Sermon: Foundations of Sand

Remnant Idolatries
#1749
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Given 24-Feb-24; 81 minutes 2024-02-24

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I would like us to reach back in our memories (three weeks ago when I spoke the last time) and consider again the foundation materials that Jesus mentions in Matthew 7:24-27. Remember I talked quite a bit about the rock that we are to build on and the sand that we are not to build on. And the contrast between rock and sand is very stark.

We went over the fact that in the Greek text, rock is petra, and petra is a very large, massive rock. Mr. Armstrong used to call it a big crag of a rock, like the Rock of Gibraltar. It could even be an entire mountain range according to those who make Greek lexicons. But it is a massive, solid, immovable. that is, a fixed single edifice. It is one, it is a unit, it is not made up of many things, and it endures for ages. This is the image that we get from a petra, a great cliff or a mountain that is just solid rock and it is one piece of rock that never will be moved and it will endure forever.

Sand, on the other hand, the Greek word ammos, is the very opposite of the great petra that we would see, like the Rock of Gibraltar. Its tiny, little grains of sand are almost microscopic. They are loose, that is, they move a lot, they shift. Sand, normally when we think of it, is not a one particular grain of sand. We usually think of many grains of sand that make up a beach or some surface that is very large and has all these small bits in them that make up what we would call sand. And it is transient, it is easily moved, it can be washed away, it could even be blown away if the wind is strong enough. So it is not something that is going to endure.

And as I mentioned in the last sermon, in terms of stability and long-term viability the rock's qualities are all positive. I mean, if you are going to build on something or want something to last, you want to put it on the rock, and the sand's qualities, if you want to call them that, are all negative in terms of, like I said, stability and long-term viability.

Now, we know because we have read the Bible, we have studied it, we know it from cover to cover (at least I hope we do or if we do not, that we are coming to know it from cover to cover), but we know that Jesus Christ or the Lord of the Old Testament is called the Rock. It is mentioned in several places. The first one I thought of was, of course, I Corinthians 10:4, where Paul says that the Israelites followed that Rock and that Rock was Christ. You know that Rock was Christ. It is obvious whom he meant. It is also all through Moses' Song in Deuteronomy 32.

David also, in some of the psalms, calls Him our Rock. Psalm 18 has several allusions or at least two allusions to Christ as the Rock. And He is all of those things, the bedrock or the rock that Jesus mentions in Matthew 7 represents. He is God, He cannot be moved, He never changes, He is sovereign. He is our, as it says in Ephesians 4, one Lord. So He is unitary in that sense.

He is everlasting; He is immortal; He will never die; He will go on forever. And so if we build on the Rock we will never go wrong, if we stay attached to Him and we stay faithful to Him.

But I can tell you, I can guarantee to you, that none of us do it perfectly, that we all have room for improvement. Many of us sometimes, I think, and I know this of myself so I can say it with some confidence, that many of us assume we are doing it pretty well. "Hey, I've grown. I understand this. You know, I'm with it. I'm never going to be moved." And that is when we have a big trial and we have to think, "Oh, well, I should be more humble about that."

But in every case, in every human who has been converted to God's way of life, if we were to inspect that person's foundation, our inspection would reveal an awful lot of sand under our foundation or on our foundation. On is better. And the reason for this is we are human. We are flawed, we are limited—quite limited. We lack a lot of insight both to ourselves and to the world. We do not see things properly. We oftentimes see good when it is actually not good, but we are comfortable with it and so we think that it is ok.

Another thing about human beings is that we get tired. Things happen in our lives and we let things slip because we just do not feel like we have the energy to do anything. Or we are neglectful. That also happens because we are such busy people and we have only so much time and a lot to do. And so we try to prioritize and oftentimes we prioritize badly and neglect what is actually more important. Or we can just simply be lackadaisical, a bit lazy about our calling, and just let things slide. We have a tendency, like the people that Paul or whoever it was wrote the epistle to the Hebrews, to let things slip.

That is what he told them. He starts the first chapter off with, "Look at your great Redeemer. Look at all that He's done. God has placed Him above all things, even the angels bow to Him." And then the first thing he says in chapter 2 is we have got to make sure we do not let these things slip away and neglect our great salvation because we all have the tendency to allow that to happen just because we get busy or certain things happen and distract us. And suddenly weeks, months, years go by and we find ourselves lacking faith because we let things slip.

Now, a major reason for many of us is that we have given a pass to certain sand in our foundations because we are comfortable with that sand. It may be that we have mistakenly considered that sand as godly or is somehow divinely approved. In other words, if I can use the analogy, we look at the sand but we see rock, because our eyes have been blinded one way or the other to see this certain ungodliness as godly, or as normal, or as okay, or as God would not mind.

We have a lot of ways of justifying ourselves and what we do and that is just the deception of Satan or our own self-deception, where we consider bad things to be good, and we need further insight from God to see them in their true light as what they really are—sand rather than rock. Only when a crisis comes, and this is Jesus' point in Matthew 7, and it ruins what we have built do we actually realize that that thing has been sand all along when we thought it was rock, and it has been steering us away from God in its own way for a long time causing us not to see the truth, reality as God sees it.

It is my hope that with a bit more insight into both ourselves and into God's purpose and the total depravity of this world, a bit more critical thinking, if you will, a bit more—probably a lot more—humility and a bit more urgency and effort, we will be better able to spot the sand under our buildings and dig it out, get rid of it, remove it. Is that not what examining ourselves is all about, as Paul tells us in II Corinthians 13:5?

We are coming up to the Passover. Today is a full moon. I think it is at 99% today. That means two moons until Passover. So we need to start thinking about this very seriously. What sand do we need to sweep away?

I know it seems like I just cannot let go of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, not just yet. This is actually not really supposed to be one of my Sermon on the Mount sermons. I just had more thoughts about this foundational parable, this fourth warning, I thought I would do another sermon. So this sermon, like the last one, will center on Christ's final warning about the foundation we build our converted lives on. However (this is where I use my own human reason here to justify myself), I want to shift our focus on this point to Luke's version of this parable. And that is in the Sermon on the Plain, not the Sermon on the Mount, because it has a few significant differences in wording that can give us additional insight into what Jesus was trying to say.

So, let us start in Matthew 7. I want to read the one that is in the Sermon on the Mount again just so we refresh ourselves and then we will go to Luke 6 and read what He said to the multitudes. Remember, the Sermon on the Mount was to the disciples, the Sermon on the Plain was to the multitudes. So we will take what we can from that.

Matthew 7:24-27 "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, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall."

Calamitous was its collapse is another way of rendering that in more stark language.

Let us go to Luke 6 and see the the same parable. We will see it in a slightly different form here. He says,

Luke 6:46-49 "But why do you call Me 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do the things which I say? [Now start start tallying up the differences here.] Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like: He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock. But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the stream beat vehemently; and immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great."

There are significant differences between the two parables. Now, I want to give you four main ones. There are a few others as well but I want to concentrate on these.

1. Luke combines the gist of the third warning, that is, the third warning was Jesus' condemnation of lawlessness and disobedience, with the fourth warning. So he is crunching the third and fourth warnings together because they do go together. That is why the fourth one follows the third one. It is on a similar theme. So we see that he takes the gist of number three and he adds it as the basis for what happens in number four.

Luke's version implies more directly that failing to do as Christ commands is the reason for so many building on the sand. If they would listen to what He said, then they would have every reason to build on the rock, but they are not listening to Him, they are not doing what He says, and so they fail to build on the foundation on the rock.

So if we would truly listen to Christ and do what He says, we would build more correctly and successfully. We would build an enduring structure.

And this only makes sense. That is why He gives us commands. That is why He gives us His law. His commands are there to create us in the spiritual image of God so we can live that eternal life of God in His Kingdom. And so His commands are helpful. His commands are good. His commands lift us up and show us the right way to go.

But if you do not listen to them and you do not put them into practice, they will do you no good. And if you try to build something, you are going to end up building something that is faulty, that is very flawed. And this more than implies that ignoring His instructions about life dooms us to disaster. There is no way that by ignoring what Christ has taught us or wants to teach us (that is a better way to put it), that we can actually build something that works. It is impossible. So we have to do what He says if we want to build anything of any lasting nature or of any good nature because only His words are the words of life.

Let us go back to Deuteronomy 5. He tried to teach this to Israel. He tried to show them the benefits of following His way. Of course, we know that they failed spectacularly, as the author of Hebrew says. Hebrews says their bodies were scattered across the wilderness because they did not build anything that was lasting. They died.

Deuteronomy 5:29-33 'Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever! Go and say to them [He is talking to Moses here], "Return to your tents." But as for you, stand here by Me, and I will speak to you all the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments which you shall teach them, that they may observe them in the land which I am giving them to possess. Therefore you shall be careful to do as the Lord your God has commanded you; you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. You shall walk in all the ways which the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live and that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess.'

This is what He says will happen if we hear Him and do His word.

Now, let us drop down in chapter 6 to verse 10.

Deuteronomy 6:10-19 "So it shall be, when the Lord your God brings you into the land of which He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give you large and beautiful cities which you did not build, houses full of all good things which you did not fill, hewn-out wells which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant—when you have eaten and are full—then beware, lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. You shall fear the Lord your God and serve Him, and shall take oaths in His name. You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are all around you (for the Lord your God is a jealous God among you), lest the anger of the Lord your God be aroused against you and destroy you from the face of the earth. You shall not tempt the Lord your God as you tempted Him at Massah. You shall diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God, His testimonies, and His statutes which He has commanded you. And you shall do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, that it may be well with you, and that you may go in and possess the good land of which the Lord swore to your fathers, to cast out all your enemies from before you, as the Lord has spoken."

This back and forth between doing what is good, keeping the commandments, following the statutes and the judgments versus falling away from Him, of being idolatrous, disobeying His voice, goes on for another, like, six chapters. It is just back and forth where He tells them, "I will do this if you obey Me and this will come upon you if you disobey Me." He gives them a long, long oration about the good that will come to them if they obey and the enduring nation that they would build and how the other nations would come to them and say, "Teach us all of this because you're a wonderful nation and you have so much wisdom."

And then He tells them the other side. If you fall away from that, those nations are going to come to you with swords and they are going to destroy you. So which do you want? Of course, He gets all the way to chapter 30 and He says, "Look, I'm placing this choice before you, life or death, blessing or cursing. What do you want? It's yours to decide."

In the New Testament, in this particular paragraph that we are studying, the choice is rock or sand; obedience, do what I say, build on the rock; or sand, which is do not build. As a matter of fact, in Luke it says, do not even build a foundation, just build on the sand and get swept away and die. That is the choice. It has always been the same. Follow God, live; do not follow God, die. Follow God, eternal life; do not follow God, eternal death. It is really simple. Even a caveman can understand. So that is what He gives us here in this parable in Luke 6.

Let us go to the second difference between the two versions. In Luke's version, the wise builder digs deep and lays the foundation on the rock. In Matthew's version back in Matthew 7, it more directly points to Christ being the rock or being the foundation, I should say. So, Luke's version suggests the house's foundation is laid on the rock, whereas Matthews makes a point that the rock is Christ. They are slightly different. But Luke's version, as you would expect, is more in line with Paul's analogy of building. And let us go to there in I Corinthians 3 just to see it so you know what I am talking about.

I Corinthians 3:9-11 [we will pick it up where he says] You are God's building. According to the grace of God which was given to me as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Here he combines them a little bit. He says, yes, the foundation is Christ, but he also says, I laid the foundation on the Rock. He is looking at it from a minister's point of view and so it is a little bit different here. But the idea is that Paul's faithful teaching of the gospel provides the foundation one builds upon. And so the gospel is about the things that Christ taught, His message that He taught. So Paul, coming alongside the new member, gives him the materials for that foundation, which are all built on the Rock. Slightly different.

And he says another minister can come later on and build either good or bad by the teachings that he gives. Like I said, it is slightly different but Luke's is a little bit more in alignment with Paul's. It just shows how deeply layered this analogy can get looking at it from several different perspectives.

However, back to Luke 6, we should not pass over that Jesus says here in Luke 6 that the wise master builder digs deep. So you have this idea that the wise master builder comes upon a piece of property, whatever it is, and all he sees is hardpan, sand. And the hardpan actually looks stable. That is how it is over in Israel. The ground actually looks very stable with the sand because it has been packed, it has been dry, and so everything is compressed and it looks like it is very stable.

But the wise master builder knows that it is actually dirt, it is sand, it is not rock even though it is pretty hard. And so he makes the effort to go and dig out the sand that is there, just packed down, till he actually strikes the bedrock and he puts his foundation there. He is not content with saying, "Oh, this has made my job easy. I can just put it right here. It's not going to float away in a storm because this is hard. I could hardly put a dent in. It must be great." No, the wise master builder does not trust how packed that dirt is. He wants to get to rock that he knows will be immovable, that he knows will be solid.

So in Jesus' parable in Luke, He builds an image here of a person making strenuous effort to remove the soil or the sand from the place he wants to build. That he really digs down deep. He puts a lot of his blood, sweat, and tears to get down to the bedrock because he will not be satisfied until every grain of sand, if you will, has been cleared from his building site. And he knows that his foundation is going to be solid.

Now, this is parallel to other analogies in the Bible that we all know. It pictures getting rid of sin or getting rid of wrong ideas, wrong ways of thinking, and bad habits that we build over the years. We know these analogies as removing leaven from our homes or from our lives actually. Putting off the old man is another analogy. It is like taking off clothing, taking off those bad habits and sins and other things that we have had as unconverted people. Paul talks about leaving his rubbish behind because he wants to go on to the perfection of Christ. He wants to throw away everything of the old way so that he could embrace Christ in the new way that he had been shown. And that is what we have to do.

And of course, there are corresponding analogies to the negatives, that is, eating unleavened bread as opposed to getting rid of leavened bread. Or putting on the new man as opposed to taking off the old man. Or growing in grace and knowledge as opposed to leaving the knowledge and our way of life that we had before behind.

We always get with God a negative and a positive because we need to clear out the bad so we could fill that space with the good.

Let us go to Ephesians 4, if you will, starting in verse 17. This is right after he had talked about the ministry's job is to equip people so that they could come into the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, among other things. And so he starts into this analogy about the new man.

Ephesians 4:17-21 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind [listen to these descriptions here], having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardening of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to licentiousness [or lewdness], to work all uncleanness with greediness. But you have not so learned Christ [He is the opposite of all of these things], if indeed you have heard Him, and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus. . .

That is, if you have had a wise master builder that has laid the proper foundation, you know that Jesus is nothing like as he described the way the Gentiles walk.

Ephesians 4:22-24 [so he is telling us]: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God [that is, according to His example, according to His way, according to His character], in righteousness and true holiness.

So if we can use the words or the ideas from Matthew 7 and Luke 6, the apostle makes it clear here that we have come out of a culture built on sand. The whole world is built on sand. And he describes this sand, the little grains of sand, as futility. Solomon talked about vanity. That is what he means. Misunderstanding, he says. Alienation from God, ignorance, past feeling; that they are unconcerned about others, about God, about many things.

He mentions lewdness. We see a lot of that in our culture today. Uncleanness, that too. Corruption, yes, we see a lot of that, deceit and many other things besides that Paul did not mention. That is a lot of negatives that we came out of. That is a lot of sand that we need to sweep away. And maybe we were not all that bad, where we were the poster child for these things, but we still had elements of them. We have all been greedy. We have all been lustful. We have all been corrupt. We have all done things that we are ashamed of now that we know that those things are wrong.

We were all ignorant. We were all unfeeling about certain people or certain good and godly things. We had elements of these things. We all lived futile lives. We were all alienated from God.

So Paul says here we have to get rid of these things. We have to sweep all the sand away. We have to dig deep and get down to bedrock and then start building good things on that bedrock that come from Him, from the Rock, from Christ. So these things that Paul mentioned here about the way the Gentiles walk, you could say the unconverted walk, all these things should be dead to us as Christians. We should not give them a bit of our time except to sweep them away.

But we do not. We figure out that some of them are bad and we stop doing them, but others we cling to. I do not know why; because we are stupid? That may be it. We are human. That is maybe a better answer. We are still deceived in certain areas, self-deceived in many cases. And so we cling to them and do not overcome, do not repent.

So, in order to dig down deep and to sweep these things away, we have to have things like faith and diligence, and be dedicated to the work. And we have to push our sleeves up and get to work! We actually have to do something. We have to put in the effort, not just think about it even though we should. We have got to jump in the hole that we have already started digging. Maybe it is just a slight depression, but we have got to get in there with our shovels and start digging up the sand. We cannot let time pass by. We do not know how long we have. We need to get in there and start digging it out till we hit the rock in every area of our lives so that we are firmly founded on the Rock in everything.

And yes, I will warn you, and you probably already know this, all that work and faith and diligence and dedication, doing those things are going to cause pain. It is hard to sweep away the sand because we like the sand. We are connected to the sand. The sand connects us to other people that we love, and to do what Christ wants us to do we have to put Him first and perhaps sacrifice relationships, sacrifice what we like doing.

All those things cause, usually it is an emotional pain, but there may be physical pain too. But that is the reason why we are so reticent about doing such things because we know that it is going to hurt. Even if it just hurts our schedule we do not want to do it. I do not want to get up a half hour earlier to pray because I need my sleep. And so we make justifications to ourselves for why we leave the sand.

So it is difficult work, but it is work that has to be done throughout our converted lives because we often fail to see the evil in these things until God reveals them to us, or worse. They are secret loyalties that our human nature holds on to desperately. And even though we know they are there, we refuse to give them up.

David talked about secret sins. He wanted help from God to get over them so he would not grasp them so much, so he could let them go. And we are all like David, we all have those things. We just need to screw up our courage and face them and overcome them. Easier said than done!

Now, getting back to Matthew versus Luke on this idea of the foundations. Some say that Matthew's version stresses where one builds, that is, on Christ, that is, either rock or sand, but we prefer to be on the rock. That is where Christ is. And Luke's version, on the other hand, focuses on how one builds. That is, we either build with wisdom and great effort or filled with folly and laziness. Again, that is the choice: wisdom and diligent effort, folly and laziness. Which one are you going to choose to do? And this idea that the two parables having these different foci is right. I think it has merit. So Matthew stresses where one builds while Luke focuses on how one builds.

Let us go on to the third significant difference between these two parables. In Luke 6, Jesus mentions no storm and no wind explicitly. Here in Luke 6, the crisis is a flood. Now in Matthew 7, the crisis is a storm, flood, and wind, all three of them. This one is particularly the flood, a flood that comes and sweeps the building away if you are foolish or sweeps past the building if you are building like a wise master builder.

So the crisis is a flood here. We have got to think of the imagery of a flood because in this particular place, God wants us to focus on a flood rather than the storm, the stream, and the winds. So we have narrowed it down to just a flood, that is, a powerful, gushing stream of water.

The Greek word underneath flood here in Luke is plemmyra. It is a flood tide or I should say it is like the flood tide of a sea or the overflowing of the banks of a river which would also create a flood. It is describing the occasion when water breaks out of its banks and sweeps everything before it. That is what plemmyra is. So it is rushing water. We could even consider it a wave, like a tidal wave. That would be the ultimate in plemmyra.

Now, the flood, from way, way back has been an image of a crisis. From time of Noah, at least. It brings calamity. It is a cataclysm that sweeps everything before it to destruction. It is that powerful. One cannot stand in a flood of this strength, that is this mighty. Think of the Noachian flood. It destroyed all humanity except for those eight people who heard God's sayings and did them. Is that not how it starts here?

Luke 6:46-47 "Why do you call Me 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do the things which I say? Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like."

A wise builder. So their obedience, their listening to God, hearing what He had to say and doing what He said, made sure that they lived. They endured through a calamity because they were founded on the Rock, if you will. Their rock, at that point, physically was a boat built because Noah believed God and did what He said.

Let us go back to Hebrews 11 and see exactly that.

Hebrews 11:7 By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen [That was the saying of the Lord, the saying of Christ, the warning that He gave.], moved with godly fear [he respected God and what He said and he was determined, then, to follow the saying, follow the warning], prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

So Noah is a good example of the wise master builder or the wise builder, if you will, from the parable, because he heard Christ's sayings and did them. And because he did them, that is, built an ark, he was saved, he endured. He did not get swept away in the Flood and it saved the lives of his entire household. Their faith was in the Rock. They were founded on the Rock.

There are examples of this all through the Bible. When people listen to God, they are safe and they endure when they do what He says. We just have to update all those examples to our own time. That if we listen to God, we do what He says, then that is a proof that were founded on the Rock and we will endure. Like I said, easy to say, hard to do.

Let us go to Revelation 12 and just search out this flood imagery just a little bit.

Revelation 12:15-16 So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away by the flood. But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon had spewed out of his mouth.

Another example of a flood being a major crisis here. And we remember that Jesus said in Matthew 24:36-39 that the end time will be like the time of Noah before the Flood. At the very least, a flood of water represents any kind of major crisis, any kind of severe test, any trial, any tribulation. They are situations and circumstances with the potential to sweep us off our feet. Or in the language of the analogy, sweep us off our foundation and destroy everything that we have built.

Usually a flood is a major trial, a major crisis. Sometimes it is not a flood, sometimes it is a fire. If we would go back to I Corinthians 3 and look at Paul's analogy, the crisis there is fire, that a fire will burn everything up. If you build with gold, silver, and precious stones, then you will endure. But if you build with wood, hay, and stubble, that is going to be destroyed. So same idea.

Now back to the idea of a flood. My dad years and years ago speculated that the flood Satan spews out of his mouth at the church here is a deluge of words. Words, ideas, philosophies, various deceits and falsehoods, so he can sow confusion in the church and attempt to deceive God's people into believing his lies and so drift from God into apostasy. And so we have here at the end, as we believe, the Information Age, where we have access to any kind of information we want and even information that AI will think up for us.

I am not condemning AI, but I am saying that the access to AI and using the Internet and all these computers to gather more and more information, it is upon us. And that is what my dad's article was called, "The Flood is Upon Us." That we have to be wary about the information that we allow into our minds because much of it is aimed at drawing us away from God.

Instead we have to do what it says in John 7, verse 37. If we want to keep anchored to the foundation we have to do what Jesus says here.

John 7:37 On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink."

We do not want the flood that Satan spews out of his mouth. We want the pure sweet drink, if you will, from Christ.

Let us go on to the fourth point, the fourth major difference here between Matthew and Luke in this parable. This one is that the foolish builder builds directly on the earth without a foundation. Notice that.

Luke 6:49 "But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation."

That is, he builds with a lack of right knowledge, a knowledge of the truth. He does not have the wise master builder that Paul was who gave them the true gospel. There are many who think they know the true gospel, but they do not. They lack that foundation and it causes them to build directly on the earth.

Notice it here that Luke says they build on the earth. He does not use sand. Now, the difference between sand and earth can be significant if you want it to, but they both basically mean the same thing. But Luke's use of earth brings other thoughts into our mind. The word here in Greek for earth is ge (pronounced yay). But this is the foundational word for geo, geology, and that sort of thing. It means the earth. It can also mean soil, it could mean ground, it could mean the surface of the earth, the land, as opposed to being a body of water. Sometimes it is land and sometimes it is a body of water. But land as opposed to sea or river. Or we could also think of it as a land, a region, a territory, a country. This word ge could mean any of those things.

Now, in terms of being soil, which is the direct intent here, that it is put on the soil rather than on the rock, it is analogous to the sand in Matthew 7 because Israel's soil tends to be sandy. So sand and earth, soil, would mean very similar things to a native of that land. But it has a slightly different connotation as ge, as earth or soil rather than sand.

I want to bring this out. This is the difference or this brings out the dichotomy between heaven and earth. If you build on Christ, you are building on something heavenly. But if you build on the earth, you are building on something earthly. Heaven is God's realm, while Earth is Satan's realm and deceived man's realm. Heavenly things are perfect and glorious, while earthly things, even its wisdom are sensual and demonic, as James says in James 3:15.

Have you ever noticed that in Revelation 13:11 the false prophet is introduced as another beast coming out of the earth, showing his origin. He comes out of the earth speaking like a dragon and deceiving mankind with his tricks.

By contrast, when we get to Revelation 19, the great King of kings and Lord of lords comes down out of heaven, showing the difference between the beast and false prophet and Jesus Christ. The beast, by the way, comes out of the sea, which is a different image of coming out of the turbulence of mankind.

But here in this parable, building on the rock, Jesus is making a similar contrast between rock and earth, or sand. In these parables He is trying to get us to understand that building on the rock is a good and spiritual thing. It is a heavenly thing, if you will. Whereas building on the soil, the earth, the sand, is earthy or earthly. So the rock, the sure foundation of Christ, as it says in Isaiah 28:16, is spiritual and from heaven, from the Father. It is all good. Whereas the sand or the earth or the soil is material. It is physical, it is native to the earth and corrupt.

Let us go to II Peter 3. And this is interesting. I thought maybe someday I will do a full-blown sermon on this. We will see. But starting in verse 10, we will read down through verse 13. Notice the difference here between heaven and earth.

II Peter 3:10-13 But the day the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

Now, where it says the heavens will pass away with great noise and then it goes on and talks about the heavens being dissolved. It does not mean the third heaven. It does not mean outer space necessarily. It means the sky; that means that envelope of air that is around the earth. That is what is going to be dissolved, and the earth. So it does not mean heaven, heaven, where God is. It means what surrounds the earth. Everything that is earthy, which includes our atmosphere, will be dissolved, even down to the elemental level.

That shows you that even though we think something on earth may be everlasting, it is not. God is the only thing that is truly everlasting. And so He says He is going to burn up everything that has seen corruption and start new with a New Heavens and a New Earth. And this time around the New Earth and the New Heavens will have never seen corruption. They will be full of righteousness and the Father Himself will come down and reign from here and live here with us.

So at this point, everything that is earthy, demonic, sensual, as James says, all those things will be totally obliterated, totally eradicated, and only the Rock and those who follow Him will have come through that to live for eternity. That is how important building on the Rock is because we want to be built on the foundation that will allow us to go through this cataclysm. Remember I said sometimes the cataclysm is water, sometimes it is fire. This time, it is fire here.

I want to read several scriptures here from the apostle Paul. We will start in II Corinthians 5. I have a three other passages beyond this one that I want you to listen to the gist of what Paul is trying to say in each of these. They are very similar. But I want you to listen to them to get Paul's arguments and to see what he is trying to get across to us.

II Corinthians 5:16-20 Therefore, from now on, we regard no one according to the flesh, even though we have known Christ according to the flesh [that is, in our flesh], yet now we know Him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away, behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ [He is mostly speaking about the ministry in this particular instance, but it flows on to us in other occasions.], as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.

Remember, we were alienated from God. He is talking to converted people. And now he is saying you still need to be reconciled to God because this is an ongoing process because when we are baptized, we have our sins forgiven but our human nature is, in a broad sense, still carnal. Remember, this is the church that he talked about "you are still carnal," and he is trying to get that across to them.

II Corinthians 5:21-22 . . . be reconciled to God. For He made Him [that is, Christ] who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

So the idea here is that the ministry has been given this ministry of reconciliation to help everyone in the church to come to be more like Christ. Simple terms.

Let us go to Ephesians 2, just a few pages over.

Ephesians 2:19-22 Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners [He is making the difference here between what it was like to be a Gentile and being unconverted and now being converted.], but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit.

This is more of the work of the ministry, more of your work in cooperating with God to become holy.

Let us move on Philippians 3.

Philippians 3:17-21 Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern. For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who have set their mind on earthly things. For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body, that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.

So he is saying that many have gone along this road and they have turned away because they love earthly things. But the whole business of Jesus Christ is to bring us to the resurrection so that we could live eternally with Him. We do not want to give this up by being too anchored to this earth.

Let us go on to one more place.

Colossians 1:9-14 For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that you may have a walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us or conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.

Colossians 1:21-23 And you, who were once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled [we come back to that word] in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable in His sight—if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.

Fantastic passages. They should lift us up and make us so grateful to God for what He has done and what He continues to do, and the great hope that He has out there for us, if we stay the course.

Now, the gist of these passages, then, is that though we are still physical we have been, as Paul says in Colossians, spiritually transferred or conveyed from the realm of the earthly to the realm of the heavenly. Right now, this is what we might call a legal transference because we are still physical, we still have flesh. But because of what Christ has done, He has allowed us through Him to enter into the Kingdom. We are part of the Kingdom now. We are, as it says here, "He has translated us into the Kingdom of the Son of His love," so we are there on a legal basis right now. But our lives are not finished. There are things that could happen and so we need to endure to the end so that we can have the fullness of the Kingdom in the resurrection from the dead.

So in this period, while we are still alive as physical beings before the coming of Jesus Christ, Christ, who is our Rock, our Redeemer, our High Priest, is tasked by the God the Father with transforming us, spiritually cleansing us of earthly things, teaching us the righteousness of God, and helping us pursue holiness. It is His job to prepare us for the Kingdom of God. It is His job to get us to the point that when the Father says, "Go!" we are ready and we can be transformed into the full image of Christ.

In the analogy in Matthew 7 and Luke 6, He is our foundation and we are His building. And He aids us as much as He can in our work of digging down to bedrock and sweeping away the sand because He is all for us. He wants us there. He wants to do His job. He wants to have our love, and Him love us, for all eternity because that is the way of God.

Now, to another scripture we are very familiar with. Romans 12, verses 1 and 2. Here is our part.

Romans 12:1-2 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Paul here gives us a concise version of our marching orders from Christ. On this point, he says, "Do not be conformed to this world" and "prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." So we get rid of the worldly things, we put on the godly things. Pretty simple. We have to eliminate the negative and put on the positive. To put it into the heaven and earth dichotomy that we talked about earlier, we rid ourselves of any conformity to earthly things, that is, this world, this cosmos, this human culture that has been influenced by Satan. And on the other side, we seek to know and inculcate into our character, heavenly things, that is, God's righteousness, God's way of thinking, God's living or lifestyle, the way He lives all the time.

And just so we are clear, this can only be done, as Paul shows in verse 1, by sacrifice. We have to give ourselves totally to this process and submit our will to God's. We cannot hold anything back. If we do, it is pretty clear that there is sand that we need to get rid of. Let us remember, we have entered the New Covenant with God, and as we saw last time in Luke 14:5 to the end of the chapter, if we are truly His disciples, then He must come first in everything: before family, before nation, before any kind of cause, any kind of desire or passion that we have. He must come before our health. He must come before our employment. He has to come first in all categories.

The New Covenant is a binding, eternal agreement and its primary demand of us is loving loyalty or faithfulness to God. We love God so much that we will follow or give our loyalties to no other. And you know what? If we give our loyalty to some other, there is a word for that: idolatry. And we know we do not want to have anything to do with idolatry.

Now, what we have done in coming into the New Covenant is that we have accepted the Old Testament concept of hesed, that is, covenant loyalty. It is an agreement with God that we are going to be loyal to Him and show Him all our love and do everything He says. So we are loyal to the covenant, we are loyal to God.

Let us go to John 17. I will just read this part, verses 13 to 19, Jesus' prayer about us.

John 17:13-16 "But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world [catch that, His disciples are not of the world], just as I am not of the world. [See, we have been transferred into the Kingdom of the Son of His love.] I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that you should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. "

We could go to I John 2:15-17 where he tells us, "Do not love the world." That is not God's way. They are going to pass away. God is eternal though. If you stick with God and love God, then you are on the right road to eternal life.

Revelation 18:4-5 is a warning, right at the end, "Come out of her, My people." Come out of this Babylon of the world. You do not want to be a partaker of the plagues that are going to come upon her. Because if you do not come out, you are going to end up suffering quite terribly.

As we come down to crunch time, it becomes more incumbent upon us to overcome the worldliness that remains in us. We have got to show that we are not of this world and that we reject this world. So we have to sweep away the sand. We have to get rid of earthly things that keep us from building strong, enduring godly character upon the foundation of Jesus Christ.

So as we finish here, I want to ask you a question: What is your sand? What worldly things are you clinging to? What ideas from this world still hold your loyalty?

Martin and I were in the same class at Ambassador College and we heard a long-time evangelist talking about a church doctrine. This was in the eighties, '87 or '88. He had been in the church since the early fifties at least. So it had been like three decades of being a minister in the Worldwide Church of God. And he said before the whole class, "We Baptists believe. . ." And then he went on and said whatever it was. And Martin and I were like some of you. Did he really say that? It slipped out in a moment of thoughtless candor. But after 30 years of being an evangelist in the Worldwide Church of God, he still considered himself a Baptist. It is not surprising that he welcomed the Tkach administration's doctrinal changes that went back to Protestantism.

I also knew a man for a couple of decades, a good, kind, long timer in the church. He left us, the Church of the Great God, when my dad preached that military service, killing for one's country, which he had done before his conversion, was sinful and should be repented of. But you see, he still carried his military, his wartime service to his country as a badge of honor. He could not get over that hill, that stumbling block. To him, at heart he was still a soldier, he was still fighting the war.

I know a lot of people that still worship the god of American patriotism. They would do anything for this country. They believe this is God's country and to them, patriotism is an act of worship. Some of them talk about the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution like the third testament of Scripture. But look where these documents have brought us. It took about 250 years but now we have a perverse post-Christian society. Loyalty to a country is fine but not above loyalty to God.

There are many people who worship the god of freedom. They believe that they can do whatever they want whenever they want and no one should tell them differently. Many have made gods of their tribe, whether it is a sexual tribe, a racial tribe, an ethnic tribe, a familial tribe, or some other division of humanity that they think is the greatest. Some of us are still Republicans or Democrats. Some of us believe in capitalism, some in socialism.

Many people worship at the idol of money. Others crave power or prestige in the world. Some of us are environmentalists and some people are actively anti-environmental. Some bow at the suggestions of doctors and pharmaceutical companies while others make a god of natural healing rather than God. Others are immersed for long hours in music, art, sports, or any kind of diversion.

So I ask you, what is your sand? Your sand is whatever separates you from your primary loyalty to Christ. Sand is idolatry.

Now each of us, in the next few weeks, should take some time to see what sand we still cling to, sand that holds us back from total devotion to God. When the flood comes—and it will come—to test us, will we be found futilely grasping at crumbling grains of sand or will we be found clinging to the Rock? You have to answer that for yourself.

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