detests the devious, but He is a friend to the upright. 

When you look at social media, you see people doing wicked things, and it is viewed as if they are prospering, but for the one who is obedient to His Word, we are not. 

This can also lead us to envy them.

But this is why, as followers of Jesus, we must look at things through a Kingdom view. We do not have a complete picture; we do not see right now what the Lord is protecting us from. 

If I had obeyed this when I was your age, I would have been protected from a lot of things that I had to work out. This is why it is key for you to obey His Word and have faith in Him to lead you, not the world’s standard. 

God blesses the house of the upright. How can we know if we are living in the house of the wicked or the house of the upright? By our foundation!

2. A Strong Home is Built on Obedience

• Scripture: Matthew 7:24-27 — There is a visible difference between a firm foundation

and a weak one.

• We all build our own lives (or “homes”) on a foundation. When we live in obedience

to Jesus, it’s like building on solid rock. When we choose to live our own way in

disobedience to Jesus, our foundation will give way, and our lives will surely crash!

Remember, Jesus concluded the sermon on the mount with a story about two men that had 3 things in common

Each built a house, both heard the words of Jesus, both encountered a violent storm. 

Those were the similarites, but now we are about to see the contrasts. One man was wise, another was a fool. 

Wisdom is the ability and willingness to apply spiritual truth to life’s circumstances. 

Foolishness is the inability and unwillingness to apply spiritual truth to life’s realities. 

So the wise man heard Jesus’s words and acted on them, which means he built on a foundation of rock. This is harder and more time consuming. 

So the fool heard Jesus’s words and did not acted on them, which mean he built on sand. This is easier, cheaper, and also faster to do. But the question is how long is this going to stand? It will not stand at all in a storm at all, jus like building a sandcastle on a beach.

You can’t build a sky-scraper on a sandy foundation. One of my favorite, is we just had BBQ and we just had brisket! I love me some brisket! But if you want some real good brisket, it must stay in the smoker for hours and hours, almost 16+ hours. But if you do not want to wait and want it easy, you can do it take way but it won’t be as good! 

We live in a world that they want the easy way out of things. They want the fast money, they want to get married fast, the fast life, but the thing about that, IT WILL NOT LAST! 

If you want stability in your life, your family, our community, our church, and espically our youth group with our series we doing, you need the strong foundation of God’s Word which includes BOTH knowledge of the Bible and APPLYING IT! 

And trust me, the storm will revealed which person is wise and which person is foolish. The trails of life will expose where your foundation is made out of! 

• One thing we can all count on and expect in our lives is that the rain is coming! Life is

hard! There will always be things or circumstances in different seasons that will come

against you trying to tear your house down.

• Are you spiritually protected on the foundation of Jesus by living a lifestyle of

obedience? Or are you risking the security of your house by disobeying Jesus?

Bottom Line: A strong home is built on obedience.

3. Obey What God Ask You to Do!

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 15:58 — 

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

The only place we can truly stand firm is on Jesus Christ.

Paul concludes at the end of this chapter on the resurrection, that we must be steadfast and immovable and be excelling in the Lord’s work because your labor in the Lord is not in vain. 

The salvation of Christ that was accomplished through the cross and the resurrection is the gracious gift of God to all sinners! 

Remember, we can’t earn this, but after we accept and received this, we are not suppose to just sit back, we are to be the light of our victory over sin and death and place our faith in Jesus!

Make God’s Will, His Kingdom your agenda. Your work, your obedience, your labor is not in vain. It is not wasted. God sees your work for Him and he will reward you! 

We live in a culture where we try to find our purpose, but the key thing is this, we want to seek, but God is telling us to obey! 

So my question to you is what is the first thing God told you to do and are you doing it well? If that is reading your Bible, applying what you read, whatever it is, are you doing what God told you before? That is a key thing on why sometimes people feel stuck. 

We must be patient and obey! 

• We actively stand firm on Jesus when we give ourselves fully to the work of the Lord

and the building of His Kingdom on the earth.

• When we intentionally seek a relationship with God, He always gives us something to

do for His Kingdom.

Bring it to the cross (Go to commentary Tony Evans) 

One time I was living at my mom’s house, there was a crack on the wall. My mom wanted me to check it out because she had work to go to and I was home during the time. She wanted me to “try to fix it.” Or find the problem so we can get a professional. So I looked at Youtube and I though it was coming from somewhere else, but the crack was not coming from the wall, the problem was a shifiting foundation. So we had to called a professional to go to our foundation and fix it. 

How does this situation tie in with our message, many of us have “cracks” in our lives, this can be emotional, relational, financial, etc. But we address the symptoms and not the source of the problem. Kind of like we attack the branch, but not the root. I could of paint it, clear it up and it looks like a new wall, but that would not fix the foundation, our foundation was becoming weak. So my question to you is where is your foundation? 

Our foundation is on the cross! The work that Jesus lived the life we could not live, died the death we should of died, and rose on the third day for us! And because of that, we are created to do good works! That mean when we read His Word, and not that, WE APPLY IT, not only we will do good works in our life, but our families will be blessed, your friends around you will be blessed, but you know who else, the people that will be coming to this church and this youth group! When we actually obey His Word and apply it, the Holy Spirit will work through you and it will help bring blessings to everyone around you! So it is awesome that you read you Bible, it is awesome you have knowledge, BUT none of that matters, if you do not apply and build off the foundation of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! 

• As we obey and do what He asks, we stand on a firm foundation.

• This week, ask God daily: “What do you want me to do today?” As He reveals

someone to talk to or something to do in service to Him, choose to obey!

• Application: Obey what God asks you to do.

Call: How do we respond to the message?

• Altar moment: If you feel like your life is falling apart, built on a weak foundation,

tonight is your opportunity to allow God to place you on the solid rock that is Jesus.

He is the firm foundation that cannot fail you when you live in obedience to Him!