Building your life and faith well

One of my most favourite things about Jesus is his ability to talk and high and to talk low often at the same time. What do I mean by that? I find that the more I read his teachings the more I find there is a profoundness that is extremely high level that I have missed the number of other times I have read the text and yet there is also a lowness to it that the text has meant something to me over the years. The new and ground learning is powerful and all, but the low and simple meaning doesn’t lose its value in all of that.

One of the teachings of Jesus I find to be this way is the way he ends the Sermon on the Mount according to Matthew. In Matthews account of the Gospel Jesus ends the sermon with these words:

24 “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. 26 And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. 27 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”

 The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Mt 7:24–27.

According to Jesus, all the teachings he has offered in this sermon leave each of the hearers with a choice to make. Will they hear and practice what has been spoke about or will they simple be hearers who do not put these teachings into practice.

This is simple, and I am sure that you have heard it before. Of course, Jesus then lays out in metaphor or parable depending on who you ask the consequences of practicing or not practicing what he taught. The picture he puts before us is one of two builders, one who built on the rock and the other on the sand and he shows one was able to withstand the winds and waves because they were built on the sturdy rock where the others home came down in a big crash because it was built on the sand and couldn’t withstand the wind and the rain.

This is all straight forward. The summary can and has often been for me, hear and do what Jesus says and you will withstand the winds and rain when they come in your life. Hear but do not do and you will suffer great consequence.

I then heard a few years ago that the work of building on the rock is harder work physically and the same can be understood spiritually that building the type of life Jesus outlines in his sermon on the mount is going to be hard work but it will be worth it one day.

The latest thing that has stuck out to me that I would like to offer you too is that it is a daily pursuit. I used to think that the point was to hear the words, obey them and move on but the truth is the obeying of the words is a daily choice. It must be done daily almost like laying one brick at a time. The journey we are on friends is a daily one and we get the privilege of choosing daily what type of bricks we will use to build our homes.

I hope this helps you thrive in life and faith and build it well.