“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.” Matthew 7:24
Here, at the end of Jesus’ ‘Sermon on the Mount’, He gives a short parable to conclude what He has just been teaching His disciples. He speaks about two men who built houses: one whose house was built on sand, and one whose house was built on the rock. Although both houses were identical in every other respect, when the storm came, only one survived – the one built on the rock.
The lesson is one about having the right foundation. If our foundation is inadequate, it doesn’t matter how much time, effort, or resources we put into what we build on it. This is true in the physical realm, and it is equally true in the spiritual realm. There are many things that people use as the foundation on which they build their lives. But foundations like the pursuit of fame or money, are just as reliable in the long run as a foundation of sand. The only foundation that we should be building on is Jesus Christ and the Word of God.
But to build on this foundation means more than just knowing the words of Jesus – we must put them into practice. This, Jesus says, is what a wise person does. We demonstrate that we trust God’s Word when we do it. And it’s as we do it, every day, that we are building the ‘house’ that is our life. Can you say, with David, “I have set the Lord always before me. Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken” (Ps. 16:8)?
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