Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
LWML Sunday
Text:  Matthew 7:24-27
Vicar Jason Zirbel
07 October 2007

If you’ve ever been to Southern California, you may have seen the multi-million dollar homes built upon the ocean-front cliffs between Los Angeles and San Diego.  While these homes are the utmost in extravagance, I have never been able to understand why these wealthy homeowners would insist on paying millions and millions of dollars for a home that is perched precariously on stilts which protrude from the steep mud cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean.  Now I understand that the views are spectacular.  One of my most favorite places on this planet, still, is a small cliff over looking the ocean on the north side of San Diego.  When I was stationed at Camp Pendleton, my wife and I would go there every weekend and just sit and talk and watch the dolphins as the sun set.  However, the idea that I would ever build on such a foundation has always seemed preposterous.   I can’t tell you how many multi-million dollar homes slide right down the side of the cliffs into the ocean when the rains hit every winter and the mudslides wash away the foundational support.  Even more amazing and peculiar is the fact that within months, there is another house, usually bigger and more expensive, built right on the same cliff-side spot, using the same stilts and eroding mud cliffs for foundation.  I’m no Frank Lloyd Wright; no architectural genius, but I do know that the foundation of these homes is poor to say the least.  Building upon this foundation is simply setting yourself up for impending destruction and calamity. 

In looking to the Gospel lesson for today, we hear Jesus teaching about the importance of having the right foundation on which to build.  Is Jesus simply playing the part of Bob Vila, and coaching us in how to choose the right building materials and location for our building projects?  No, and we know this.  Even as a child in VBS, when we would sing the song about this parable and the foolish man’s house SMASHING when the rains came down, we all knew that the rock and the sand meant something more than simple foundation choices.  The rock that we sang about was Jesus, and the sand was everything else that wasn’t Jesus.

Now before we get ahead of ourselves in talking about how properly “do” the Word and Will of God in our lives, it would do us well to look a couple words earlier to the beginning of the lesson; words that talk about first hearing the word of God.  While it is perfectly right to say, as Scripture teaches throughout, that faith and works necessarily go together in the life of the Christian, one must understand that there is an order at work here in terms of salvation.  Hearing of the Word of God, which creates saving faith in the heart (Romans 10:17), necessarily precedes the good and truly God-pleasing works that naturally spring forth as the fruits of faith.   To take this sequence out of order is akin to expecting to harvest a rich bounty of apples before you ever even plant the seed of the apple tree.  You can’t reap apples from a tree that has never been planted in the first place.  However, after the apple tree is planted and nurtured, it will grow and naturally and effortlessly produce apples.

So what exactly is it that makes the wise man “wise” and the foolish man so foolish in the parable?  Remember, context-wise, this parable is the last teaching of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.  No one can deny that the Word of God was rightly proclaimed in that particular sermon, especially given the fact that it was Christ Himself doing the proclaiming.  Notice that both men in the parable had heard the Word of God rightly proclaimed to them; the same unchanging and eternal Word that is proclaimed to us today, the Word which pronounces us to be damned sinners before God, apart from the all-atoning work of Christ, and the same Word which pronounces us to be completely forgiven and redeemed only because of Christ.  The wise man is the man who, upon hearing these words, confesses his sins and trusts in Christ alone for his salvation, deliverance, and life.  The foolish man, however, is foolish precisely because of his faith.  He heard the same Word of God that the wise man did, yet he rejected it.  He instead grounded his faith in the fleeting things of this world; things that can provide absolutely no eternal foundation for life and salvation—money, job, social-standing etc.—shifting sands that still tempt us and seduce us today.  In terms of salvation, Jesus couldn’t say this any more clearly in this parable (and neither can I in speaking to you today):  if you place your faith in anything other than Christ alone; anything other than the Word of God that proclaims the all-redemptive work of Christ alone, you have built your faith upon shifting sands that will lead to sure and certain death and destruction! 

“That’s fine, Vicar, but how do I do these things?  What do I need to do to serve my neighbor the right way?”  Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, this is the wrong focus.  If you’re asking this, you’re focusing on yourselves and what you need to do rather than on Christ and what He has already done for all mankind.  Because of His all-atoning sacrifice on the cross, we are “freed up” to serve our neighbor, not to help God out or attain forgiveness or merit before God, but simply because of the joy we already have in our complete forgiveness in Christ.  We don’t have to sit down and fret over some imaginary “to-do list” so as to make sure that we will be doing enough boy scout-like good deeds for God.  This type of behavior robs Christ of His victory over sin, death, and the devil. 

This is where the biblical terms like “justification” and “sanctification” come into play.  Because of the joy we know in our justification before God; that is, the joy we know in trusting in God’s declaration that we are righteous and completely forgiven solely because of Christ’s death, we are free to serve our neighbor in our sanctified lives; our lives that have been set apart by God for service to His people, and that includes all people, unbelievers too.  Sanctification is simply the fruits that naturally spring forth from the saving faith that trusts that we are justified and declared forgiven by God Himself.  Sanctification is the apple and justification is the apple tree.  We are “doing” God’s Word and Will in our sanctified lives, not to be saved, but simply because of the joy we have in trusting that Christ has saved us.  Are these fruits of faith perfect?  No, they’re not; not while they’re done this side of eternity.  Because of our fallen and sinful flesh, we do corrupt and pollute these fruits.   However, Christ, who dwells within the justified—“it is no longer me, but Christ who dwells within me”—He continues to serve our neighbor through us; maybe even in spite of us, as the case often seems to be.

If you’re here today looking for simple, step-by-step instructions in how to properly lead the sanctified life; a way to “flow chart” your way home to Heaven, you’re not going to hear it here.  All I can proclaim to you this day is the Word of God alone, which calls us from our sinful foundations of the world to the never-failing rock of Christ.  I can only point to rock-solid foundation of Christ alone.  True saving faith in Christ alone will naturally produce the God-pleasing works that follow.  

 This doesn’t mean, however, that I can’t point you to some fine examples of what the sanctified life looks like in this day and age.  In fact, the reality of lives that are freely and joyfully lived out in the joy of trusting in God’s declaration of “innocent because of Christ alone” is right here among us today.  I don’t have to have you imagine what the sanctified life looks like, as if it’s some type of hypothetical notion that we will never know until we enter into Heaven.  If you want to see what a fine example of justified and sanctified living is, look no further than the ladies of LWML.

When I first sat down to write this sermon, I struggled with how I can somehow “work” LWML into this text.  The more I wrestled with this text though, the more I came to realize that I don’t have to “squeeze” the ladies in today’s sermon at all.  The more I’ve gotten to know the ladies of LWML, and not just at this congregation, but from congregations all over the United States, the more I have come to recognize what rightly “hearing and doing” the Word of God looks like in everyday life.  It’s baking like crazy in order to raise money for mission work.  It’s selling honey, sewing clothes (or vicar’s robes), giving mite boxes, and so on and so forth.  In short, it’s simply using your God-given talents and abilities to freely and selflessly serve all those around you.  Why?  Not for personal glory; not for power; not for control or esteem, but simply because of the joy of knowing and believing that God has given you the greatest gift of all—forgiveness of all sins for all time simply because Jesus Christ took them upon Himself on His cross.  And more important than that, the sanctified life in Christ, as so wonderfully modeled by our ladies of the LWML, is the life that simply uses these wonderful God-given talents and natural fruits of faith to simply point others to Christ alone; the sole source and rock of salvation, life, and forgiveness.

To Him alone be all glory, praise, and honor.  AMEN