New Thoughts (2/1/06-2/8/06)
Here, Jesus is reaching the climax of His message. Throughout, He has taught upon the differences between the Truth and the Deception. Deception, as He has taught, comes in many forms and degrees, ranging from the relative innocence of hypocrisy – only hoping to convince others we are what we are not, to heresy – by which we seek to lead others from the Truth. In a number of clear illustrations, Jesus has been contrasting these two, the True and the false, that we might understand the difference. Now, He provides us with a reason to care about what He has been teaching.
Around the Church today you will hear many talking about what Christianity is and is not. Christianity is not a philosophy, it is relationship. That is one popular statement: incorrect, but popular. In truth Christianity is both. It is rather like that other false dichotomy that insists that God doesn’t care about your mind, only your heart. This, too, oversteps by rejecting the Truth that God cares intensely about both heart and mind, and insists that both be wholly engaged in the pursuit of Him. Here, we find Jesus declaring in so many words that righteousness is not a fine philosophical point, but rather a fundamental necessity for our survival. Would that we would speak the same of Christianity! Christianity is a philosophy, but it is not just a philosophy. It is a philosophy (which after all simply means a love of wisdom) joined with a relationship.
The issue with modern philosophy, with all philosophy that is not conjoined to Christian faith, is that it stops at being an idea. It is something to be thought about, perhaps even something we try to work at. But, it is never something we can become intimate with. We can have no relationship with such wisdom as the godless philosopher offers. In Christianity alone, as it alone presents God to us in all His glory, are we presented with Wisdom Himself. He is not Wisdom personified. He is Wisdom. And He invites us to come and be one with Him. Indeed, that we might be one with Him is the whole point of Creation!
One of the great problems of that hypocrisy that Jesus joined battle against was that it took away the relationship from the philosophy. It separated the opportunity for fellowship with Wisdom Himself from the pursuit of wisdom. In doing so, it settled for the appearance of wisdom, for being thought wise. But the wisdom it had settled for was no wisdom at all. For, how can he be thought wise who has insisted he knows better than Wisdom?
As I said, Jesus has been showing us the difference. Now, He proceeds to make clear to us the importance of pursuing Wisdom, not imagined understanding. It is presented to us in rather a reversed image. Rather than telling us that He will show us what a wise man looks like, He turns it around and says He will tell us what to make of His real disciples – those who not only sit nodding at His feet, but apply what they have learned, become intimately one with the wisdom He imparts.
These, He tells us, can be compared to truly wise men. He does not, by the way, speak of them as being men of wisdom, such as we understand it in relationship to philosophy. He is speaking of men who are prudent, shrewd even; men with good sense, common sense. The man with any sense, He continues, if he should choose to build a house, will first dig down until he has hit bedrock, until he is certain of a solid, immovable surface upon which he can lay his foundation. To make the image more complete, He then shows us another sort of man, who is in such a hurry to build his house that all common sense is left behind. He not only fails to look for solid ground upon which to build, he doesn’t even bother to lay a foundation, just moves straight to erecting walls and roof. One wonders if such a foolish man even thought to leave a doorway or a window in his hurry to get the job done.
Jesus, in showing us the great benefit of seeking after Wisdom instead of simply knowledge, now presents these two as facing the same outward challenges come to test their work. Against both houses come floods and high winds. The house of Wisdom and prudence stands. The house of the heedless, the ‘moron’ who has shown himself devoid of any moral worth whatsoever, falls at the first testing.
The first point I would make from this great lesson is this: It is Jesus Himself who likens the failed builder to a moron. That is the word which is there. It is interesting to note that Luke removes the likenesses of wise and moronic from his account, focusing more clearly on the actions these two undertake. But, in Matthew, the character of the men is brought forward far more clearly than their efforts. For us, I think it is critical to have both pieces of the picture in the forefront of our thinking simultaneously.
Let us, for the moment, understand the message Jesus delivers in presenting us the moron. The message is really quite simple. It simply points out the great danger of hearing without doing. To know the Truth but then continue onward without acting upon the Truth is not just worthless. It is not just that we have reduced the power of intimate acquaintance with Wisdom to merely philosophy. It is not just that we have become so enamored of learning for the sake of learning that we fail to gain more than a store of factoids for ourselves. Far worse, it is moronic to have stopped short. It is without moral worth. There is the key to the term. All our knowledge of Scripture, of Jesus, of God, all our ability to quote chapter and verse are worth absolutely nothing in the scales of righteousness by which moral worth is measured. What matters is not whether we heard and memorized what God taught in Jesus and in the Apostles. What matters is what we have done with it. Have we put into practice all the great practical applications that Peter, Paul, James and John have provided for us? Have we, in looking at the message of Jesus and of the older prophets, allowed their message to impact not only our storehouse of knowledge, but our way of understanding our world? Or, have we simply filed it away with all the other useless facts we have learned over the years?
In other words, does the teaching of Jesus merely sit beside the math lessons and the spelling lessons in our thinking? If so, we have failed utterly of Wisdom and of righteousness. Wisdom remains forever separated from and far above knowledge. Knowledge alone can do nothing for character and sense. Wisdom, in applying knowledge correctly to the choices and activities of life shapes character, and determines the moral worth of a man.
It is interesting, as I think on that, to note that it is the man with common sense and the man of no moral worth that are contrasted by Jesus. They are presented to us as the polar opposites of one another. In this I see that it is not the greatness of learning that counts with Him, but the thoroughness. We might think of it as quality being valued over quantity. It’s not what you know, it’s what you do with what you know.
Now, all of that is fine and good, but it still does not drill down to the core of the message. It still does not give me any particular incentive to pursue the better way. But, in understanding the houses and the testing they faced, my incentive is made entirely manifest. In the storm and in the flood I am presented with the trials of life. These are the things that come upon us, things which have no basis in our own actions. I may be as good or as evil as I choose to be, and the same storm will still come. Were I to take New Orleans and its vicinity for an example, I can rest assured that both good folks and evil, both Christians and heathens lost lives and property. It was not, in that sense at least, a matter of who you were, but where.
If I begin to search out the greater point that Jesus is making by the commonplace scenes of His parable, what great reason I have to be wise! If those storms and floods are the trials of my life, the things that disturb my peace, then clearly the house is my life, and I the builder of that life. This is not to suggest that I have somehow created myself, or even that I have created the now that I live in. That is the nonsense twisting of truth that some New Age beliefs would have you to accept. It’s the same nonsense that the power of positive thinking folks would have you swallow. However, the truth of the matter is that Jesus simply makes the point that a large part of who and what we are today is due to the choices we have made in reaching this time. He is not focusing our attention on our power to effect the present or the future, but on our responsibility for past actions.
With that in mind, my current choices, the things I do or refuse to do today, will be amongst those past actions tomorrow, and if I find tomorrow’s present unbearably difficult, I have none to blame but myself. This is not a point to be pressed too far, but within its proper bounds, I think it holds up.
My life, insofar as this parable is presenting it, is a house I have built. However, Jesus is not focused on the house itself, but on the beginnings of that house. He cares little for the walls, the roof, the doors and windows we have constructed, and is far more concerned with what we have built these things upon. How’s the foundation? How’s the terrain upon which that foundation has been laid? These have far more to do with how well a house will withstand the test of time. Likewise, the fundamental principles upon which we have built our lives have far more impact on how that life will withstand its own tests.
Consider the construction of the house for a moment. We know, if not from experience then by the reports we have heard, that foundations can crack. Why do they crack? Because the ground upon which the foundation was laid was either unfit to bear such a load, or was prepared improperly. It must be said, in this regard, that rock and sand in themselves are not really the point here. To build one’s house upon the rock is not a wise thing if that rock is the exposed outcropping of some mountainside. To set a house upon such ground is to know it will be gone in short order, for nothing really fastens it in place. Likewise, as I heard from my African brothers last week, in that land, it is actually the sandy soil that is to be preferred for building. The alternative is a soil rich in clay, which will not settle in place, but continuously shifts with the changing of the weather. It is not impossible to build on either of these soils, but the preparations must fit the terrain. If one must build in the clay, one must dig deep enough to establish a firm footing for his foundation. If one has the sand, he may be able to satisfy the need by packing the sand down sufficiently flat and firm, knowing that it will hold, even if he dig but a small ways.
Turning to Luke’s account of this parable, an interesting piece is added to our picture. It is not just that the wise man chose a rock upon which to build, it is not even that he dug deep to reach that rock. He has also laid a foundation upon the firm footing he has established, and only then does he proceed to raise up walls and roof tree. The foolish man, on the other hand, has not only chosen loose ground to build upon, he has not even bothered to lay a foundation! He’s just slapped up some walls and thought that would suffice. It is like comparing a house to a tent in the face of such disasters as are thrown at them!
So, let us understand that the solid footing itself is not enough, although without it our efforts will surely fail. Neither is the foundation sufficient in itself, for unless its footing is well chosen and well established, it, too, will fail. Both footing and foundation are a necessity, and both require something of us if they are to be sufficient.
Let me look first at the footing. We do indeed wish to have rock upon which to set our foundation, but we don’t want that rock up at the surface. We must dig to reach the rock, and the depth of our digging will add to the firmness of the foundation when it is built. Let me just say by this that if all we have ever done is to accept Jesus, to “pray the sinner’s prayer” and maybe sign some card, we have indeed come to the Rock, but we have not dug down. We need the training of discipleship, of learning just who is this Jesus to Whom we have prayed, to dig into His being and His meaning, before we can really say we have a firm footing to start with.
It is not that we need to add our works to His perfect and finished work to be saved. Not at all! He has done it. The point I would make is that many, having done these little things that were asked of them, think they have truly come to salvation when in fact they have done nothing of the kind. Many in the Church are equally satisfied by this one time show of what may be little more than emotion, and fail to provide these newly converted folk with any sort of discipleship or support. Having never learned to dig down into the Rock of their salvation, what little they have built in that moment will soon be swept away.
Let me look at it from another angle for just a moment. If you have spent any time really thinking about what Jesus said, you must surely have been challenged by it. Much of what He says, particularly in those most intimate encounters such as Nicodemus, or the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, is difficult to make sense of in connection with the conversation He is having. You have to really work at it to see that the conversation is truly connected. What He teaches, even here in the Sermon on the Mount, is perhaps easy enough to take if we don’t look too closely at its implications. But let us see that we are no different than the Pharisees in needing our standards restored, let us see the full impact of loving our neighbor as ourselves, and the sheer impossibility of obedience is overwhelming! Try to shed your Christianese and all the benefits of two thousand years of hindsight, and then listen to Jesus saying that we must eat His body and drink His blood. Is it really any wonder that so many were blown clean off the Rock of salvation at hearing that? I tell you, were He to minister anything so shocking from the pulpits of the Church today, the impact would be no less. Surely the majority of those in the pews would be gone in a flash, never to return!
No, you have to dig into what He is saying, what He is driving at, what He means and what He is before you arrive at that footing that will suffice for you to start your foundation. Yes, and as you start that foundation, you must be certain that the cornerstone is laid square and true, for any least error in its position will be magnified with each successive stone that is added. Stone upon stone, that foundation must be built up, constantly tested to make certain it squares with the cornerstone, until the walls of the foundation rise up from the pit to stand as the platform upon which we may now build our house. Because the foundation is sound and true, the floor that spans the top of the foundation will be trustworthy. Because the foundation lifts all else up from the ground, the walls will not only stand true, but will be kept from the rot caused by contact with the things of the earth.
There is plenty in Scripture to continue the connection of our lives with such house construction. Most famously, perhaps, there is that word from Peter, who had sat here at Jesus’ feet listening to the Word on foundations. “You are being built up to be a spiritual house, a house of God. You are set as living stones in that building whose Cornerstone is Jesus” (1Pe 2:5). Peter, of course, had his understanding of the Cornerstone from Isaiah, who in turn had it from God. “I am laying a tested and costly cornerstone in Zion, to serve as the foundation for all who shall believe. They will not be disturbed. For them, My Justice shall be the measuring line, and My Righteousness the level” (Isa 28:16-17). These are the tools by which the foundation is checked. The house that has set Jesus as the first and chief stone of its foundation, and has from that costly, perfectly prepared stone laid up the complete foundation, measured and leveled by the tools of His Justice and Righteousness, is exactly the sort of house Jesus advises building.
The writer of Hebrews puts us in mind of Haggai 2:6. “In time, a short time, I, the LORD of hosts, will once more shake the heavens and the earth. Sea and land shall both be shaken. Indeed, I will sake all the nations.” Wow! What a passage this is! Look how it continues. They will come to this house with all their wealth, filling this house with glory (Hag 2:7). This, from the King of Glory! Yes, for all silver and all gold is His (Hag 2:8). And, what a reminder that is for us! We who take such great care to earn a livelihood, to get ahead; we who are so anxiously building up our retirement funds and insuring ourselves against loss. We become confused, thinking that all that material store is ours, when in truth it is but put in our charge for a time. All that I am, all that I have, continues to be His whether I am acting in accord with that knowledge or not. Then, comes this promise in regard to this house. “The latter glory of it will be greater than the former, and in this house in the midst of the shaken land I will give peace” (Hag 2:9). In case we have missed it, our writer makes it clear for us. When God said that once again He would shake Creation, the point was that He would remove all such things as can be shaken, until nothing but that which could not be shaken remains (Heb 12:26-27).
Now, come back to the tale of two houses, and the test by which they were measured. Heavy rains and high winds, the irresistible and unpredictable forces of nature came, things which shake the heavens and the earth. One need only look to the trees in such a storm to recognize the shaking, and if the winds rise high enough, we will surely hear that shaking in the windows of our own houses. We will hear the creaking strain of the beams of our houses as they strain to bear up. There is the test of our house’s construction.
I would note, if I have not done so already, that the choice of imagery Jesus has made here is to the point. The sorts of things that came against these houses were not the sorts of things that one must take personal responsibility for. Nobody is to be blamed for the hurricane being formed in the open waters of the ocean. Neither will any be found upon whom the course of that hurricane, and the place it came ashore can be blamed. In the hurt and fear of its aftermath, there will doubtless be those who try. In the sanctimonious halls of those who escaped, there may likewise be those who think to blame the hurricane’s course on the ways of those who lay in its course. But, we must surely recognize that both righteous man and sinner, both good man (if there be such a thing) and bad, suffered the predations of that storm. The storm was not, in that sense a holy retribution. It was but a test. This is evident in how Jesus presents His message.
The storm winds and the flood waters do not come in retribution. They are not the direct result of the choices these two men have made. One chose wisdom, one chose immorality, but both were caused to face the test. Both were faced with exactly that sort of turmoil that breaks in upon us to disturb our peace. Both could ask with equal reason what it was they had done to deserve this. Both had likewise been given the opportunity to make of the trail a cause to glorify God, and in the response to that opportunity lies the difference. Neither man can be seen as responsible for the trial’s coming, but they are most assuredly responsible for the outcome of the trial, and here is the whole point of the message!
However closely we follow after God, we can rest assured that turmoil will come. We are pretty much promised as much. In this life, you will know persecution, tribulation. It is a troubled world, and it is not pleased to be confronted with the shoddiness of its preparations for trouble. Those who are of a mind to persecute Jesus will likewise persecute those in whom He dwells. Those who honor Him with obedience will likewise heed what we have to say from His wisdom (Jn 15:20). The majority out there are in the former category. Trials will come. Even apart from persecution, trials will come.
There will be events in our lives that will test us to the uttermost. Like the floodwaters of the parable, they will crash against the walls of this life we have constructed, and in doing so will show the value of our construction. Have we dug down to the Rock? Have we chosen a firm and unshakable footing upon which to start? Have we dug deep into the rich soil of His Wisdom? Have we measured every step of our construction from the precious Cornerstone that God has laid in Zion? Have we been careful to lay that foundation squared and true? Are righteousness and justice our measure? And what shall we say of the house we have built upon that foundation? Has it continued to be measured by Him? Is it the house that the Lord builds? For, unless He has built that house that is our life, the builder labors in vain. The life that is built is in vain, for it ends only in a futility of death (Ps 127:1).
I have been witnessing just such a shaking trial as this in my own life, and in the lives of my extended family. It is precisely that sort of test at which I and many others effected by it can look and ask, “What have I done to deserve this?” For all that, I have asked that very question a number of times. The answer is, “Nothing.” But, there is this in it: It is showing me where I have constructed well and where I have constructed poorly. It has revealed the weak spots in my building, and torn them clean off the foundation, leaving only that which cannot be shaken. It is exactly as God has promised. He will shake, even in His chosen ones, perhaps especially in His chosen ones, everything that can be shaken until only the unshakable, the steadfast and true remains. All that is worthless in His children, He will take out of them and destroy, leaving them as they were meant to be. The house will have been shaken, but hear again the promise He speaks in the midst of the shaking: “The latter glory of it will be greater than the former, and in this house in the midst of the shaken land I will give peace” (Hag 2:9)!
Now, Haggai was pretty clearly speaking of the House of the Lord, the Temple. But, the Temple was only the symbol. It was a building, the work of the hands of man, and could not possibly hope to hold the King of Glory. But, now He has come and established Himself as the foundation of a new Temple, a Temple not built from stones hewn by the hands of man, but of lives hewn by the hand of God. He, the Master builder, comes and shapes our lives, fashioning us to be square and true, that we may be laid alongside Jesus in the foundation of the real Temple, the spiritual Temple of flesh in which God is pleased to reside. And, in that house He gives peace! There is His shalom. There is all restored as it should be, for every life that is found in the construction of that Temple has been measured, tested by His Righteousness and His Justice, tempered by His Mercy, and set upon the Rock of His Wisdom. That house shall not be shaken, whatever trial may come. Indeed, that is the House He promises even the assaults of every vile soldier of hell will not be able to topple (Mt 16:18). No, it was not Peter upon whom the house stood. How could it be, when he was himself a stone laid next to the Cornerstone? How could he who was a living stone in the wall be confused with the Rock upon which the whole was set? Who else is a Rock besides my God (2Sa 22:32)? There is no one else like Him!
Here, then, is what defines the wise man: He has founded his life upon the Rock. He has dug deep into the rich soil of Wisdom and found a solid footing for his life. Stone upon stone, line upon line, precept upon precept (Isa 28:10) he has raised up the foundational character of his life. In each situation he has encountered, the things that have guided his reaction have been the considerations of what is righteous and what is just in that situation. He is ever measuring himself by those rules, testing himself to ensure he continues to build square and true to the Cornerstone.
Isn’t it amazing to consider that Jesus is not only the choice Cornerstone set at the start of God’s construction in our lives, but also the Rock upon which the Cornerstone is laid? Likewise, as the manifest Wisdom of God, He is the rich soil into which we have dug down to the Rock and laid our precious Cornerstone in place. Truly, everything we are is from Him and through Him, in Him and to Him!
The Rock, Ha Tzur, is one of my favorite titles of God. I would refer to it as a name of God, but we have lost our understanding of what is in a name, so the term title becomes necessary to understand. It is not His name as Jeff is my name. He has but one name, which He has told us. It is, instead, a title, an office, an integral part of who He Is. He is the Rock. He is the place that cannot be shaken. He is the firm footing upon which we can establish ourselves. Those who founded the fastness of Petra thought that in the hard rock of the mountain into which they had carved their city they had security. But, the rock, even the thick bedrock that rose up to form that mountain, is still no more than the shadow of that steadfastness which is God’s. So many have thought that in whatever are the gods of their lives they have found that rock, that steadfast, unshakable basis for their lives, but God, the Rock, when He shakes what can be shaken will shake down to sand and dust those lesser rocks who have thought to displace Him.
The first place I come across this mention of the Rock is in Exodus 33:21-22. Here, we are at the scene of Moses seeking to see God’s face. The promise in God’s answer is so much more than just a reply to His prophet, though. It is a promise to all His children. “There is a place by Me where you shall stand on the rock” (Ex 33:21). Whether or not the Hebrew allows for it, I would be inclined to restructure the punctuation there just a bit. “There is a place by Me where you shall stand: on the Rock.” It is in the Rock that we shall be hidden when the glory of God is too much for us to bear (Ex 33:22). Oh! This is not just for Moses who sought such ultimate intimacy with his Maker. No! As no man can see God and live, and none of us are quite as dead to self as is necessary for such a sight, we all know those times when the glory of God is too much to bear. What else is repentance but the recognition that were we to meet God in our present condition it would surely be the death of us? Oh! But especially in those moments of repentance, God declares that He has hidden us away in a cleft of the Rock. Wrapped in Jesus and in His righteousness, we are able to survive His passage, for what He looks upon is His Son, the Perfect Man. We are hid within Him upon Whom we stand. Jesus is indeed by the Father, seated at His right hand forevermore, there to plead our case before the court of heaven, interceding on our behalf at every moment. And as He is thus occupied, He fulfills that word of God, for He is the solid Rock upon which I stand, and in Whom I am hid from the overwhelming glory of God. In Him, I am tutored at my own pace, never overwhelmed by a weight of glory to great to bear.
This is the Rock upon which I can build my foundation without fear. Here is the firm, unshakable footing for a truly righteous life. All these other things have been nothing but the imaginations of man. All these other things have been polite little philosophies at best, the Codex of the Achievable at worst. What has been built upon these is sure to fall, for there is no permanence to the ideas of man. Such morals as are founded on nothing but opinion change like the wind. How, then, shall they help us stand when the wind blows contrary? They do not stand, they shift. Like a ship with full sail and rudderless, they are driven before the storm, certain to be caught upon the reefs of trial and destroyed.
Oh, but the LORD is my Rock, my Fortress, my Deliverer! Let me emphasize this, personalize this, internalize this! The Lord is my Rock, my Fortress, my Deliverer! He is no impersonal, disinterested God as the deists imagine. He is no vengeful and fickle governor over the powers of nature who must be appeased lest He throw a fit and destroy us. No, and neither is He merely the God of the nation of Israel, or even merely the God over all the nations. He is my God, my Rock, my Deliverer. It’s an incredibly personal thing. It’s an incredibly intimate relationship that my Rock and I share. With all the cares He has in maintaining the order of the universe, He is yet so personally mine that He takes time to shelter me, for He is my Fortress. When He sees me yet again wandering astray, heading into danger in my willfulness, in danger of once more coming under the bondage of sin, He takes time to come rescue me from myself, for He is my Deliverer. As He tutors me in the ways of righteousness, He trains me in my digging to find the only firm basis for my life, for He is my Rock.
Oh, in Him and Him alone can I take refuge. In Him, I find my refuge from sin, my shield and my strength for the battle. In Him, too, I find my refuge from the overwhelming glory of God’s pure glory which must surely be my demise apart from that Refuge. Yes, He and He alone is the strength of my salvation, for He, the Rock, is my Salvation (2Sa 22:2-3). Oh, who else is a Rock besides my God (2Sa 22:32)? Many think they have found their security in their idols. The call to me about the security they have made for themselves, but how I fear for their foundations! They will crack at the first shaking, for they are not founded on the Rock, my Rock. They have heard of Him, have perhaps read of His teaching. They may even have a certain appreciation for His teaching, recognizing the moral worth of His ways, but they have not established themselves on Him, not understood Him as their Rock. They have seen wisdom, but would not dig into it to find their firm basis. They have built for themselves such foundations as seemed fit in their own minds, but these have not been measured against the Cornerstone. The house they have built may look fine, may be elegant of line, but it is structurally unsound, rotten in its beams and waiting with trepidation for that trial which must surely come. The winds will blow eventually, and the torrents come rushing through, and sadly, having seen the choice Stone and rejected Him, it knows in itself what the outcome must surely be. Yes, and the ruin of that house will be great for its knowing.
Having seen that God has identified Himself with and as the Rock for such a long time, how can one come to His comment to Peter and think He was building His church on a man rather than upon Himself? All are familiar enough with the verse. “Truly, you are Peter, the stone, and upon this rock I will build My church. It shall be built to withstand the worst assaults of Hell, and even the worst assaults will not be able to overcome it” (Mt 16:18). The question, I suppose, is whether Peter is the stone or the rock. In short time, there would be evidence that Peter was as fallible as the next man, as capable of ‘losing faith’ as you or I. Storms of great trial would come upon him and he would be seen to falter under the onslaught. Many would have written him off in that moment. Many would have decided he was one of those who were ‘from us but not with us’. “Not one of us” would be the verdict, and he would be cast aside and forgotten. However, Peter was not the foundation, he was a house built upon the foundation, and because of this, in spite of the reactions of a momentary weakness, he was found standing in a very short time. Because his Foundation had determined that he would not be overcome by the assault, only trained, he was not lost to the ministry, but restored to it stronger and wiser. The weak construction that he had built upon the foundation he had was destroyed, to be sure. But, this only served to make a clean start. Having shaken what could be shaken in the crisis of His death, Jesus had left standing in Peter the foundation, the Rock. Peter, restored to fellowship with his beloved Lord and King, was able to rebuild the house of his life, but stronger now, because he had seen where the weak spots were in the first construction. When next he found himself assaulted, when the crisis of his own death came, the assault would be against a stronger house. Though it would indeed be his death, those who assaulted him did not prevail. Faith and God prevailed even in death.
Perhaps we would do well to ask where Jesus had placed the emphasis as He spoke that message to Peter. “Yes, Peter, I gave you that name, and truly you are a stone.” Let me stop there for just a moment to recollect that it was this Peter, this stone, who recognized that we all are being built into the spiritual house of God. We are all living stones, laid up in true measure to the precious Cornerstone (1Pe 5:5-6). Peter understood then, that it was “upon this Rock” that our God was establishing His Church. Upon the very same Rock that David had sung about: like which there was and is no other. The Rock, who is my God, my Deliverer, my Salvation: He is the choice Cornerstone, and He is the firm footing upon which the Cornerstone has long been laid. Indeed, that first step in the foundation of His Church was dug and set before Creation began.
The long eons of History have already proved the point. Throughout that History, the gates of hell have poured forth assault after assault against God’s handiwork. They have had their moments, they have done injury to the people of God, but they never have and never will prevail. At their hands, we have not persecution, but we have never been forsaken by the Rock. We have been struck down, but our Deliver and Salvation has not suffered us to be destroyed (2Co 4:9). That is the story of God’s Church. It is the reason that the Church as we have it today is known as the Church Militant. It is ever on a war footing. It must be, for the forces of the enemy lay thick about it, and even within the walls are treacherous spies and subversives, seeking to weaken her defenses. But the Lord is her Sword and her Shield, her strong Tower against the enemy, and the gates of hell will never prevail against the Church whose Cornerstone is the Christ of God, whose foundation is built up, layer upon layer, precept upon precept, martyr upon martyr, ever and always measured against the Righteousness and the Justice that is God’s very nature.
It is precisely because the Church is built upon the Rock Christ Jesus and upon no fallen man that the gates of hell cannot possibly prevail, for He Who is the Foundation and the Footing of the Church is greater than he who propels his forces out from their lairs to seek the destruction of the Church. He is greater than the infiltrating forces of humanism, greater than the insidious lie of acceptable homosexuality, greater than the eroding acid of infidelity. He is greater than any weapon or attack that our enemy can devise, and because He is greater, she, His bride, shall stand secure and strong.
Now, lest I lose sight of the main point Jesus was making, let it be said bluntly: the one who knows this Christ and His teaching, but refuses to put it into practice is a moron. He is morally worthless, and not fit for any good work whatsoever. He may, in spite of his unfitness, manage to do things that look good in the eyes of man, but he has done nothing that is truly good. He cannot, for he rejects the Teacher of all that is good.
Having stated the moral problem clearly and plainly, let me also say this: We all of us show ourselves morons in responding to this knowledge. Every one of us knows in himself that there are instructions He has plainly imparted to us that we simply choose to forget. We are all of us guilty of having neglected our lessons in one degree or another. But, our God is determined that the hidden rebellions that we allow in our lives will be laid out in the open and dealt with. He is determined to shake off all the shaky construction we have done in our partial obedience. He is determined to see us built up as living stones, firmly established in the foundation He Himself has laid. This does not in any way reduce our personal responsibility. We are responsible for the construction we have done, and we are responsible for seeing to the correcting of the flaws in that construction.
As I read elsewhere this morning, His word does not go forth in vain. He will accomplish His purpose – even in me. If He has instructed me to pursue a particular course and I have stubbornly gone my own way, I can rest assured that He will continue to challenge my ‘progress’ with stronger and stronger means until I am willing to go the way He has told me. I can be sure that by the time I have learned the lesson of obedience, I will be glad to go that way. I will doubtless wonder at my own foolishness in having insisted on the opposite course for so long. “It is hard for you to kick against the goads,” He said to Paul. It is an experience every follower of Christ knows, if he has been at it very long at all. There are those things, those habits, that He is telling us to relinquish and do away with, but we will not have it. Not yet. But, His Word accomplishes that for which He is sent. If He has gone forth to vanquish that particular enemy in my life, I can be assured that however much I may cling to my enemy, he will be vanquished and I shall know my freedom.
Again my mind is turned to the imagery of the storms come against those two houses. I pointed out earlier that the storms were not a response or reaction to the efforts of the two builders. They were not responsible for the storm, only for the house each had built, for how it would withstand the storms. This is a truth worth knowing, to be sure. Yet, there is another sense in which we, particularly we who claim to be followers of the Way, do indeed bring such storms upon ourselves. It is in those times of willful disobedience that we are breeding storms for our future. We hear meteorologists talk of how certain weather patterns far out to sea just seem to breed hurricanes which will then come in their assault upon the land. Likewise, there is that in our disobedience which breeds great trials that will then come in their assault upon the house of character.
Familiarity, we are told, breeds contempt. Willfulness in matters of spiritual training breeds stronger training. Here, then, lies the distinction between those storms that come without obvious cause and those that come in response to our stubbornness. It is a minor distinction, but worth attending to. The earlier storms, as much as they may rage and blow, and as fearsome as they may be to endure, are in reality the easier training. If we will but look to what it was those storms have ripped away, and undertake to make repairs in accord with the plan of our Master Builder, well and good. The trial is past, and the lesson learned. If, however, we choose to rebuild things just as they were before, what good has the lesson done us? Clearly, that particular manner of teaching did not get the job done. More training must ensue, until our Teacher is certain we have grasped His meaning. This is the breeding of future storms, our refusal to pay proper heed to the point of the present storm!
One simple, pragmatic question we might ask ourselves in the midst of the storm, or in its immediate aftermath, is whether we would prefer to be done with this particular lesson now, or rather prefer the advanced training course. Thanks be to God that we can, in spite of the wisdom or foolishness of our decisions, be certain of this: He will not send against us such trials as we cannot endure. Oh, be sure that we will doubtless make noises as if our trials were most assuredly beyond endurance. Yet, we will inevitably come to know that they were not. The proof is in our emergence at the other side of trial. But, how will we emerge? Will we have sought the purpose for the trial and learned from it, or will we settle for bare survival? Until we awake to the fact that these trials don’t come simply to harass us but to train us, we will never have the benefit of the trials.
How often do I counsel my daughter that so long as she views her schoolwork as no more than an odious task that must be endured, she will fail to draw from that work the greatest benefits? It is no different with us, as we dwell under the teaching of the Holy Spirit. So long as we refuse to see the purpose of what He is doing, so long as we look upon the lessons as odious, we will simply do what we must to squeak by, and utterly miss the benefit of the training. Remember those days when you would study for the test? Oh, how you would cram that information in! Oh, how you would pray that it would stay in just long enough to get through the test! Oh, how quickly all that information was disposed of so soon as the test was over! We get the same way with the training God provides. When we see the test coming, how we turn to Him, how we dig into His Word, and implore our Teacher to come tutor us in preparation. But, when the test has receded into the past, what then? Have we let that which we dug into envelop us? Having found the solid footing of Wisdom, have we established our foundation there, deep in the soil of His righteousness, or do we simply climb out of the hole now the storm’s passed, and go build another house on the sand?
Lord help me. I know that this has been a season of such testing in my own life, and I know how easily I could simply tuck the whole experience away, never to be looked at. Let it not be so. Grant me the wisdom, oh Wisdom, to rebuild in a new fashion, to look for those places You are shaking loose in me and see to their removal. Holy God, reveal those weakened spots, and show me how You would have it rebuilt. Let me test myself constantly against the measure of Your Righteousness, Your Justice and Your Mercy, and not fear to tear down and start over again wherever the work does not measure true. Thank You, Holy Father, for this time of shaking, for I know that Your hand is with me, and I know Your purposes are not for destruction but for construction. Indeed, all You do is good, though so many accuse You of violence. Oh, that they had eyes to see! Oh, that You would speak wisdom to them in ways they can hear! Oh, that they would also learn from the trials You have sent to correct, rather than insisting on harder lessons in future! Oh, that I would do the same. Holy Spirit, keep this heart soft to be molded by You. Keep these senses tuned to Your training, never dulled, always responsive to Your slightest touch.
