A Strong Foundation

“A Strong Foundation”

SERMON on MATTHEW 7: 24-29

INTRO:

Well, it’s Super Bowl week once again! All the Steelers and Packers fans say “Amen - thanks be to God for his indescribable gift (2 Cor 9:15)!” Yeah, that’s not what Titans fans are saying. After 17 years, we’ve lost Coach Fisher, dare I say our “Moses,” but have no idea who our “Joshua” will be. We're complaining like Israelites in the wilderness! No, really, on one hand this time of year is a sign of God’s blessings, no matter which team you love. Football. Food. Fellowship. We get to find out which team is the best of the best. Now, I’m a native Memphian, and even though this game could be labeled “North vs. Northeast,” my excitement remains at full tilt. On the other hand, the Super Bowl itself denotes that the football season is about to end. So, this weekend does challenge football fans to live joyfully in the moment. Much to our dismay, God is sending us into a famine without football until September! Pray for me…

This year’s Super Bowl carries special significance. The storied tradition of both teams has sports analysts everywhere asking the same question (no, not just “Who will win,” but): “Which team has the richer history, the Pittsburgh Steelers or the Green Bay Packers? Each has won multiple Super Bowls. The Steelers, residing in “The City of Champions,” have accomplished the feat 6 times. The Packers, from “Title-town USA,” have done so on 3 occasions. That’s 1^st and 3^rd respectively in the NFL’s Super Bowl era, where winning 1 ring alone is of the highest degree of difficulty. And this year, one of these squads yet again will earn trips to both Disney World and the White House. So what is it about these organizations that has paved the way for this continued championship-level success?

We could say it’s the players. They’re the ones on the field making plays right? Surely its not the “Terrible Towels” or “Cheese-heads” for Pittsburgh and Green Bay respectively that put them over the top (although, ask any player from these two “small market” teams and they’ll tell you just how important their fans are to them). No. I submit this; the quality of these franchises should be attributed primarily to one fact: each rests on a strong foundation! I’ll tell you what, why don’t we come back to this in a bit? For now, open with me to Matt 7: 24-29, where we find the powerful conclusion of Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount.” Let’s see what our Savior says on the topic: “A Strong Foundation.”

BIBLE PASSAGE:

MATTHEW 7: 24-29:

"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. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash."

PREVIEW:

CONTEXT, EXAMINATION, CLOSING

Let's do 3 things:

1.     Uncover the CONTEXT of this passage.

2.     EXAMINE Jesus’ definitions of and contrasts between stable and unstable foundations.

3.     CLOSE with clarification, illustration and application.

1. CONTEXT

I’ve divided chapters 1-7 of Matthew, those preceding our text, into three parts. Our passage of study is found at the conclusion of chapter 7.

i. Chapters 1-4: Jesus’ Ministry Begins

Matthew begins by writing about Jesus’ genealogy and birth. He then introduces Jesus’ ministry by documenting His baptism by John the Baptist and subsequent temptation in the wilderness. Next, Jesus commences His preaching, calls His first disciples, and begins to perform healing miracles. These passages precede Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount,” wherein He details to His disciples what it means to follow Him.

ii. Chapters 5-7: “Sermon on the Mount” – Lessons

Here Matthew shifts from recounting events to emphasizing Jesus’ teaching. He begins by sharing Jesus’ surprising illumination on who is blessed, including the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, etc. He continues sharing Jesus’ wisdom and instruction on a variety of issues, such as giving, prayer and fasting. Later, Jesus merges these teachings together: “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets (7: 12).”

iii. Chapter 7: “Sermon on the Mount” – Warnings

Jesus draws an emphatic close to His sermon by making a transition from teaching…to warning. Note the 4 passages concluding the sermon: “The Narrow and Wide Gates,” “True and False Prophets,” “True and False Disciples” and “The Wise and Foolish Builders.” The mood has changed!

Context Recap

Matthew establishes who Jesus is and chronicles the beginnings of His ministry. He shares Jesus’ wisdom and teaching via the bulk of the “Sermon on the Mount.” Through four consecutive parables, he closes his book highlighting Jesus’ admonishment to those He has instructed. With this in mind, let’s do some dissection.

2. EXPLANATION

            We'll split this passage into two parts, “the formula” and “the variables.” The formula will uncover revealing similarities between the wise and the foolish builders. The variables will speak to the significant differences between them.

i. The Formula

To the similarities - as these two do in fact have much in common. Look at the structure of this parable. Jesus said all of these words twice, once of the wise builder and once of the foolish.

-“Everyone who hears these words of mine is like a man who built his house on…”

-“The rain came down, the streams rose, the winds blew and beat against that house…”

The 31 words shown reveal 3 similarities between the builders. First, in addressing both of them, Jesus puts them on a level playing field. His message isn’t for 1 person, some people or even many people. It’s for “everyone who hears,” including both the wise and the foolish. This echoes the sentiment shared in Psalm 98: 2, “The LORD has made His salvation known and revealed His righteousness to the nations.” This is encouraging. Second, both builders aim to ensure the stability and security of their final product by setting it on a foundation. Neither set out to fail! Third and finally, storms likely will come and affect both of them at some point in the future. This is no surprise, as narratives of storms are littered throughout the Bible and are necessarily interwoven into its overall storyline.

ii. The Variables

But what differentiates the wise and foolish builders? What determines whether their houses stand or fall? As we discussed, Jesus set the builders on a shared stage. Here, however, He uses distinctly different and opposing words to make His contrast between them very clear.

“…and puts them into practice…wise…rock…yet it did not fall.”

“…does not put them into practice…foolish…sand…and it fell with a great crash.”

James makes this point very well. Check out chapter 1, verses 22-27 of his book: “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it – not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it – they will be blessed in what they do.”

Clearly, the difference between this text and ours is not that of meaning, but of means or method only. Jesus juxtaposes wise and foolish builders. James speaks of a man in the mirror (yes, I almost used a Michael Jackson intro today). In both cases, the intent is the same, as each aims to spur the audience to obedience, not mere acknowledgement.

Explanation Recap

            To this point we’ve brought to light the context wherein Jesus spoke and Matthew wrote. For the past few minutes, we’ve differentiated between the wise and foolish builders. 

3. CLOSING

Next – let’s move to a couple clarifications, illustrations and questions. 

Clarifications
i. What exactly do the “wise” put into practice?

Jesus opens this parable with the word, “therefore, (everyone who hears…)” pointing us to relevant preceding texts. Continuing, “…these words of mine,” He links those texts with His teachings. But how do we know which ones? Remember, this parable concludes chapter 7. So consider how chapter 8 opens: “When Jesus came down from the mountainside…(v. 1)” This tells us the parable of “The Wise and Foolish Builders” concludes the “Sermon on the Mount” which began at the outset of chapter 5. So to answer this question we must look to all truths He shared throughout the sermon. Our limitation is that detailing all of those lessons in 1 sitting isn’t feasible. We could build a 2-year sermon series on them. True, we’ll hone in on a few areas in closing momentarily, but we heard earlier how Jesus Himself summarizes. Again: “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets (7: 12).”

ii. What’s the difference between a house that stands and one that falls?

The answer might seem obvious, but it bears underscoring. Ultimately, Jesus is referring to our final destination! Some believers have a hard time reconciling the God’s all-loving character with the existence of an eternal hell, but both are ”foundational” precepts of our Christian faith. We won’t be diving into analytical apologetics here, but suffice it to say that if Jesus is not our foundation we will not be with Him in the afterlife. See Romans for more on this.

Illustrations
i. Weight Training

Let’s move to a light-hearted illustration. Ladies, bear with me as we continue with the sports-related theme. Don’t let me lose you here. I ask for a little understanding, since it’s Super Bowl week and all. And another disclaimer - I expect I’ll hear from the avid old-school weight lifters in the audience after this, but - you can save the emails; I was one of you myself!

O.K. let’s get to it. Who’s heard of “core exercises” and “free motion” equipment? For many fitness enthusiasts, long gone are the days of stationary exercises like the “bench press” and “military press.” Opinions vary, but in my experience those types of exercises don’t provide much “bang for the buck.” Sure, you get stronger…on that specific exercise, but is that why you workout? That’s like saying you eat more so that you can eat more; ultimately it just doesn’t make sense. Put another way, those kinds of exercises don’t provide much “functional strength.” To generalize, neither bench-pressing 315lbs nor military pressing 225lbs increases your fitness or makes you a better athlete!

More importantly, those exercises can put your body at great risk. Briefly, they put too much pressure on the joints, ligaments and tendons involved in the movements. The few contracting muscles grow in strength through the work, but the aforementioned structural body parts connected to them can’t and aren’t meant to keep up. Both of my shoulders can attest to this!

So why does this happen? Because the body isn’t meant to operate disengaged from its core. Stationary exercises by definition focus in on one or two areas specifically and prevent all parts of your body from working together as they were made to. If you aren’t strengthening your core (your abdominal muscles, lower back, etc.) and using it as the base or balance point for your exercises, you’re minimizing your results and increasing your odds of injury! Here’s the point: In sum, your core is the foundation of your body and should provide stability for all you do!

ii. Back to the NFL

            A final illustration before we apply today's lesson to our lives. Let’s circle back to where we began. What has made the Steelers and Packers such great organizations? I could go on and on. I won’t presume to know intimate details on the faith of the men who started these teams nor of those who have lead them over the years, although in my research I did find some good evidence in that regard. But in my investigations I found time and again – consistently - examples of these leaders demonstrating Christ-like behavior in their work and lives.

Listen to what Super Bowl winning former head coach Tony Dungy had to say about Al Rooney, the Steelers' original owner: "When I got traded to San Francisco (from Pittsburgh), Mr. Rooney sent a letter to my mom saying how proud he was to have had me on the team. I was only a backup there for a short time, but that letter was thrill for my parents. He did that kind of stuff all the time." Players, coaches and staff members throughout the league hold Al and the Rooney family in very high regard, but coming from Dungy, a devout follower of Jesus, this complimentary tale holds extra weight.

Two eye-opening points for Green Bay. First, did you know they are set up as a non-profit corporation? Yes, the only one in the NFL. Secondly, did you know they have 111,921 stockholders? Yep - THEIR FANS (season ticket holders)! And I haven’t even mentioned the impact Vince Lombardi had throughout the NFL. The championship trophy is named after him. But here we’ve revealed at least a little bit with regards to Green Bay’s emphasis on charity and community.

Application Questions

            Two questions to close out...

i. Do you believe storms are headed your way?

Some of us are like: “You ain’t kiddin.’” Yeah, I know. Many of us have faced more struggles than we ever thought we would. Loss of family members. Divorce and broken relationships. Financial problems. Unemployment. Sickness. Loneliness. You name it. Some of us have made it through life to this point without any major scars. God bless those folks right? Regardless, the Bible itself is littered with narratives on storms. We see them from Genesis 3 (the fall) through the final battle in Revelation. Personally, one of my favorite parts of Scripture is 2 Corinthians 11: 23-29, wherein we learn about some of the sufferings Paul endured during his ministry. I’ve got a lot of respect for Paul to say the least. Yet, many of us, like the Israelites in the Old Testament, still build the houses of our lives on earthly foundations, in search of worldly comforts, acceptance, rewards, etc. Further, we build additions to those houses in short-term and ill-fated attempts to alleviate pains stemming from whatever ails us at the moment.

Friends, we must realize that God either prescribes or ordains our sufferings to turn us to Him and to receive maximum glory! We see this clearly in the story of Job. Therefore, it is of no benefit to repetitively replace one earthly foundation of our lives with another. We gain nothing by putting band-aids on our problems and/or avoiding them altogether. Adversity is a powerful catalyst giving us an opportunity to realize our total depravity, acknowledge our ultimate dependence on God and turn to Him as our foundation! Look again to the book of James: “Consider if pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work in you so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing (1: 2-4).” In essence, James is saying: “Don’t run from your struggles! Embrace them and turn them over to God!”

Too often we forget Christians are called to suffer. Listen also to Peter: “But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed (1 Peter 4: 13)…and the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast (1 Peter 5: 10).

ii. What is the foundation of your life?

On the home stretch; understanding that “to live is Christ and to die is gain (Phil 1: 21).” We here acknowledge that Jesus is the only firm foundation for all of us. And we understand His “Sermon on the Mount” is a wonderful reference point instructing us on how we are to live out this belief. So in closing, I ask a final question: What is the foundation of your life?
Rephrased: What are your priorities? Where do you place your faith and trust? What do you rely on? What do you seek? Respect and admiration? Strength and independence? Knowledge and wisdom? What about stability and security, or money and possessions? What about religious piety, shrouded in love and care for others or good works? In the storms of life…are you fighting the battle or are you asking Him to fight it for you?

THE MAIN POINT:

For our lives to withstand the trials that are headed our way, we must rely on Him; nothing and no one else. Let’s remember what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 13: 5: “Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith.” Today, make sure to commit or recommit to Jesus as the sole authority and foundation in your life. Rejoice and remember, it is He who calms the storm (Matthew 8: 23-27)!