Well, as I mentioned last week- JESUS knew the power of a story. He was known for travelling around and talking to huge crowds of people, often telling stories (parables) in order to help teach people something important. He told stories so that people would remember what they heard and would be able to pass it on to other people—and it’s the reason why there are a lot of people who’ve never even been in a church, but they would know a lot of the stories that Jesus told.
This week, we’re going to look at another of the GREATEST STORIES EVER TOLD. This one is about a couple of guys who were building their own houses…and for one of the guys, it ended in complete disaster.
Matthew 7: 24-27 (NLT)
Jesus said “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. But anyone who hears my teaching and ignores it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”
Now, the first guy in Jesus’ story was pretty smart… I mean, it sounds like he knew exactly what he was supposed to do because he was following the plans! And because of those plans, he ended up building a solid home on a really good foundation that could withstand any kind of storm or hurricane that came its way. There’s a reason why, when you build a house these days, you have all sorts of professional people involved. You don’t want to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house only to discover that some guy who had NO TRAINING did all of the electrical wiring and that it could burst into flames at any moment. The first guy in Jesus’ story did things “by the book”. He followed the building codes. He followed the plans, and his house was pretty awesome
But then Jesus tells us about another guy who didn’t seem to be too good at following instructions. Maybe he thought that the instructions were irrelevant, out-of-date, or flawed? Maybe he just wanted to do his own thing instead of following the “rules”? Maybe he was just super lazy and wanted to do a rush job? Ahatever the reason, Jesus said that when the storm came, his house, which he built on sand, on a foundation that wasn’t really secure, was totally wrecked! There was nothing left!
Now, the reason why Jesus told that story is because he wanted to convey the importance of not just recognizing that the instructions exist, but TO ACTUALLY PUT THEM INTO PRACTICE…TO FOLLOW THEM! I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to build or help your parents build something from IKEA, but those instructions (even though they are made of ridiculously simple pictures with no words) are pretty important! There was one time when I bought two shelving units from IKEA, and after I successfully built one by following the instructions, I was pretty confident that I could just build the second one by remembering how I did the first one. Well, after about a half-hour of work on the second shelving unit, I began to notice that I had built the drawers upside down with the opening at the bottom, so, even if you managed to get your clothes inside it, if you pulled it open, all of the contents of the drawer would fall onto the ground. It was so frustrating! I had wasted time, and had to unscrew the whole thing and follow the instructions closely so I wouldn’t mess it up again!
The same thing is true for a LEGO set. I’m a pretty huge fan of LEGO, and when I buy even a small Star Wars set for my office, I’m often amazed at how so many tiny, random, pieces can be built into something that looks pretty cool. But of course, if you were silly enough to not follow the building instructions, even if you studied the picture on the box pretty closely, the odds of you actually building the set successfully are pretty slim. Those instructions are there to help you build the set the way it was designed and created to be built!
Now, when Jesus is talking about following his instructions, he’s not talking about the instructions that come with the furniture you get at IKEA or the LEGO manual…although those are pretty helpful…but he’s talking about GOD’S WORD, THE BIBLE, GOD’S INSTRUCTION MANUAL FOR LIFE!
There are some people who think of the Bible as being out-dated…that because it’s old, it’s irrelevant. There are some people who feel that the Bible has TOO MANY INSTRUCTIONS…so they pick and choose what to follow and what to ignore. Some people feel that it limits their freedom…that following it might mean giving up something that seems pretty fun… so why bother?
But, I tend to think of the Bible as being INSTRUCTIONS DIRECT FROM THE MANUFACTURER! As we talked about a few weeks ago, God DESIGNED US, he CREATED US…and because of that, HE REALLY DOES KNOW AND WANT WHAT’S BEST FOR US! He knows how life is meant to be lived! In fact, Jesus himself said in John 10:10 that his purpose was to give us RICH AND SATISFYING LIVES! The whole point of God’s instruction manual isn’t to rob us of fun, but to help us through life, to point us in the right direction, and to keep us safe from danger!
I remember, when I was a new dad, I had to safety-proof our apartment so that it would be safe for our little boy. Because I wanted to be a good parent, I had to place restrictions on what he could play with, I had to show him what was safe and what wasn’t safe, and I had to warn him about stuff that could hurt him. I remember that there were times when he would cry or fuss because I wouldn’t let him wrap the cord for our drapes around his neck, or when I put a safety gate at the entrance to the kitchen so he wouldn’t grab stuff off the stove. He didn’t like those rules and boundaries, because he just didn’t understand that the thing he seemed to desperately want might hurt him OR WORSE!
Well, God is the ULTIMATE GOOD PARENT, and even if we don’t always understand WHY he tells us to stay away from stuff, why something is considered sin (something that separates us from God), we need to TRUST that it’s for a GOOD REASON- it’s for our health and well-being! God doesn’t want our lives to be all busted up because we make horrible mistakes and do what we want instead of what he wants. Like we talked about last week, he also doesn’t want any of us to be lost—to end up far from him and to miss out on heaven. Of course, we all have the freedom to accept God’s instructions or reject them, but we have to understand that God warns us about stuff and tells us the right way to live for a reason.
That’s one of the reason why we have CATALYST on Friday nights, it’s why people get together in churches all over the world. Whenever we get together, we want to have fun together and be a great community, but we also want to check out what God has to say about life, so that when we “build our lives”, so that when we make important choices and face big decisions, we would look to that instruction book direct from our manufacturer instead of going our own way, doing whatever we want, and possibly making a real mess out of things. Be committed to be a regular part of CATALYST youth! Be a regular part of some kind of church community! During the week, take a few minutes each day to read the Bible and think about what it says! At CATALYST we offer a bunch of different Bibles and even devotional books you can borrow to make it easier for you to make Bible reading a daily habit.
Jesus said in Matthew 6:24, “-“Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock.” Let's be like the wise builder!
This week, we’re going to look at another of the GREATEST STORIES EVER TOLD. This one is about a couple of guys who were building their own houses…and for one of the guys, it ended in complete disaster.
Matthew 7: 24-27 (NLT)
Jesus said “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. But anyone who hears my teaching and ignores it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”
Now, the first guy in Jesus’ story was pretty smart… I mean, it sounds like he knew exactly what he was supposed to do because he was following the plans! And because of those plans, he ended up building a solid home on a really good foundation that could withstand any kind of storm or hurricane that came its way. There’s a reason why, when you build a house these days, you have all sorts of professional people involved. You don’t want to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house only to discover that some guy who had NO TRAINING did all of the electrical wiring and that it could burst into flames at any moment. The first guy in Jesus’ story did things “by the book”. He followed the building codes. He followed the plans, and his house was pretty awesome
But then Jesus tells us about another guy who didn’t seem to be too good at following instructions. Maybe he thought that the instructions were irrelevant, out-of-date, or flawed? Maybe he just wanted to do his own thing instead of following the “rules”? Maybe he was just super lazy and wanted to do a rush job? Ahatever the reason, Jesus said that when the storm came, his house, which he built on sand, on a foundation that wasn’t really secure, was totally wrecked! There was nothing left!
Now, the reason why Jesus told that story is because he wanted to convey the importance of not just recognizing that the instructions exist, but TO ACTUALLY PUT THEM INTO PRACTICE…TO FOLLOW THEM! I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to build or help your parents build something from IKEA, but those instructions (even though they are made of ridiculously simple pictures with no words) are pretty important! There was one time when I bought two shelving units from IKEA, and after I successfully built one by following the instructions, I was pretty confident that I could just build the second one by remembering how I did the first one. Well, after about a half-hour of work on the second shelving unit, I began to notice that I had built the drawers upside down with the opening at the bottom, so, even if you managed to get your clothes inside it, if you pulled it open, all of the contents of the drawer would fall onto the ground. It was so frustrating! I had wasted time, and had to unscrew the whole thing and follow the instructions closely so I wouldn’t mess it up again!
The same thing is true for a LEGO set. I’m a pretty huge fan of LEGO, and when I buy even a small Star Wars set for my office, I’m often amazed at how so many tiny, random, pieces can be built into something that looks pretty cool. But of course, if you were silly enough to not follow the building instructions, even if you studied the picture on the box pretty closely, the odds of you actually building the set successfully are pretty slim. Those instructions are there to help you build the set the way it was designed and created to be built!
Now, when Jesus is talking about following his instructions, he’s not talking about the instructions that come with the furniture you get at IKEA or the LEGO manual…although those are pretty helpful…but he’s talking about GOD’S WORD, THE BIBLE, GOD’S INSTRUCTION MANUAL FOR LIFE!
There are some people who think of the Bible as being out-dated…that because it’s old, it’s irrelevant. There are some people who feel that the Bible has TOO MANY INSTRUCTIONS…so they pick and choose what to follow and what to ignore. Some people feel that it limits their freedom…that following it might mean giving up something that seems pretty fun… so why bother?
But, I tend to think of the Bible as being INSTRUCTIONS DIRECT FROM THE MANUFACTURER! As we talked about a few weeks ago, God DESIGNED US, he CREATED US…and because of that, HE REALLY DOES KNOW AND WANT WHAT’S BEST FOR US! He knows how life is meant to be lived! In fact, Jesus himself said in John 10:10 that his purpose was to give us RICH AND SATISFYING LIVES! The whole point of God’s instruction manual isn’t to rob us of fun, but to help us through life, to point us in the right direction, and to keep us safe from danger!
I remember, when I was a new dad, I had to safety-proof our apartment so that it would be safe for our little boy. Because I wanted to be a good parent, I had to place restrictions on what he could play with, I had to show him what was safe and what wasn’t safe, and I had to warn him about stuff that could hurt him. I remember that there were times when he would cry or fuss because I wouldn’t let him wrap the cord for our drapes around his neck, or when I put a safety gate at the entrance to the kitchen so he wouldn’t grab stuff off the stove. He didn’t like those rules and boundaries, because he just didn’t understand that the thing he seemed to desperately want might hurt him OR WORSE!
Well, God is the ULTIMATE GOOD PARENT, and even if we don’t always understand WHY he tells us to stay away from stuff, why something is considered sin (something that separates us from God), we need to TRUST that it’s for a GOOD REASON- it’s for our health and well-being! God doesn’t want our lives to be all busted up because we make horrible mistakes and do what we want instead of what he wants. Like we talked about last week, he also doesn’t want any of us to be lost—to end up far from him and to miss out on heaven. Of course, we all have the freedom to accept God’s instructions or reject them, but we have to understand that God warns us about stuff and tells us the right way to live for a reason.
That’s one of the reason why we have CATALYST on Friday nights, it’s why people get together in churches all over the world. Whenever we get together, we want to have fun together and be a great community, but we also want to check out what God has to say about life, so that when we “build our lives”, so that when we make important choices and face big decisions, we would look to that instruction book direct from our manufacturer instead of going our own way, doing whatever we want, and possibly making a real mess out of things. Be committed to be a regular part of CATALYST youth! Be a regular part of some kind of church community! During the week, take a few minutes each day to read the Bible and think about what it says! At CATALYST we offer a bunch of different Bibles and even devotional books you can borrow to make it easier for you to make Bible reading a daily habit.
Jesus said in Matthew 6:24, “-“Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock.” Let's be like the wise builder!
DISCUSSION FOR HOME
1. Have you ever ignored the rules or instructions for something (like a recipe, something you built, something your parents told you) and it ended in disaster or really regretted it later? Share that story with your teens. Have they ever decided to ignore rules (maybe as younger kids) and were nearly seriously injured? Talk about it why rules exist.
1. Have you ever ignored the rules or instructions for something (like a recipe, something you built, something your parents told you) and it ended in disaster or really regretted it later? Share that story with your teens. Have they ever decided to ignore rules (maybe as younger kids) and were nearly seriously injured? Talk about it why rules exist.
2. As much as we don't like rules, they are pretty essential for survival. Encourage your teen to spend a few minutes each day reading the Bible or using a student devotional (there are some online resources below). Maybe that might look like doing family devotions together after a meal? Tell them that, at least a couple of times during the week, you want them to tell you about what they read and what they think it means for their lives.
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