In this sermon on the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Builders, speaker Robert Bosley emphasizes the importance of building one's life on the solid foundation of the words of Jesus. The foundation is not just hearing, but also obeying the teachings of Christ. The parable highlights the distinction between the wise builder who builds on the rock and the foolish builder who builds on sand. The storm in the parable represents the final day of judgment when the wrath of God will be poured out on unrepentant sinners. The ultimate outcome is that the house built on the rock stands, while the house built on sand falls.

Amen. Good afternoon church. If you would take out your copies of the scriptures and open to Matthew, Matthew chapter 7. Matthew chapter 7. We're continuing our look at some of the parables taught by our Lord Jesus during his earthly ministry.

And as I was Reading through and reflecting on which parables to do this Lord's Day, part of my decision to do this passage was motivated by a conversation I had last Sunday with a prospective member of our church who said that this passage was instrumental in her conversion and that grabbed my attention and I was already considering this and so that solidified it in my mind that we're going to look at this parable of the wise and foolish builders. Parable of the wise and foolish builders. Parable of the wise and foolish builders. Matthew chapter seven, beginning of verse 26, or sorry, end verse 24. Matthew seven, verse 24.

Therefore, whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock and the rain descended the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house and it did not fall for it was founded on the rock but everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand and the rain descended floods came the wind and the winds blew and beat on that house and it fell and great was its fall. Let's pray. Father we thank you again for your many gifts. Thank you God for the wonderful gift of your church and of the Lord's day that we can have this time together. What a delight it is.

And Lord as we look again into your Word May you show us wonderful things. May you instruct us this afternoon. Help me, Father, to speak as I ought to speak, open hardened hearts and stopped ears. May you cause your word to come alive and have its work in the hearts and souls of those who are here. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen. So this passage, this parable, There's some debate, is it really considered a true parable? Is it more of an illustration? But regardless, this is one of the more familiar stories that Jesus told. They're children's books.

People know this parable, this picture of the wise and foolish builder for obvious reasons. It's short, it's attention grabbing, and it seems to be fairly easy to understand, but it has a short, kind of a punchy message and people can grab hold of it and it is easy to remember. However, I know for myself the interpretation of this that I grew up hearing and the interpretation that you will hear in many churches is not really what this passage is teaching. There is an application to the way it's taught, but they substitute the main point for some secondary application. So oftentimes the way this is presented is a secondary thought, a secondary application of this passage while missing the main point.

And so today I want us to be sure that we get the main point. And so I want to look at this parable and we're going to look at it literally from the ground up. We're going to begin with these two builders and their foundation and then we're going to look at the house itself and then we're going to look at the storm that comes against these houses. So first we're going to begin at the ground floor at the foundation. Now we are used to hearing and reciting in accord with the hymn that we occasionally sing, the church's one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord.

And we confess and say yes and amen to that. Paul uses that language. He says, for no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. But in another place, Paul uses the same language and he slightly modifies what he's applying it to. He says that the church is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus being the chief cornerstone.

And we see this throughout scripture. We see a word picture or a term or a metaphor that seems to have a really concrete identification, but it's actually applied in different ways to different things throughout Scripture depending on context. For instance, both Jesus and the devil are called lions in Scripture. Jesus is the lion of Judah and our adversary is a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. Now does that mean the Bible is trying to say Jesus and the devil are the same thing?

Or the same person? No. It's using a similar metaphor in different contexts to teach us something about who Jesus is and about who the devil is. Similarly, we can do it again with Christ. He is called the bright morning star in Revelation, but the king of Babylon is also called the morning star in Isaiah 14.

We have to be comfortable with the way scripture uses language. There are times where terms can be applied as a metaphor to multiple different things. The Bible is not contradicting itself. It's simply using language in a natural way where a metaphor can be used in different situations in different circumstances. So when we come to this and we see the foundation, we see the image of a rock, let's not jump immediately to saying that it's Christ himself because Jesus actually doesn't say that.

What does he say? Everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who builds his house on the rock. The rock, the solid foundation here is not Jesus per se in the parable or in the sermon that Jesus is preaching here. It's the words of Jesus. It is the sayings or the teaching of Jesus that is the solid rock.

It is the foundation. There is an emphasis here not necessarily on the person and work of Christ, but on his doctrine, on his teaching, on his saying, on his words. Now what are his words? Well, in context, in Matthew, the first time that Jesus teaches a crowd is the word that we repeat to every person for the rest of time until he returns, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near. All the way to just in the preceding chapter, Jesus then says, be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect and everything in between.

And by extension, we could say all of scripture are the words of Christ, because it is Christ who gave Moses the law on Mount Sinai, and it is the Spirit of Christ that has inspired all scripture. So all of scripture is the word or the sayings the teachings of Christ because it all comes from him and bears witness to him and what he has done. And so when Jesus presents this parable, he is instructing that this foundation that one must build their house on, which we'll talk about what the house is in a minute, but this house must be built on the solid foundation of the words of Christ. But is it enough simply to hear? Oh no, what does Jesus say?

Everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does them. There is a serious emphasis not just on hearing but on doing. Obedience that follows hearing and reception of the Word. What you do matters. It does matter.

So the foundation, the solid foundation, the foundation built on the rock is hearing and believing and obeying the words of Jesus. Look at the the foolish man in verse 26. Everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does not do them. This is the hypocrite. This is the false convert, the false professor who hears the words of Jesus, maybe even gladly, maybe even professes faith, but he does not follow through.

He does not obey. I mean, we can look in just the preceding couple of verses. That is the context of this sermon. Look in verse 21, what Jesus has said earlier in the sermon. Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven.

Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name, cast out demons in your name, and done many wonders in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness." We heard this morning the glorious doctrine of justification by faith alone apart from works, and what I'm saying now is not in contradiction to that in any way. Absolutely, yes and amen, we are justified by faith apart from works. But faith without works is meaningless.

True saving faith will result in good works. Sanctification follows justification, necessarily. The one leads to the other. And if you say, Lord, Lord, and do not obey the one you call Lord, what real hope do you have? Jesus says your end will be being cast out.

So that's the foundation. Let's look at the houses. Two things. Some things that the houses that are built have in common and what distinguishes them. So first what they have in common.

Now in the metaphor, in the parable, when Jesus, he doesn't spend a whole lot of information about the building, it's a house. But there wasn't a whole lot of architectural variety in first century Israel, especially among the poor, which is Jesus' primary audience. One house largely looked like another. And so we can presume that in this story, the houses probably look pretty similar. They would look the same.

From the outside you wouldn't necessarily be able to tell the difference. Now I'm not a house builder. I build things that go in the houses. I don't put the houses up. You don't want me to do that job.

I don't know anything about that. But we have guys in this church who do, and I'm sure that they can confirm it really matters a whole lot what you put down first before you build the house. That will change everything. You can make two houses that look identical, But where you put them and what you put under them will determine which one stands and which one falls. And that's what Jesus is getting at here.

These two houses from the outside may have looked the same. They also face the same storm. Now, we'll look at the storm more in a minute, but suffice to say right now that both of these houses, they may look the same, unknown to the outside world. They have two entirely different foundations, But they look the same. And you might expect going into this same storm, they would have the same outcome.

But this common storm shows and reveals the different foundations. They face the same storm. Both face the same thing. Just because the wise man was wise and built on the rocket did not exempt him from going through the storm. He still suffered the storm.

And in the same way the foolish man was not given a pass because he was a fool. The storm came without mercy. So these two houses may look the same, and they face the same storm, but they do not have the same outcome. And that's what distinguishes them ultimately. The one stands and the one falls.

Now, why does one stand and the other fall? Because they have two different builders. You have a wise and a foolish builder. Now when we think of wisdom and folly or being wise and being foolish, we can often in our in our own mind in our own time we can often just equate that with being smart and dumb. Biblically that's not what wisdom and foolishness mean.

Wisdom is, there's an element of knowledge to wisdom, but it's not simply having intellectual knowledge. It's not simply being book smart. Scripturally speaking, wisdom is applied knowledge. It's applied intelligence. It is knowledge that affects what you do and causes you to act in the right way.

And biblically, that right way is God's way. The wise builder, he builds because he's building in accordance with what God has said. Just as if you build a really pretty house today, and you just say, well, I think it'll still stand even though I don't put a foundation. No, this is still God's world. And that house will still fall down.

No matter how much you really want it to stand. Your own thoughts, your own feelings, your aspirations do not change how God's ways and how God's world works. The foolish man, He doesn't take the time to consider what he's building on. He doesn't go through the accounting of the resources or the land. He doesn't do what needs to be done.

He just does this haphazardly with a disastrous results. Now it's interesting in Luke's parallel he amplifies the the wisdom of the wise builder he says he digs down deep and founds his house on the rock. The contrast of the wise and foolish cannot be more stark. The foolish just goes out unaware, unconcerned, utterly ignorant and unwilling to be taught and just says, yeah, right there, That's perfect. I'll just build the house there and the wise man He hears these words of Jesus.

He digs down deep and he builds his house on the solid foundation So what you do matters because remember in the parable what are we saying? The foundation, the solid rock is hearing and doing the words of Christ. It is hearing and obedience. As I said this does not contradict what we heard this morning. The Bible is crystal clear.

Faith alone saves, is faith alone that justifies. But faith that is only in the mind and only in words is not real faith. It is not genuine saving faith. That is what James calls a dead faith. Faith without works is dead.

We live by faith and that faith motivates us to good works. The book of Ephesians was mentioned earlier and I'm going to bring it up again Ephesians chapter 2 1 through 10 is probably aside from what we're in right now in Romans probably the preeminent passage on salvation by faith alone. But how does Ephesians two, one through 10 end in verse 10? Paul writes, for we are his workmanship. We are this thing that He has made with His hands.

We are His creation, His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. And that should there isn't a, well, maybe I could, I should do these things. It's not a mere suggestion or an idea. If you have an opportunity to get around to it, you might do these good works. No, that is a statement of purpose or a result, God's determined result.

The purpose for which he makes you a new creation in Christ is that you would live and do these good works. That's what he's saying there in Ephesians 2 10. Or as Paul says in chapter three of Romans, do we then make void the law through this faith? Certainly not. On the contrary, we establish the law.

We uphold the law. We cause the law to stand properly through our faith Salvation is by grace through faith alone But real saving faith is never alone. And so that is what distinguishes these two men. One is wise, He hears the words and he obeys. He does the He does the things that Jesus commands and his house stands.

It endures the storm. Now the storm. Consider the storm probably the most common interpretation of the storm, and this is again an application of it, is that this storm is a picture of the trials and difficulties of life. That you lose your job, you had somebody make fun of you for your faith, or even something serious like actual persecution or harassment, mistreatment. That's how it's usually applied.

It's talking about getting through the ups and downs of life. That's what the storm is a picture of, the downs of life. And so this is saying if you build your life on Christ you can endure the suffering of this world easier because you have Jesus as your foundation. That is true. So when I say that's not the main point here, don't hear me say that that's not true.

Absolutely, you can endure hardship in this life better if you are walking with Jesus, if you are living in obedience to his commands. Because again, this is God's world. If you live in God's ways, you will have a better time in God's world. It will work out better for you. So absolutely, there is a genuine application of that.

But that is absolutely not what the primary intention of this passage is. Nor is it primarily what a storm means in any other place in scripture. We, Somewhere along the line of interpretation and preaching, we've equated storms with trials, and I don't know why, because that's not what the Bible does. The Bible uses the imagery of a storm to picture and convey God's judgment every single time. For instance, I think Jesus is almost borrowing from Ezekiel 13 when he's giving this parable.

Ezekiel 13 verse 10, in this passage in Ezekiel, he is rebuking the false prophets, which is actually what Jesus is doing in the sermon. He's talking about false prophets. So Ezekiel 13 you've got the same thing God is speaking to the prophet Ezekiel concerning the false prophets in the land, and he says in verse 10, "'Because, indeed, because they have seduced my people,' saying, "'Peace, when there is no peace,' and one builds a wall and they plaster it with untempered mortar, say to those who plaster it with untempered mortar that it will fall. There will be flooding rain and you, oh great hailstone, shall fall and a stormy wind shall tear it down. Surely when the wall has fallen, will it not be said to you where is the mortar with which you plastered it therefore says the Lord God I will cause a stormy wind to break forth in my fury and there shall be a flooding rain in my anger and great hailstones in fury to consume it so I will break down the wall you have plastered with untempered mortar and bring it down to the ground so that its foundation will be uncovered it will fall and you shall be consumed in the midst of it.

Then you shall know that I am the Lord. Thus will I accomplish my wrath on the wall and on those who plastered it with untimpered mortar. And I will say to you the wall is no more, nor those who plastered it. That is the prophets of Israel who prophesy concerning Jerusalem and who see visions of peace for her when there is no peace, says Lord Yahweh. It is a picture of God's wrath, his judgment against these false teachers and an apostate nation.

And we see this imagery in other places. In Revelation, we are repeatedly told of noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake. And these are pictures of the wrath of God on the world in his judgment. And sometimes the storms themselves are actually not just pictures of wrath, but they are the wrath of God as in the book of Exodus. Moses stretched out his rod toward heaven and the Lord sent thunder, hail and fire darting to the ground and the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt.

So there was hail and fire mingled with the hail so very heavy that there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation." So storms in scripture are pictures and even sometimes the very instruments of the wrath of God. Now often these are temporal judgments on a people or on a king or some other individual or group that has come under his just judgment. But ultimately, all these storms point forward to a much greater storm. All these displays of God's wrath throughout time and in the nations point forward to a final day of wrath, when it's not going to be just one individual or a few or one nation, but where all nations will stand before him and give an account. That is the ultimate storm that every man, woman, and child will face.

That is the storm that Jesus is talking about here. It is the storm, the day of judgment. And the context, the context demands that we look at or we accept that view. Again, what did he say in verse 23, I will declare to them, I never knew you'd depart from me, you who practice lawlessness." He says, on that day, what day? That day when he comes to judge the world in righteousness.

Even earlier, verse 17, Even so, every good tree bears bad, or sorry, every good tree bears good fruit, a bad tree bears bad fruit, a good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. That is the day of judgment. That is what we have here. This storm that these houses face alike is the final day of judgment when the wrath of God will be poured out on unrepentant sinners.

And when you stand before God on that day and you are called to give an account and that storm is coming, What will you say? What is your foundation? What have you built your life and your hope on? Will you find yourself standing on the firm foundation of Christ and his word. Now I'm not saying that unless you've lived perfect obedience to Jesus you will find yourself destroyed on that day.

Jesus does not expect perfection. He knows it won't happen. But has there been, as an outflow of a truly changed heart, has there been a life of a sincere desire to obey your Lord? When that day of judgment comes, will you stand before him on the firm foundation of faith in Christ and true heartfelt obedience to him over your life, however long God gives you to live as a believer? Or will you stand before him on the existing and unstable sand of unbelief and hypocrisy.

Because remember, the houses probably look the same. We can't know the heart, but we are warned that there are false teachers. We are warned that there are hypocrites. There are those who make a great show with their mouth. They hear the words and they may even say that they believe and obey them.

But on that day, all pretense will be done away with. The real foundation will be exposed Because some will stand and some will fall. So what is your foundation today? Where do you stand? What have you built your house on?

What have you built your life on? You say you believe. The demons believe and tremble. Do you live like you believe? Are you living in obedience to the Lord again, not perfectly, but sincerely?

Or do you find yourself on sand today? If that's you, hear and obey the saying of Jesus, repent for the kingdom of heaven is near. It is near, it's at hand, both in that one the day of judgment is closer now than it has ever been before. We are one day closer. But also it's near in that all you have to do is reach out with the hand of faith and take hold of it.

It is not far from you. It is not a rigor. It is not a challenge. It is near. Just reach out by faith and take hold.

Come to Christ, hear his words, and spend the rest of however long God gives you, building your life on the foundation of Christ. I wanna finish with a great paragraph from Matthew Henry's commentary on this passage. He sums it up so well. It's a little bit long, so bear with me. Christ here shows that it will not be enough to own him for our master only in word and tongue.

It is necessary to our happiness that we believe in Christ, that we repent of sin, that we live a holy life, that we love one another. This is His will, even our sanctification. Let us take heed of resting in outward privileges and doings lest we deceive ourselves and perish eternally as multitudes do with a lie in our right hand. Let everyone that names the name of Christ depart from sin. There are others whose religion rests in bare hearing and it goes no further.

Their heads are filled with empty notions. These two sorts of hearers are represented here as two builders. This parable teaches us to hear and do the sayings of the Lord Jesus. Some may seem hard to flesh and blood, but they must be done. Christ is laid for a foundation and everything beside Christ is sand.

Some build their hopes upon worldly prosperity, others upon outward profession of religion. Upon these they venture, but they are all sand, too weak to bear such a fabric as our hopes of heaven. There is a storm coming that will try every man's work. When God takes away the soul, where is the hope of the hypocrite? The house fell in the storm when the builder had most need of it and expected it to be a shelter to him.

It fell when it was too late to build another. May the Lord make us wise builders for eternity. Let's pray. Oh father I pray that you would make us wise builders for eternity. God may we truly consider our own hearts, consider our lives.

God reveal to us if there is any uncleanness or unrepented sin. God show us even our secret and hidden faults. Lord that we may walk uprightly before you in holiness. Lord help us to be a holy people who love you and follow the Lamb wherever he goes. God may we not merely be hearers of your word but doers also.

Lord go with us the rest of this day and the rest of this week. Help us Lord to be doers of your word. Help us to love one another and help us, Lord, as you give us opportunity and give us grace and strength, help us to build your kingdom and build our lives on that foundation of Christ and his words. And in his name, we pray. Amen.