And everyone who hears these words of Mine
In Luke Luke 6:46, He says everyone who comes to me. Everyone who hears or reads Jesus’ words is responsible for activing on them. Although many at least intend to act on them, not everyone does.
This week we’re looking at the false Christian, the pseudo-Christian, the carnal Christian, the one who just hears the word, and deceives himself into thinking that this is enough. If someone hasn’t truly trusted Jesus with their life, their eternity, then they don’t really have saving faith in Jesus.
and does not act on them
Jesus says that the difference between the wise and the foolish builder is that the wise builder acts on the words of Jesus, incorporating Him into the life he is building as the foundation, and the foolish one does not. Jesus wants us to have lasting fruit, and the only way that this is going to happen is if we serve Him, abide in Him. We are the branches, He is the vine. Without Him we can do nothing. (John 15:1-17)
will be like a foolish man
So, What does it mean to be a “foolish builder”? The wise man dug deep and laid a foundation for his house, whereas the foolish man did not dig at all, and did not take time nor trouble to lay a foundation, he just started building upon the sand. Foolish people are always in a hurry; they have no time to wait for what God wants them to do. Psalm 127:1 Unless the LORD builds the house, the builders labor in vain. It’s foolishness to build without the Lord as the foundation, and being in control of the finished structure. (Proverbs 19:2). No time for a true relationship with Jesus, but just wants the RESULTS of a relationship with Jesus.
Judas Iscariot, the foolish builder
Judas Iscariot had all the tools and resources handed to him to construct a house on a solid foundation, and yet chose to build his house on the sand. Judas never believed Jesus to be God. Judas is never recorded as calling Jesus “Lord,”–just “Rabbi,” Do you see why making Jesus truly the Lord of your life from the outset of your relationship with Him is so important? The other disciples, at times, made great professions of faith and loyalty to Jesus: Simon Peter in John 6:68, Nathaniael in John 1:49 Tomans in John 11:16 and John 20:28. But Judas made no such profession, he was a skeptic. He seems to have had little or no personal relationship with Jesus–when the disciples are listed in in Matthew 10:2-4; Mark 3:16-19 and Luke 6:14-16, the order is believed to indicate the relative closeness of their personal relationship with Jesus and Judas is always listed last. Judas was concerned about what he could get from Jesus materially—the benefits of a suppose-ed relationship with Jesus. He was consumed with greed to the point of betraying the trust of not only Jesus, but also his fellow disciples as well. In John 12:5-6 we see that Judas cared nothing for serving the poor, as Jesus did, but instead stole from the money bag—which was the money that Jesus and the disciples lived on. Judas may have followed Jesus physically, and even paid some lip-service to him, calling him rabbi, but his heart was far from Jesus. Like many false-Christians, Judas thought that he could pick and choose, receiving and obeying only those of Jesus’ words that appealed to him.
We have to truly have a personal relationship with Jesus, and make Him Lord of our lives, acknowledging that He is the Son of God, and has died for our sins, and was raised again, so that we would have the hope of a relationship with God, and eternal life!
But, have you ever thought of the self-centerdness and stubborness it took for Judas to sit with Jesus day after day for three years, and not get that Jesus was the Son of God, and was offering him Eternal Life? It’s the same kind of self-centerness and bull-headedness that it takes to sit in a bible-believing and bible-teaching church for years, and still not understand the need for a personal relationship with Jesus. A person with this foolish mentality does not trouble to listen to instruction. He thinks his ideas about God are best, not God’s ideas about God, or anyone else ideas about God, but only his own—this is the very essence of “every man doing what is right in his own eyes” that we see as such a bad example in the book of Judges.
The Christian and the Carnal Christian
The true Christian and the false generally both go to church, although the attendance of the true Christian might be a bit better! They sit and listen to precisely the same gospel; they may even like hearing the sermon some weeks. They have a desire for forgiveness, but the false has an insistence that it’s on his terms, and not with true humility, submission and repentance before God. They may come to church of peace, and a break from all the noise and hustle and bustle outside the church. They desire comfort and consolation—and there’s nothing wrong with that, but they musnt stop there! They must find the source of this comfort and rest and peace in the person and Lordship of Jesus over their lives.
Who built his house on the sand
When the house is built it’t a little bit too late to examine the foundation. The time to get your foundation right is at the beginning of building a house. If the foundation is wrong, everything else is wrong.
The Foolish Man Does Not Dig Deeply
One of the great problems of the foolish man is that he does not dig deeply. We see a similar example in Matthew 13:20-21, of this lack of a serious and deeply heartfelt commitment to Jesus when Jesus is explaining the meaning of the parable of the sower 20 The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. It’s not God’s word, the seed, that is different, but the heart here is different. This heart is rocky, with little soil, a heart with a lack of personal depth or maturity. Notice all of the time-words. Immediately receive it, only temporary, immediately fall away. Notice the short period of effectiveness of the Word in this type of heart. This is a man in a hurry, who’s careless in his building, without a serious commitment to Jesus. There is a cost to discipleship, and it takes the deepest commitment. As Jesus reminds us in Luke 14:27-28 27 Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. 28 For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it?
27 And the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and it fell—and its collapse was great.”
And Pseudo-Christians, false-Christians are the very sort of people that fall for the prosperity gospel’s message of God as only a God of love, who would never hold anyone accountable. And when the rain begins to fall, the lies of the prosperity gospel make them bitter toward God. It leaves them unprepared for the storms of life. And, so what happens when when affliction or persecution comes, as it surely will? This person falls away. We don’t want to put all our efforst into building our little house on the sand, only to find that it is washed away in a flood.
28 When Jesus had finished these words, the crowds were amazed at His teaching; 29 for He was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.
The sermon on the Mount is Jesus’ great lesson to the disciples, in His authority as the Son of God about the Way to live our lives as Citizens of Heaven. Jesus shows that righteousness through works is impossible to achieve, because life as a Citizen of Heaven depends on an inner righteousness unachievable by human effort. It’s not about outer works, but the inner attitude of the heart, based on the foundation of Jesus Himself, and what He has done on the cross, and motivated by love for Him, inspired by the Holy Spirit to overflowing outward acts of righteousness, which help others and also provide real evidence to ourselves that we’ve been saved from our sins. A great lesson on what it means to be a true disciple of Christ. It’s only when we make Him the center of our lives, that we find love for God and then love for others because He loves them. We find the Joy of God, because in Him is Joy, and live everlasting. We find Peace of God that surpasses all understanding, because He is the prince of Peace. Build your life on Him. He will never let you down. And you will find contentment, despite any circumstances, storms, wind and rain that life brings your way.