If you can join me in Matthew chapter number 7, we are actually concluding a series that we have been in for the last 14 weeks.
Can you believe this? If I remember, I think this is the longest Sunday morning series that I've ever worked through. And we entitled this series, The Greatest Sermon Ever.
And I've said this every single week because I don't want, if you're a guest in here today, I do not want you to think that I think really highly of myself by titling that. Here's why we call it that is because we are studying Jesus is the greatest teacher ever. We're studying his famous sermon on the mouth. This covers Matthew five through seven. To our knowledge, this is the longest sermon that Jesus ever preached.
And he deals with everything. In fact, I've said this to you each week of the series that we call this a Sermon on the Mount, The Sermon on the Mount. But I'll tell you that we really should call it a mountain of a sermon.
In this series, Jesus has really taught us about so many different things. He talked about living a joyful, blessed life. He talked about being salt and light in such a dark world. He talked about relationship issues, things like divorce.
And what does the scripture say about divorce? He talks about spiritual disciplines, things like prayer and why we should give to the church and why we should be generous with our money and with our time and treasure and talent. He talks about that. He talks about loving your enemies, which is hard for us, right?
He talks about loving them that don't deserve it. He talks about so many different things in here that it is really a mountain of a sermon. And here's what I want you to know is that Jesus is concluding the sermon here in Matthew chapter seven. So to our knowledge, he has been sitting there and he has been teaching all of these different people.
We spread it out amongst 14 weeks. And Jesus was there in this one massive sermon, large multitudes there. And he begins to wrap everything up here at the end of Matthew chapter seven. It's almost as if Jesus is saying, hey, if you've tuned out, right, tune back in. If you've kind of gotten a little bit weary in the journey of this sermon or in the journey of this sermon series, Jesus is saying, hey, tune back in. Perhaps he's saying things like if you've fallen asleep. You ever fallen asleep in church?
How many of you would admit that? Raise your hand. Okay. Hey, listen, I can tell you who sleeps in the service. I can just tell you.
I see it. I think it's awesome because I remember what it was like to be on that side and stuff and just dozing off. You ever dozed off and somebody's like, hey, he just asked you to pray.
That's a great joke to pull on somebody because if they've fallen asleep and your goal is I would love for them to do that. But Jesus is kind of saying here in this this passage is he's saying like, hey, if you've tuned out or if you've fallen asleep or you kind of got weary on the journey, tune back in because what I am about to close this sermon with is the secret to everything. It's the ingredient to everything that you are looking for. And here's what I'll tell you. Here's what every single one of you need and every single one of us are searching for. It's to have a life that is unshakable. It's to have a life that is unshakable.
And here's the thing. Every single one of you want that. Every single one of us need that.
Every single one of us desire that. In fact, I'd go as far to say this, that even if you don't know Jesus and you kind of slipped in here because somebody invited you or you maybe have come for several weeks just checking things out and you don't have a personal relationship with Jesus. Here's what I'll tell you. You still are searching for a firm foundation.
You're searching for what does it take to have a life that is unshakable no matter what comes into your your life. Well, here, Jesus, he is talking about that very thing. And here is his point is he's saying this, that we are all going to end up somewhere.
In fact, last week he talked about that. We're all going to stand before God. Every single path that you take leads to God. But only one path leads to standing in front of him in favor.
You see, all of us are going to stand before God one day, but only those who have trusted in Jesus as their savior are going to stand there and find favor with with God. And so what Jesus is saying at the conclusion of this sermon is this is that we're all going to end up somewhere. And here is how you end up there on purpose.
Here's how you end up there on purpose. You have to build your life today so that you can end up where you want to be tomorrow. So let's look at it. Matthew chapter number seven. Here's the first thing that we see. Every one of us are building our lives on something.
Every single one of us are building our lives on something. Look at what Jesus says. Matthew seven, verse 24. He says this. Therefore, in other words, basically everything I've said because of this whosoever heareth these sayings of mine. And what's the next phrase do with them. In other words, whoever hears what I've just told you this whole sermon and practices it.
Those who put what I've said into practice. I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock and the rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell not for it was founded upon a rock. He goes on in verse 26 and everyone they hear at these sayings of mine and do with them not shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand. The rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell and great was the fall of it.
So here at the conclusion of the series or at the conclusion of Jesus's sermon is he tells a parable. He tells a parable about two builders and they were both building their house and here's what's interesting about the story is that the houses look the same on the outside. The houses look the same on the outside and they both experienced storms but what made one standing and one fall was the foundation by which it was built upon. Now the houses they represent your life. So when we look at building your life he's talking about building your life when he's talking about these houses. And he mentions two different people. The first one is this the wise man. We know this if you've grown up in church and stuff you've probably heard this preached about in Sunday school and you probably know the song that goes along with this. But here's the thing the wise man is the one that builds his life on the rock. Now you say what does this mean?
What does this look like? The rock represented the hard way. The time consuming way.
The way that looks to everyone else that passes by a construction site that looks like nothing is happening but there's a whole lot of work that is happening. You see the rock is a process. The rock is a process that it takes to be built and this is the wise man and how he builds his life.
He's willing to do the hard things because he recognizes that the hard things now results in the firm foundation that I'm looking for then. So that I'm prepared when the storms come. It's like if you have a house at the beach and a hurricane's coming. You have to prepare your house for the storm. That's the idea by which he's mentioning here that is the rock way.
You're preparing yourself so that when the storm hits you are prepared for it and you can be left standing. But not only does he mention the wise man he mentions the foolish man. And the foolish man is the one that builds his life on the sand. Now have you ever built a sand castle at the beach right? You go to the beach and you sit there for a while and you build a sand castle and then next thing you know this huge boat or something comes by and this wave comes and it just knocks everything down and then you got to start all over.
Super frustrating right? But if you've ever built anything on sand you know that that's probably not going to turn out well right? Things that build on sand are not going to last. And so here he likens a foolish man to somebody that's building their life on sand.
You say what does that represent? This way the sand built life represented a life that lives without the future in mind. The sand built life lives with this idea. Now is now and later is later. The sand built life is the one that says I've got this.
I have everything under control and when the storms come they just feel because they've not been living to be prepared for the storms they just feel like their life is like an electronic device that they can just turn off, unplug, replug it back in and we can start over. But here's what we know about life. You can't just start over can you? Right? You can't get back the time that you have lost, the time that you spent living as a fool. You can't just start over. You can't start over with your kids.
Right? You can't start over in your career. You can't start over with your integrity.
You can't start over with your character. You see the point is that we can't just have a do over what we do in our life if you live like a fool. You've got to go all the way back to the beginning and you don't get that foolish time back.
You don't get that time back. And so what he's saying is this is that the foolish man builds their life on the sand. Here's the thing and maybe this will resonate with you. The foolish assumption is this is that today's weather will be tomorrow's weather.
That's what Jesus is saying. He's saying that the fool looks at today as today is today and tomorrow is tomorrow. That the weather that I have today, I'm getting by, life is good, everything seems to be flowing the right way. That today's weather is going to be tomorrow's weather. But here's what we know about life.
It almost never is that way is it? Weather that you have today is not always going to be true tomorrow. Your life can be great today and then you go into a doctor's appointment tomorrow and everything be flipped on its head.
So what prepares you for that moment, for those terrible tragedies that life throws at us? Here's what he's saying is that every one of us are building our lives on something. You see, he likens your life to a house. Houses don't just erect and show up just like that, do they?
You don't start on a house today and it'd be done by the end of the afternoon. Now that's what we love, right? We love immediate results.
I don't know about you, but I know I do. I love immediate results. I don't like to work for things. Several years ago, I was in Florida and our staff at the church that I was working at, they decided to do this kind of weight loss little challenge. So you could set a goal and you could set a goal and just participate in this thing. So they had a scale in the office that you could go and weigh yourself and you could get your starting weight and then you could set a goal of how much you wanted to lose. And then they would have a goal and you would reweigh yourself.
And so I'd never done a diet and things like that. So I was kind of like, okay, I'll participate in this along with the rest of the staff. I could lose a little bit of weight at the time. And so I was like, you know, I can do this. And so I go over there and I weigh myself and I see what I'm starting at. I wrote it down and I had a goal in mind of what I wanted to see happen in my life.
And so I left there. That was the morning and I had lunch plans with some of the staff who were also participating. So I went to lunch with them and I ate really healthy at lunch. And then that afternoon I stopped by Walmart on my way home. I bought a scale for my house so that I can track progress. And I took it home and I weighed myself and I looked and nothing had changed from the morning to then. And I was frustrated. I was like, man, I just ate healthy at lunch. Why am I not seeing the result that I want?
Right? Here's the reason that is, is we want immediate results. We don't like to work for anything. We don't like to take time for anything. And here's what Jesus is saying, is that the life that is built on a firm foundation takes time.
It's like building a house. It takes time. There's progress. It takes time. It takes work. It takes decision making.
It takes time building your character. It takes time and decisions choosing the right path to build the house that you want to build. You see, every single one of us are building something.
That's what Jesus is saying. You're either living today on a house that is being built, that is being built on sand or you are being built on the rock. But not only is every single one of us building something with our lives, but number two, every one of us will be tested in life.
Every single one of us will be tested in life. Look at what he says in verse 25, and the rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew, beat upon the house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock. Verse 27, and the rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew, beat upon the house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. Here's what's true of this story. You have two houses. They look the same, but they have different foundations.
And here's what's true of both of them. Storms came. Storms came. Don't you wish that the moment you said yes to Jesus and said yes to following Jesus that it meant the absence of storms, right?
But here's what I'll tell you. Following Jesus is not about the absence of storms. It's not about the protection from storms. No, following Jesus, it actually gives you the foundation that you need to stand firm in the midst of the storm. You see, that's what we see here in this passage.
That's what he's talking about. And so storms are inevitable. I wish I could tell you that if you said yes to Jesus today, that you don't have any storms in your future, but we know that is not the way that life works. In fact, this is where the song comes in. And, you know, for Sunday school, if you grew up in Sunday school, right, remember this song? And the rain came down and the floods came up.
How many of you remember that? Okay, raise your hand. Okay, that's several of us. So let's sing that together. You ready? I'm going to lead you.
Okay. And the rain came down and the floods came up. Repeat it. And the rains came down.
And what's the emotions? There we go. And the rain came down and the floods came up. And then here's what it says.
And the house on the rock stood firm. But we know the foolish man, let's sing it again. And the rains came down and the floods came up. The rain came down and the floods came up. If you didn't grow up in Sunday school, you're like, what in the world am I part of right now?
Okay. And then the third man, the rains came down and the floods came up. And it says, and the house on the sand went splat, right? Or what's the word?
I don't know what the word is. And so I wasn't listening in Sunday school, probably. So, but here's the point. Is that here's what we know is that all of us storms are coming. Storms happen. It doesn't matter about listen, every single one of you are going to experience storms. What Jesus is saying is the difference of how you handle the storm is going to be built. It's going to be based upon where the foundation is built, where the foundation is built.
So he says this. The wise man's house remains standing during the storm. The wise man's house remains standing in the storm. The rain descended, floods came, winds blew. It beat upon the house, but it fell not.
Why? For it was founded upon the rock. It was founded upon the rock. And so when everything happened around it, it was it was intact. And by the way, it's like, don't we look at people that that their houses, their lives are standing no matter what? And then your life seems to be falling apart. And when we look at people that their life is together, sometimes we'll say things like this, man, they must be so lucky.
Right? Like if they were dealt the cards that I was dealt in my life, that they wouldn't be standing as strong as they are. Well, their life is easy. And we say, listen, Jesus is saying that their house, it's not standing because of luck. It's not standing because of a coincidence. It's not standing for any of those reasons. The reason their house and their life is left standing is because it was built upon a rock.
It was built upon something that is unshakable. So when the bad diagnosis comes, they're left standing. When the doctor's office and you pop into a doctor's office and you don't know and you get bad results and they bring a doctor in and it's something you don't want to hear, you can stay standing. When something happens with your kids, you can say standing. When the career doesn't work out the way that you wanted, you can say standing. The point is, it's all about where your foundation is standing.
Where is your foundation built upon? But then he says the foolish man's house fell during the storm. Verse 27, same thing. The rain descended, the floods came just like the house built upon the rock. Just like the house, nothing changed with the storm.
The storm was still the same. The rain descended, floods came, winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell and great was the fall of it. In other words, when tragedy struck, the life fell apart. When the diagnosis came, their life falls apart. When bad news hit them, their life is going to fall apart. Why? Why?
Not because of personality, not because of any of those reasons. The reason is, is because their foundation was built upon the sand. It was built upon things that don't last. Jesus is the only one that you can build upon that can give you the firm foundation that you need when life happens to you.
You see, here's the point. The foundation of your life means everything. The foundation of your life means everything. And so I ask you, what are you building upon?
What are you building upon? So that when storms come into your life, that you can stay standing. So that you can stay firm because your foundation will be tested. As a follower of Jesus, your foundation will be tested.
But if your foundation is on the rock, you will be left standing during the testing, during the storm. Number three, every one of us, not only are we building our lives on something, but every one of us have a choice to make. Every one of us have a choice to make. Look at what he says in verse 29 as he wraps up the sermon. Here's the people's response. And it came to pass when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished. They were amazed at his teaching, at his doctrine. They were amazed at all these teachings that he had.
And then here's why. It's for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes. In other words, all the audience is sitting there and they're amazed.
I mean, their jaws are on the floor. They're just incredibly amazed at the teaching of Jesus and everything that he had taught them because he taught us somebody having authority. In other words, he taught us somebody that finally gets it, that finally speaks to how life really works. Because, you know, their audience probably had tons of problems and storms that are coming into their life.
People that were hurting, people with burdens. And Jesus is telling them that, listen, I'm not going to stand here and tell you what a lot of people are going to tell you. That, hey, if you follow Jesus, that, you know, you're not going to have storms and stuff like that.
They're sitting out there like, man, I'm in a storm right now. And they're amazed at Jesus's teaching because he's teaching as one that has authority. And here's what Jesus is saying.
The principle is this. Is that the decisions we make today and how you build your house are going to determine the destination that you're going to end up at tomorrow. In other words is here's what building your house on a rock looks like. It means building it and taking the time to invest in what really matters now so that when something down the road happens and the storms come into your life, you've spent all this time and years building the life that can be sustained in the storm. You see, the foolish man, they just think today's today and tomorrow's tomorrow. I'm living for today. I'm going to live it up. I'm going to live for me. I'm going to live for myself. I'm going to make all the money I can and I'm going to just do everything I want to do.
I'm going to let my kids do whatever they want to do. And they just have that philosophy. And tomorrow is tomorrow.
But here's what I'll tell you. A house built on the rock takes time. It takes time.
It takes time. It's not built overnight. Houses that those people that you see that have a firm foundation, no matter the storms that come into their life.
It didn't just happen. It didn't just show they didn't just wake up one day and say, wow, I have a firm foundation. No, it comes because of years of them spending time building and investing in what really matters. So that when the storms come and when the rain falls and when the wind blows and the floods ascend. That their house, their life can be left standing. You see, here's what breaks my heart as a pastor, just to be honest with you.
Is as a pastor, I can see some of us and some of you are living in a direction that isn't going to get you to the destination that you're trying to get to. In other words, we all want the life built on a firm foundation, don't we? Every single one of us want that. We want that when things come in our life that we can be solid, that we can be unshakable, that we can be not fazed.
We want that life. But here's the problem. Jesus is saying, man, that takes a lot of building to get there.
And here's what I'll tell you as a pastor. I see it all the time that people are living and building in a direction that isn't leading to that. They're building on all these other things that this world has to offer. And here's what's true of it is people can see it happening. But sometimes when we're the ones building it, we don't see it, do we? It's easy for you to probably point out, man, they shouldn't be doing that. They shouldn't be investing in that.
They should be spending a little bit more time here. And you can see how everybody else is building their house. But sometimes we're naive to how our own house is being built, our own life is being built.
And here's what I'll tell you is that how we're building it now and what we're building it upon and the foundation that we are choosing to build our lives upon will dictate what happens to your life when storms hit. So if you're in here today as we kind of wrap this thing up, you say, where do I start? Pastor, like I get it, but where does this begin?
Perhaps you've kind of slipped in here because somebody invited you and you're kind of figuring this thing out. You say, where do I begin? Listen, Jesus talks about that in Ephesians chapter number two. Ephesians chapter number two, Jesus says, or actually Paul says to his letter to the church at Ephesus, he says this in verse number 20, he talks about Jesus being the chief cornerstone. He talks about Jesus being the chief cornerstone. He's like, what does that mean?
What does that mean? You see, the cornerstone was the center stone that they would build upon. So it was the center stone that was laid first and then all of the foundation of the house and everything else that they build upon was built upon the chief cornerstone. And so Paul is saying this, that in the gospel, that's what the book of Ephesians is all about, it's all about the gospel of Christ and how Jesus came to save us and to give us a new identity in Christ. And so as he's talking about that in his letter to the church, he says that Jesus should be your chief cornerstone. If you're in here today and you don't know Jesus, let me tell you this, your life right now is built upon sand.
It's built upon sand. It's going to come and go and when the storms of life come into your life and into your family, you're going to fall apart. You're going to fall apart.
Why? Because you're not building your life on the cornerstone. You see, Jesus should be the cornerstone of your life, the center of your life, where everything else, he's the only thing that can secure your foundation.
So here's the challenge. Here's how Jesus sends his sermon. Build your life on him. Build your life on him, on Jesus.
Let him be the chief cornerstone and go all in on what Jesus has for you and spend your life with him and spend time with him through Bible reading and prayer and through serving the church and going all in on that in your Bible study. And here's what will happen is that is building, that's like blocks and bricks leading so that when the storm comes, your life can remain standing. You see, the thing that we all want over here, the life that is unshakable, we all want that because that's what everybody sees. But what we neglect and what we forget is that this life that everybody sees, it usually results from a bunch of things that nobody sees that leads to a life that everybody sees.
You see, we want the life that everybody sees, the unshakable life, but we're not willing to invest and build behind the scenes. The things that nobody sees like committing to reading your Bible and committing to growing, committing to church, committing to serving, committing to giving, all these different things. They're like building blocks to a life that is unshakable and it all starts with Jesus. See, if you're not saved, it starts there. Your next step is to trust in Jesus as your savior because he can be your chief cornerstone.
He can be the one thing in your life that remains constant no matter what happens in your life. Would you bow your heads with me? I'm going to ask Becky to come at this time.
Nobody's looking around. This is an opportunity for us to do business with God. This is a time where it's between you and the Lord. We're not going to embarrass anybody in this place today.
That's the last thing on my mind. But it gives us an opportunity to respond to what God has done in your heart in this service. So I ask you this question. The question I have for you is, what are you building your life upon?
What are you building your life upon? If you're in here today and you say, Pastor, I don't know Jesus as my savior. I don't know him. And I know that tonight. And I feel that if he was to come back, I would experience that terrible verdict that we looked at last week that I would stand before him and he would say, Depart from me. I never knew you.
And that scares me. And I don't know Jesus as my savior. If that's you in here today, be honest before God. Would you please be honest with me today? Just slip up your hand high enough for me to see it, long enough for me to recognize it.
If you don't feel comfortable with that, you want to make eye contact with me, that's fine as well. We had one young man who wrestled with this all day Sunday last week. And he called us late at night and came by the house and he said, I'm sick of fighting this. I'm sick of putting it off. I'm going to accept Christ today so that my life is where it needs to be. So I don't have to hear that verdict one day so I can be prepared for when I stand before God.
If that's you today, would you please just be honest? Because it's the most important decision that you would ever make. And then for the Christians, you know, even sometimes we we kind of on our journey with Christ, we kind of get off track from time to time. And perhaps that's you and you say, pastor, there's some things in my life that I feel aren't healthy for me. There's some things that I participate in or some things that I allow my family to participate in that just aren't good for me. And they're not helping me build that foundation upon Christ that I need to. And there's some things that I need to commit to as a family, as a dad, as a mom. And you say, those are some things and God spoke to me that I need to be building my life more on Christ than I am. If that's you, would you be honest, Christian, before God today and slip up your hand high enough for me to see it?
Yes, I see hands going up throughout this place. I feel you. My hands right there with you.
There's things that I could cut out of my life to better build and position myself for an unshakable life. Well, I'm going to pray and then we're going to stand. I'm going to invite you to come if you want to do business with God up front or right where you are. Father, we love you blessing this invitation time today. Speak to our hearts, for it's in your name we pray. Amen.
Would you stand with me? Heads are still bowed. Hearts are still lifted in prayer.
The music's going to continue to play. This altar is open. You're welcome to come pray up here. You're welcome to do business with God up here. Or perhaps you need to to pray right where you are and do business with God. But the altar is open. Build your life upon Him, upon the rock, upon Jesus.
