A Solid Foundation

"Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a sensible man who built his house on the rock."

Matthew 7:24


People like options. A shopping trip to Wal-Mart or the local grocery store will quickly prove this point. Take toilet paper for instance. Small rolls. Medium rolls. Big rolls. Giant rolls. "I-accidentally-drank-some-water-on-my-foreign-mission-trip" rolls. Options are everywhere, with every item and every brand. We don't like either-or decisions. Perhaps that is why we struggle so much with the teachings of Jesus. He doesn't hesitate to tell us that life's options are limited; we are either sheep or goats, wheat or tares, light or darkness, seeing or blind, hearing or deaf, trusting or worrying, selfless or selfish, wise or foolish. In this passage, found in its entirety in Matthew 7:24-27, the distinction between wisdom and foolishness is differentiated in Jesus' lesson by way of rock and sand. We are all building on a foundation. Jesus clearly states that we build wisely on rock by acting on his words, or we build foolishly on sand by ignoring them. No other options exist. Ask yourself a simple, either-or question: Where am I building? Rock or sand?