How to Build a Life | Matthew 7-24-29
Sermon Transcript
Good morning. Thank you choir, and Thank you Becky for filling in for Terry. Terry's at a family wedding and different time zone, so that's where she is. We'll be praying for her to get back safely. Thank you, Earl, I bet you all didn't know that the organ could do that kind of stuff. Did you? We appreciate you and your skill wonderful. When John David, my five year old, was younger, like three, he was learning how to build with his big Lego blocks, and like most children, he would start building, and he would put one Lego block on the table, put another one on top, another one on top, and you know, like a single file line. And you know, what happens the higher you build? Well, it starts to fall. And he would get real upset, because he wanted to build this tall tower, and it kept falling. So after watching him get frustrated a couple times, I gave him some dad wisdom and showed him that if you widen your base, you can build a tower even taller. And that made all the difference in the world. And he was happier, and you could build it even and then you build this way, and you can kind of get even thinner up the top, and just just basic architecture, right? Basic building. And I said, just widen your base, and your tower will get taller, and that foundation will hold that's we're talking about today, talking about widening our base in life, building a strong hire, to have our life being fulfilled. But what does it mean as a Christian to be successful? What does it mean as a Christian to have a fulfilled life? Is it a great career? Is it a happy family? Is it a large bank account? Our world often defines success by these external factors, but as followers of Christ, our foundation is different. The base that we build is wide and looks different. Today we are in Matthew chapter seven, starting in verse 24 to 29 today, we complete our summer series on the Sermon on the Mount, and we'll be pivoting to talking about the works of Jesus, some of the miracles that He did, as we learning more about that in the days ahead. But today we're in Matthew chapter seven, starting in verse 24 a very familiar passage for some of you, but for others, it might be the first time you've heard it. So let's dig into it. Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock, and the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand, and the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house and fell. And great was the fall of it. And when Jesus finished these things, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes, Father in heaven, we thank you for bringing us all here today, as our summer time winds down, as people's vacations have been taken, as they're starting to get back into their house, Lord, As we only have a couple more weeks of summer before children go back into school, we start getting looking ahead, Lord, into the busy fall, late summer, season of our lives, whether we have kids or not, it's just a busy time. So we thank you that we are all here today, that you've brought us here today. We pray that this rest of this service is one that continues to bless our lives, continues to speak to us, and continues to reach us where we need to be reached, Father, as we look at this passage today, I pray that I will be faithful in delivering your word as you intended it to be delivered. I. The true meaning of it will be unearthed. Father, I pray that you fill me with your Spirit and the power of preaching that we have a supernatural experience today hearing from you that those who hear it will be changed. We ask these things in Jesus, name Amen, three things, three things about building a life, about widening a foundation. Number one, a stable life is built on God's word. A stable life is built on God's Word. Jesus says as he's finishing His Sermon on the Mount, referring to all the things that he had said. He says, Everyone who hears these words and does them is like the wise man who built his house on the rock. Now, the previous two passages mentioned false teachers, which we talked about last week, the next passage, which we skipped just because of sake of time, talked about false believers. False teachers have false believers. False believers go to false teachers. That kind of go together. And so there are those he said, who claim to be, to be preachers of God, who are, who are not preaching to those who claim to be Christians, but who are not but he's saying that true believers hear the words of Christ, they receive it, and they build their metaphorical house the light their life on the rock of the gospel, which is the word of God, And when the storms of life come, their life does not fall apart. Now, the word for rock here does not just mean a stone. Does not just mean a boulder. It refers literally to a to a large expanse of bedrock. It is literally a foundation. It is a base. And so after hearing the Word of God, the believer, who's wise, proceeds then to build his foundation, his house and the foundation of the gospel. He's just saying this, that if you believe me, you build your house differently. If you receive my words, your life will be different, and your life will be stronger, and your life will be built to resist the things that happen to you in your life. Amen, that's what he says. The blueprint for the house is God's word, and that blueprint brings stability, he says in verse 25 and the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock in life, there will be storms. Amen, there will be storms. The longer you live, the more you know that truth to be evident, the more you've been through now in a physical storm, the house that has that sure foundation will still be standing during a storm. And he's saying that the person who builds their house their life on Jesus will be able to stand that the Christ follower is secure in the storms, because his house is built on the rock of Jesus. What kind of storms you think Jesus is talking about? Well, there's all types of storms we can weather in life that come at us. Some like hurricanes are we can see coming. Amen. We can see it coming. We can track it. Some, like tornadoes, come out of nowhere, and you're you're blindsided by them. Several different type of storms. We have financial storms, a sudden loss of a job. Something that you never saw coming is a storm mounting debts. You know thing any of us were were prepared for the inflation that occurred a few years ago. We kind of thought it would come based on some things, and it did an economic downturn, an unexpected expense. When your dog eats a sock and it gets stuck in her stomach, that's an unexpected expense that you never saw coming. These can create stress because of the financial turmoil, financial storm. Secondly, what about relationship storms? Has anyone in here ever had any conflict with. A family member. No Nobody has but you know it might happen. You might have a conflict with a family member, maybe a distant cousin or uncle or something I don't know, aunt, friends, even even your partners, even your spouses. You can have conflict in marriage. Did you know that these can be storms. It leads to emotional distress. It can lead to isolation. With that relationship? What about a health storm, a medical diagnosis or a chronic illness that you can't just get over. What about what about an accident? You know, my father, when he was 18 years old, had a sports car, and he was sitting at a red light, and this car came behind him full speed, and never put the brakes on, and hurt his back real bad. And so he's had back issues his whole life because of that. What he did? Nothing wrong. He was just sitting there, said, back issues the remainder of his life. Just never, can never goes away. That's a health storm, an accident, any type of injury. Health storms, what about, what about psychological storms? We hear a lot about anxiety today and depression and in trauma, and in all these mental health issues that that can just be debilitating, where people can't even leave their house, they came in function. Sometimes we get psychological storms. It's all in our head that only only that person can see and no one else can see him but that person. What about a career storm? You have a job loss. You know, some places of work, there's workplace conflict from time to time. You have that maybe you feel stuck in your career that you can't advance, or maybe you feel like you can't balance your work and your life, you don't know where to balance that out. And then what about just real storms, like natural disasters, earthquakes, we don't typically have that, although we would probably do one is what they tell us. We've all experienced hurricanes, some floods, things like this? Fires in your house. I had a fire there was we weren't prepared for that. Years ago, smoke alarm went off. We got out of the house, natural disasters, things like that. And then do we talk about the spiritual storms of life? Do you have doubts? Sometimes? Do things happen to where you have a crisis of your faith? Just sometimes you just feel like you're not close to the Lord like you used to be. For whatever reason, you can't figure it out you've turned from sin. But maybe there's just the joy in your life, isn't there a spiritual storm. Whatever it could be, these storms, they test your faith, they test our resilience, they test our perseverance. They're going to come. You probably have one of these seven types of storms right now, or you see them coming above the horizon. I was driving down the road the other day. I was going up 52 and I looked off to the north, and there was these storm clouds coming. And I said, Lord, let me get home before it starts to rain. I prayed that, because it was coming. And right when I pulled in the driveway, raindrops started falling on my windshield. It's like, Thank You, Lord, and I beat the rain, but you can see it coming. Stable life is built on God's foundation. Stable life is built on the foundation of God. Secondly, a fragile life is built on the world's ideas. A fragile life is built on the world's ideas. If you want a fragile life, just watch what's on television. Mimic those on TV. Watch something that that makes no sense, like we've seen before. Look at verse 26 everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. He's saying this that there are people who've heard the gospel preached many times for years, but they're not obeying God's word. They're not putting it into practice. Jesus says, the people who hear the gospel, but they don't really receive it. They don't obey it. That they're not building their house on the firm found. Nation, but actually building it on sand, as we know that sand is not stable. It's loose. It shifts over time. And he's saying that these people, they they hear the truth of the gospel, but instead of building their house on the rock of Jesus, what they do is they build their house on the rock of what they think is going to work, which is their own ideas, that they've adopted their own life. We have to be careful that we don't do that, that we have to be careful that our foundation is not our own creation, which is like building a house on sand. This person doesn't think his house will fall, but eventually it does, because it's built on himself, not on Jesus Christ, verse 27 The rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell. And great was the fall of it when the storms come unto the life of the person who thinks they're a Christian when they're not living the life, there's no Jesus to fall back on. There's no firm foundation. The storm ultimately ravages him because he trusted only in himself for salvation, not the gospel of Christ. Many times a person who's built their house on the sand, on the sand is the same one who when suffering, when a storm comes, it doesn't drive them to Jesus. Doesn't drive them to church. It drives them away. They they fall back. The tough times come, they lose that faith. When troubles arise, they implode because they weren't really seeking Jesus Christ. They were seeking a a semblance of religion which they had built for themselves. They they picked, and they chose the things of Christ they like and wanted to hear. We can call them cafeteria Christians. I'll take this. I won't take the jello. Instead of conforming their lives to the image of Christ, they conformed Christ to their version of their lives they wanted to live. So let's be careful. We're not doing that, because if we're doing that, we're not building our lives on a foundation, so when the storm comes, our little makeshift hut that we built on the beach is not going to survive. When it's pretty outside, it's nice, but we know that the storms come, there are four types of sand that I came up with that I think we build our lives on. I got these on the screen. Number one, some of us try to build our house, our lives on material sand. We'll call it, placing our trust in the material things of life, placing our trust in our possessions, placing our trust in our wealth. You know it might be really good right now, but you never know what tomorrow brings. You never know when, when eggs will cost $20 a dozen. You never know when gas is going to skyrocket. You never know when a recession is going to hit. You never know when, when someone just says, You've lost your retirement. I don't know what happened to it. Invested it wrong. You never know when these these things are going to happen. So we can't place all our trust in possessions or wealth or even your status, because your status can be removed. So we have material saying that some people place their trust in. Secondly, I call this happiness sand. This is your goal in life, is just to be happy. You're just going to do you. That's what the teenagers say. You just, you just you just take care of yourself. You just do you. You just live for you, just living life through the temporary pleasures. Just indulging on anything excess leads to addiction, happiness. Sand, third, maybe you try to build your life on the achievement. Sand, that you're going after worldly success. You're trying to be the best at whatever year it is you're doing. You're trying to achieve whatever it is you want to achieve by your own power. You have a recognition for validation. You get your self worth from what you've done and things you've accomplished, and not on your character or not on Jesus Christ. Christ, that too will fall. And then fourth, superficial sin, this is living a life without really looking at the spiritual things in life. You may be a Christian, but you really are you taking spiritual stock of your life? Are you drawing closer to Christ? All these things lead to emptiness. Overall. Building your house on sand signifies that lack of foundation, that lack of wisdom, that lack of values that provide stability, that provides security, that provide resilience in the face of the challenges of life. Fragile life is built on the world's ideas. And finally, number three, a successful life is built on God's authority. A truly Christian, successful life is built on God's authority. Look at verse 28 and when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority and not as their scribes. The people recognized that the Pharisees and the scribes and the religious leaders did not speak with authority because they recognized they did not speak from the Word of God. They had made up all sorts of external rules, external legalisms that burdened the people. There was no love of God in their teaching. It was just do this. Do this, don't do that. Jesus, on the other hand, spoke. Can you imagine hearing Jesus speaking live? What an incredible thing that would have been like. Think about the best speaker you've ever heard, the best preacher you've ever heard in your life, live. And I've had a couple experiences wherever I heard someone live, I was like, that's just like the greatest sermon I've ever heard in my life. And multiply that just by I don't know what, when Jesus speaking God Himself, He spoke with this directness, he spoke with this confidence at the same time, he spoke with this loving humility. And everyone knew this was God's message to the world. It's unmistakable he had authority, and people knew it. So we can build our life on him, because he's the authority, and we can build our life on the authority of who he is as we close today, I want to give us a few steps to help us build our life, to make sure we're living in that authority of Jesus upon this solid rock foundation. Number one, practice obedience. See, we don't obey God's word to be saved. We obey God's word because we are saved, amen, big difference. We have the freedom now to obey God and to love Him in the way he says to do it. Many people reject Christianity or religion because they feel like they have to do this to make God love them. No, that's not what you do. Jesus Christ died on the cross when you were a sinner who was condemned. He died for you. You did nothing but receive His gift of salvation through His death and burial and resurrection, because you've received that gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, that gift of reconciliation to God the Father. Now you are free to build a solid foundation on Christ, and you are free to live the life he would have you to live. So we have to obey Him, not because we're trying to work our way into heaven, but because this is now how we live our life, and this is his blueprint for us. We live out the principles he teaches us. We are called to love people. Now, what I did not say was that means we have to be nice to everyone. That's not what love is. Not saying we be mean. Can't nice people to heaven. We have to love them, which means we we we care about them, we tell them, we teach them what they need to know. We do things for them in need. Love is an action as we know, we have to live out the principles of forgiveness. Jesus says, when someone sinned against you, you have to forgive them. He says that, well, I don't know, Pastor, that's a tough ask. I'm not asking you. I'm telling you what Jesus says. He says, If. You cannot forgive those who sin against you. You expect me to forgive you. Forgiveness live a life of of service to other people. That's obedience, serving and ministering to those Secondly, we can make sure our life is built on the foundation as we build up our faith, how do we build up our faith? Well, part of it you're doing today. You're here, you're worshiping together with other believers. You're in groups of discipleship, you're reading scripture, you're praying, you're taking opportunities. To grow in the Lord. When you turn the TV on and the Olympics has some crazy skid on, you turn it off, you go to the Word of God, build up your faith and three, stay grounded in the truth we talked about this last week. Be discerning of the false teachings, the false doctrines, the false ideologies that contradict the teachings of Christ. If someone says a true Christian will live like XYZ. Put the brakes on and make sure you make sure that squares with scripture. Make sure that is correct before you start changing your life. You might be changing your life. You might be building it on a different foundation, and make sure you understand what the truth of the gospel is. That's why we have God's word. That's why He gave it to us. We can build our house in the rock. We can withstand those storms. We can we can trust in God's word. And when the storms come, we are at a place where we have to rely on him. And if we're at a place where we know we have to do that, then we know our house is built on a firm foundation. I got a photo I want to show you that I thought was interesting. This house is located on 36th street, Mexico Beach, Florida. It was built in 2017 just one year later, Category Five, Hurricane Michael, came ashore right there on the beach. That's the aftermath of Hurricane Michael. As you can see, this house was the only house to survive that direct cataclysmic hit, how? How did that was there a bunch of angels watching over what in the world happened, right? And there's another one off to the side that didn't do too bad, but that one for sure. How did it survive? Well, it was made from poured concrete reinforced by seal cables 40 feet down into the ground, rebar, additional concrete bolstering the corners of the house. The space under the roof was minimized so that wind could not sneak in underneath and lift it off the home's elevation on high pilings was meant to keep it above the surge of sea water that would come with a powerful hurricane. It was built to withstand the big one. They just didn't think the big one would happen in a year. It happened in the first year of the house. The house cost about twice as much as it would normally build, which is front beach. So you know, it's going to be expensive. We'll double it, and that's what it was. But you know, if you're going to be on the front Beach, might as well build something that's going to withstand a storm, amen, and that's what they did. The siding that wrapped around a stairway, providing access to the house was gone. So were the stairs. It wasn't all wasn't all saved, but that was by design. The family architect used to break away walls that would tear free without ripping any more off the structure when a storm would come and the structure had little water damage and one cracked shower window with that storm, even their in home elevator was untouched, a little damage, nothing catastrophic. When Jesus is our foundation, we might take damage. Amen, but it will not be a catastrophe, because we have built our lives on the foundation of Jesus, Christ. How are you building your house? What is your foundation built upon? Is it. The world, is it the silliness you see on social media and TV every day? Is it the changing morals and values of the world that one day is okay the next day is not 10 years ago, it was not okay now it is? Or is it built on the everlasting truth of the Word of God, which never changes. See, God doesn't tell us these things to somehow make our life miserable. He tells us this thing so we can enjoy the freedom of living in him when you are building your house, and we're constantly building that house until the Lord takes us home. God's given us a blueprint. He's the architect. He's the engineer. How silly would be if I was building a house and I had an architect come in and he was telling me how he was going to do something. I said, you know, I don't know about that. Well, do you have a architecture degree? No, but I don't think it should look like that. It would be silly. But how often do we tell the Lord, I don't know about that. God, I'm not going to do that. And God says to us, are you the architect? Did you create the world? Did you create life? We're created to live a certain way, and God knows what that way is, and he's given us every way to be successful doing it. If we LISTEN to Him, He's given you the blueprint. He's the engineer. Trust his plans and when the storm comes, when the storm comes, when that category five hurricane is bearing down on you, and you're on the beach and you see it coming, you can trust in the foundation that God has built for you and that you have rested in Heavenly Father. We thank you for who you are in Christ, Jesus, and as we close our time together today, Lord, if there's one here today that has never placed their faith in you, that today they would be the day they do that, Lord, you promise us that when that day happens, we become born again. We become renewed with the Holy Spirit of Christ, become a new creation, anew that today they would make that decision, Lord, if there's those of us in here that have realized that we're building a house and sometimes we're building it wrong, that you convict us of that, and you'd give us the wisdom, the guidance to change, to make sure we're building it according to your blueprint, so that we can experience everlasting peace, and when the storms come, we can resist them, and we might take damage, but it will not be a catastrophe, because Lord, we know that you are holding us together. Father, we love you, and we ask these things in Jesus name, amen. Amen.
