The Choice Is Yours

Chapters

• 0:00 A Choice To Make
• 2:19 Setting The Scene In Matthew
• 4:56 Hearers Versus Doers
• 9:45 Rock And Sand Foundations
• 15:20 Storms That Test Our Faith
• 18:26 From Proclamation To Demonstration
• 21:10 Action Steps For Real Practice
• 22:23 Prayer And Closing Blessing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Good morning. My name is Drew Littweiler. I'm part of the staff team here at Cross Point working a lot with students. And something you guys should probably know about me, that my experience growing up was that my my dad was my middle school principal. Oh yeah. Yeah. You feel it too. No, it really wasn't that bad. For some reason, my middle school principal was or my middle school was grades four, five, and six, so it really like wasn't all that complicated or dramatic. But every day at South Adams Middle School in rural Indiana, I have the insignia up here for us, bring a little rural Indiana to Wisconsin today. Every day he would end the morning announcements with the same phrase. So my dad could repeat himself if he wanted to. But for five days a week, 36 weeks out of the year, for three years, everyone at South Adams Middle School in rural Indiana heard the phrase, make it a great day or not. The choice is yours. And while it got old, hearing it over and over again, it was my dad's way of reminding me and my classmates that we have the freedom to choose how we're going to respond to whatever the day might bring. Similarly, at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus concludes with a profound parable, letting us know that we have the freedom to choose how we're going to respond to his words. We are in the final weeks of our teaching series, The Way of Jesus, where we have been going bit by bit and down some rabbit trails through the Sermon on the Mount. And Jesus had so much to say in these just three chapters of the Bible. He's talked a lot about who his followers ought to be. He's talked about his commentary on the Torah or the Jewish law. He's talked a lot about what real right practice is, all while aiming at the heart. Not just on the outside, but on the inside too. And to conclude, he tells a parable highlighting the weight of our response to his sermon. And let's just waste no time. Let's get right into Jesus' words, huh? Let's do it. Matthew 7, 24 through 27 reads like this. Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash. So, in looking at Jesus' concluding words, the Sermon on the Mount, uh, we're gonna do, we're gonna look at three things. One, we're gonna set the scene, all right, the literary context. We're gonna discuss three contrasts that we see in this, and then gonna suggest some action steps at the end. Sound good? Let's do it. Okay. So this passage, our passage for today, starts with the word therefore, and it reminds us that we're in the middle of a complete thought. All right, Jesus in the middle of saying something, and it acts as a signal to check that literary context. So, in setting the scene, in other words, every time we read therefore, we need to look back to see what the therefore is there for. So, Matthew 7, 13, if we backtrack a little bit, Jesus is reframing the two-ways tradition. It's a Jewish way of illustrating the two paths you can have in life. We talked about it a little bit a few weeks ago, so I'm just gonna do a quick highlight, but essentially summary is hey, here's one path of following God and it leads to life. And here's the other path of not following God and it leads to death. In Jesus, he's talked about two gates slash two roads. He's talked about two fruits, the good fruit and the bad fruit. He's talked about true teachers versus false teachers, and most immediately those who merely call Jesus Lord and those who actually know him. So real disciples versus false disciples. And today continues like the second part of that real versus false followers of Jesus. He continues the theme by talking about two builders now. And they act as an illustration or the difference between somebody who hears Jesus' words and someone who hears and does Jesus' words. And honestly, this is what Jesus has been getting at from the very beginning of Matthew, uh of the Sermon on the Mount. All the way back in Matthew 5.19, uh, Jesus says this toward the beginning. He says, Therefore, anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. So from the beginning of the sermon, and now here at the end, what Jesus has been getting at, our bottom line for this morning is this hear and do or hear and don't, the choice is yours. Hearin do or hear and don't, the choice is yours. So in this parable, uh we're gonna we're gonna hear that, we're gonna loop back to it after every now and then as it gets highlighted in different parts. But in this parable, Jesus essentially tells the same story twice, right? Uh, but with one little change in detail leads to vastly different results. And it's the differences in those that we're gonna draw our contrast from, the thematic contrasts. And the first one of that is hearing versus doing. So Jesus characterizes, this is a little repetitive, but so is Jesus' storytelling. Jesus characterizes the people who hear his words as builders of houses. The one who hears his word and does them is the wise builder. The one who hears Jesus' words but stops at merely hearing is the foolish builder. Now, the rabbis of Jesus' day were in a pretty heated debate over just about anything, it seems like. But one of the debates was, hey, what's more important? Hearing? God's Torah, God's law, or doing it? And while they would argue back and forth, most people like, well, hearing must be most important because you can't do without hearing. But regardless, this is a distinction that should never have been made for God's people. Jesus makes the preferred choice of hearing and doing very clear. But what he doesn't, what he does differently from the rabbis of the day is that he orients the debate on his words, equating what he says with God's law. No other rabbi would have done this. A great passage to kind of restate what Jesus is going at comes from James 1. Um, and if you are, we're coming toward the end of the Sermon on the Mount, and if you're like, man, I just can't get enough of this. Uh, read the book of James. There's a lot of similarities, a lot of repetition, but it says it in a cool way too. James 1, 22 to 25 says this do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. We're gonna come back to that idea later. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and after looking at himself goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom and continues in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it, they will be blessed in what they do. Hearing that stops at the ear, hearing that fails to be acted upon is not what Jesus would have for those who claim to love and follow him. I mean, the big summary on the Sermon on the Mount is do to others, what you would have them do to you. Now, a few weeks ago we discussed um, you know, good trees bearing good fruit and bad trees bearing bad fruit. Well, that word do in this passage is actually the same word as bearing fruit. Bear the fruit, do it. Authentic faith requires action. But all the legalism warnings are going on in my head a little bit right now. I want to steer away from legalism, though, and doing the right things as a way to earn or check off a list or complete something, achievement of some kind of righteousness. Last week's passage and discernment discussed in more detail what fake faith is, even while doing the correct things. So if you missed that or need a review, check that out online. It's very helpful. What I'm trying to emphasize today is that hearing and doing is the proper faith response to the words of Jesus. And this Sermon on the Mount kind of doing is different from just legalism because when you start living out the Sermon on the Mount, it actually hits the heart. It can be difficult. You start to wonder why and ponder. It reaches far deeper than just activity. Which is what we're going to discuss in our next contrast, too. But as a quick uh review, hear and do or hear and don't, the choice is yours. So the one who hears Jesus' words and puts them into practice is like the wise man who built his house on the rock. But whoever hears Jesus' words and does not put them into practice is like the foolish man who built his house on sand. So our second contrast today discusses foundation quality or rock versus sand. The difficult thing, to be honest, in trying to teach some of Jesus' parables is that he thinks he just puts things so masterfully simple, there's not a whole lot to add. But here we are. I mean, ask any child that's been to the beach, and they'll know that sand is way less stable than stone or cement or whatever you want to say. And it's tricky, what what's tricky though is truly knowing about the integrity of a house because you can't see the foundation. In coming to uh this church community in the past year, we've been here a year now, which is really awesome, um, but we've done a lot of house searching um the past year, and Hannah and I had a few high hopes as we went into and we scheduled a tour and we were really excited, and then we saw the basements. And I'm sure this is true everywhere, but uh we saw some things that made us uh pretty nervous um to put an offer in or to even think about relying on that when the glorious Midwestern storms would roll through. Now, unlike house showings today, the strength of the foundation of a house in first century Judea uh would only be revealed when the storms finally came. There was no basement to check out or showing. Before the storms and in good weather, they looked the same. The houses would look the same. And the preaching team this week was brainstorming, like, hey, what are some of the different ways um that we often trick ourselves into thinking we have strong faith, uh, but we don't really, because it because it seems to look the same. And so um took all the ideas, try to, I tried to find some categories, and here are the categories, and I'm gonna try to riff off of some of these um to give some specific examples. But I have found that um as opposed to strong faith, if I can call it sandy faith, uh, is confusing, it's posturing and excusing, or maybe a better way to say it, uh sandy faith confuses, it postures, and it excuses. Sandy faith confuses a lot of things. Uh, one thing I think it confuses is it confuses feelings for faithfulness. Whenever a part of the sermon or a moment in the worship song hits us and our emotions seem to be right in line with whatever is being presented on a stage, we think, oh, my faith must be stronger. I think that is a pitfall that we can fall into sometimes. Or Sandy Faith confuses cultural Christianity with Christ-likeness, things that we take for granted or should be natural in our in our culture and confuses that for, oh, that's clearly God's way. Stuff like uh homeownership, marriage, job status, employment status, promotions, or even independent living. I think we would assume, coming from this culture, uh if this is uh if we're hitting these boxes, maybe we are actually following God's God's path. But I don't think that's always true. I think Sandy Faith confuses activity with allegiance. Every time the doors of the church are open, we, me and my family were there. We're doing this, we're serving, we're engaged, we're participating, um, we're trying to be leading, we're trying to give opportunity, but like, is my allegiance really with God or am I putting up an appearance? Similarly, going through the motions externally is what Sandy Faith confuses with engaging in the transformation internally. And oftentimes that looks like excusing parts of the Sermon on the Mount that we don't quite want to live out. Sandy faith also postures. It postures. Um, what I mean by that, it elevates theological positions over how you're present with people. Yes, the Bible says this. We think it's a correct interpretation, looking at history, praying through it together, and so this is the position, and yet we can totally be dismissive about how we come off to others when we when we do present those. We are called to have conviction, yes, and compassion. Sometimes in the church, that gets missed. Sandy Faith uh postures morality and lifestyle and avoiding certain behaviors, thinking that's holy. That in and of itself is holy, while missing the relationship with our Savior. Sandy Faith also, as a posture, thinks that sitting in service is the same as being connected to real community. And it's not, it's not. Sandy Faith also postures a lot of service, a lot of doing the good without fully surrendering our life to Jesus. So Sandy Faith confuses, it postures, and it excuses. I think Sandy Faith, um, moments that uh our faith can be exposed to Sandy anyway, include justifying ourselves as the exception to whatever Jesus might be calling us toward. Oh, yeah, I would totally practice generosity more, but my kids are in college and it's kind of tight right now. That may be very real. Or, hey, um, man, we we would uh prioritize uh gathering as a church family on Sunday mornings, but it is really tough with these young kids getting them out of bed. It is. Or even um trying to justify ourselves saying with the excuse that Jesus' teachings just aren't pragmatic. They're not they're not utilitarian, they're not they're too hard. Why would we do that? For example, um upholding the sanctity of marriage, or being serious about having a nonviolent stance and witness in our world, or practicing generosity. Hear in do or hear in don't. The choice is yours. Moving on to our third contrast in the Jesus' parable, we see the rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house. Yet, because the house that had its foundation on the rock, it did not fall. But the house that had its foundation only in sand fell. And almost a literal translation, mega fell. With a great crash. Jesus ends his sermon with a bang. Now, here in the Midwest, we will face literal thunderstorms and flooding. We saw it just a couple months ago, right? Is it crazy? It's almost Thanksgiving. We will face literal thunderstorms here in the Midwest, but metaphorically, our world will throw storms at us too. And whether these storms are the natural consequences for our actions or a sign of God's judgment, or perhaps because the brokenness in our world is just horrible and we get caught up in it, Jesus is teaching that when we hear his words, we have a choice, and that he is offering us a way to stand in the midst of those storms. Bible nerd warning moment. I'm gonna get real in the details, but I promise it applies. All right? The two words that Jesus uses to describe the storms striking the house are very similar, but they are different. So strike is a good translation. They hit that house. Uh, but there's a nuance to each of them that I found enlightening and to be honest, a little exciting. So if I get really pumped up, please excuse me. I'm just, I'm just, I Bible nerd mourning, okay? You've been warned. Uh the storm that strikes the house on the sand is what causes the house to fall. You're thinking, okay, nothing new there. All right. That word, if you check it out, it's used in the rest of the New Testament, describes a falling or a stumbling or something or somebody going down, all right, in a bad way. But the storm that strikes the house, that's a different verb that strikes the found the one that had its foundation on the rock, when you compare how that verb is used in the rest of the gospels, it's the same verb that describes people who are falling down before the Lord Jesus. People who are prostrating themselves in worship, adoration, and surrender. And so the question for us here is this when you get hit with the hard times in life, will the storm break you or will the storm break before you? Something's gotta give. There are times when life just gets tight, just feels narrow, just gets hard, and something's gotta give. And no matter what, no matter what your faith is, no matter your financial situation, no matter your social reputation, you're going to feel it. And our question is, will you rely on Jesus through believing loyalty or not? Hear and do, or hear and don't. The choice is yours. Early on in ministry, um, when I when I first started, um, I was operating under a philosophy that could be boiled down to just this great teaching produces great disciples. As long as we got the teaching correct and a good interpretation and and presented it well, that was the key to cultivating very strong faith in a community. But then COVID hit. And in my context at this time, I saw many in the student ministry in our church, and even some of my personal friends in different places around the world abandon either their faith community or their believing allegiance to Jesus altogether. I was shocked. I was pretty grief stricken, and very just surprised that what COVID had revealed what was in our hearts. It had me rethinking a lot. It had me rethinking church, it had me rethinking scripture, the connection between believing and doing, all the things. And while I think before COVID, I would have said, yeah, I believe that right belief and right practice are both essential and necessary, man. Now I'm just convinced we need way more than just proclaiming something. We need more than just proclamation. We also need a demonstration. That's how we build up strong faith. Hear and do or hear and don't. The choice is yours. If I'm able to move on to action steps, I find it very difficult, to be honest, because the parable functions both as a warning and an encouragement. And the most faithful way to practice living out this passage is just know. Know the two options that you've got. Know the two ways that Jesus presents. And hopefully, being convinced by Jesus' words, seek out living the Sermon on the Mount. But, so if God is saying something to you and you're like, I think, I think I know how to walk away with this and what I need to do, please do that. Here are just some ideas to maybe uh spark creativity. Pray. Um go to God in prayer and ask, hey, is my faith solid or is it sandy? And ask God to reveal the specific areas where one might be sandy or one might be solid, and how to best live that out. Now, if we take this away, these categories away and go, oh, I'm a sandy person, that person's a solid person, I think we're we're missing the point here, right? Use these categories as a launch pad, but also know that we are way more complex and nuanced than just uh a simple binary, too. What parts of my life are solid? What parts of my faith are sandy? Where might there be misalignment between what I say I believe and what I live out? That's uncomfortable. Um, and this part's hard for me. Sit in the uncomfortableness with curiosity. I tend to be a kind of person where uh if I review my day, I mostly think of all the ways I messed up before I get excited about the good things that happen. Um and sitting in the uncomfortableness with curiosity is really difficult because I start going, oh, I should have done this, or I should have said that, or I would have been the verbal hero here, or man, I missed the opportunity here. But sitting in the uncomfortableness for me, and maybe for you guys, would look like, hey, I'm not gonna sit in self-condemnation, I'm just gonna ask why. Prayerfully investigating with God the why behind these things happened. That may reveal that might reveal a sandy faith. As for practice, well, I think after prayer, read through the Sermon on the Mount. Pick one thing, one part of it that you can apply this week, whether it's fasting or giving to the poor secretly, loving your enemy, or at least your adversary at work who you know is gonna drive you up a wall this week, in a way that provides dignity and also boundaries. Or perhaps it's just doing taking a step to getting close to those who you judge whenever you're watching the news or driving around there on the interstate. Hear and do or hear and don't. The choice is yours. Um I want to do a quick uh promo uh for next week. Um I'm still in my own exploring of like what it looks like to form uh people, a spiritual formation and growing more like Jesus. What does that actually look like to live it out? Well, next week, uh Mac's gonna talk to us about a present a model for not a simplistic but a holistic way that involves all of ourselves, the hearing, the doing, the reflection, community, all of it, um, for discipleship next week. And I, for one, am really pumped because this is a thing that we are trying to live out in all areas of our of ministry here at church on Sunday mornings, with students, with kids, all of it. So I'm really pumped about that. But I'm gonna pray for us and then uh let's actually sink into community with coffee hour, huh? Let's do it, let's pray. Lord Jesus, uh no one no one represents the Father like you. No one has the authority that you have, and it's amazing that you would meet us where we are and give us these teachings, model the lifestyle, and ultimately give your life just because you love us. Thank you. Thank you. But Lord Jesus, your words are hard too. And knowing that we have a path before us, would you give us the grace, the eyes to see when the options are before us the rest of this day, this week? Give us the curiosity to sit in uncomfortableness when we might miss that or mess that up. But Lord, holy s send your Holy Spirit in an extra portion this week to Cross Point Community Church, that we may have the courage to trust in you when things don't seem pragmatic or helpful, um, but to live things in your way, to follow your lead and trust. And to and to entrust the results to you. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Thanks, y'all. Go in peace. Let's enjoy coffee hour.