Day Twenty-one

“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.” (Matt. 7:24)

Scripture Reading: Matthew 7:24–29

The first signs of dawn whispered me awake. I slipped out of bed, peeked through the heavy hotel-room curtains, and marveled at the sunrise I didn’t want to miss. We were basking in some much-needed rest a thousand miles from home. I grabbed my journal, left the family sleeping, and hastened to spend time with the One who gave the seas their boundaries.

I slipped off my shoes to enjoy the cool, coarse sand beneath my feet, stood on the shore, and beheld the Artist at work. After God and I exchanged our glad good mornings, I glanced up and down the beach. No one in sight, yet I could see the remains of yesterday’s sand castles. Parents and children alike worked for hours on structures doomed only to melt into the ocean. It was just a game. They knew it when they built them. But what our Scriptures describe today is not a game.

Notice the common denominators in the passage. Both men built a house. Both faced a storm. What is a house? Walls of protection, a refuge, a fortress, a place to rest and fellowship, often a place that defines our worth, our status. A place to call our own. Each of us builds a house for ourselves in one way or another.

Then came the storm. In every life what we’ve built is subject to raging winds and rising floods. They will come. Christ warns that the only indestructible house is the one built upon the rock of His teachings. The strength of our houses is not dependent on our salvation. It’s not dependent on our faith. It’s dependent on our willingness to live according to God’s Word. An unsettling thought indeed.

You see, we can be never-miss-a-church-service Christians but still never get “into” God’s Word. Excuses like “I’m just not the studious type” don’t cut it. We are a people desperate for God’s Word. More than anything, God’s people need to know His Word and be willing to give Him the freedom to adjust our lives to its precepts. Guarantees come from living our lives according to Scripture.

Yes, storms will come, but we have an absolute promise—our lives will not collapse. Every time we leave a Bible study or a sermon and methodically begin to discount the truth we’ve heard or apply it to others, a few shingles slide off our roofs, the Sheetrock crumbles in a place or two, and our foundations crack just a little bit more.

But the best of news prevails. Every time we receive, believe, and heed His Word, He nails new shingles to our roofs, He reinforces our walls with fresh Sheetrock, and His wet cement hardens beneath our feet. The storms come—but the house stands. As long as we have breath, it is never too late for a foolish man to become wise.

Better to have a hut on the Rock than a castle on the sand.