Built upon the Rock – Christ Jesus
Let us turn our attention to an interesting Parable that has eternal consequences and is so current it should have been written afresh today. Luke 6:47-49 “Whosoever cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will show you to whom he is like: He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock. But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a foundation built an house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great.”
Paul writes in a similar vein in Ephesians 3:17 “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love.” Roots are a plants foundations, and foundations are a buildings roots; so tying the two together, are we rooted and grounded, with deep foundations in the Rock Christ Jesus? Matthew 16:18 “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Here Jesus plays on contrasting words, Peter is Petros or pebble, being contrasted with the rock Christ Jesus, which in Daniel 2:45 we have a prophetic symbolism of the Rock Christ Jesus coming back to planet earth to remove earth kingdoms and to take it over, making it his own Kingdom, the Kingdom of God, or the Domain of King Jesus.
So in the parable, building on your own shaky ground of pebbles/sand/earth/failure. Remembering “Adam” means red earth (ground), but build on Christ Jesus and you are rock solid. When you add another prophetic symbol that peoples are waters (Isa 17:12, Rev 17:15). Add this back into the mix and then ask the question, when people press you to abandon your Faith and Christian Walk: are you going to be washed away by the pressure or are you so deeply rooted and grounded in Jesus Christ, that just like Martin Luther, you are unmoved, based on scripture alone. A Scripture for this is found in 1 Peter 3:15 “But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and [be] ready always to [give] an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:”
Our Saviour Jesus was always answering questions with “it is written,” or “how readest thou?” for he always answered by directing the hearers back to scripture. Add to this Matthew 4:4 “But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God,” and we get the emphasis of “it is written.” So if God commissions you to perform an errand or task for him, (which will always agree with the written Word) then that has as much weight of obedience as scripture and is a sure foundation. Isaiah 28:16 says, “Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner [stone], a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste,” admonishing us to build upon the firm foundation, Jesus.
Paul writes in a similar vein in 1 Corinthians 3:9-17 “For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, [ye are] God’s building. According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire. Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and [that] the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which [temple] ye are.”
The theme therefore is the same: build well and dig foundations deep in Scripture and in Jesus Christ, and when the fires of affliction and the storms of persecution beat at your soul, you can stand immoveable because Jesus is your foundation. One writer puts it this way: Foundation = Jesus and Individual Stones = believers. This concept suggests that the believer rests on the foundation without mortar. There is no joint between, just one solid rock building, melted and melded together into one, as if carved from a solid block of rock. Individual stones are now one with Jesus. Jesus gave us this concept regularly in “I and my Father are one,” and in marriage, a husband and wife are one. With Jesus as the head of the body which is the Church, we are the blocks being made up of the followers of Jesus make a one body. This concept I find to be scriptural and meaningful. For a building made of blocks can be disassembled piece by piece, but solid flawless rock, is just plain, rock solid. So come to the Rock Christ Jesus, fall on him in confession and surrender and become part of the rock solid everlasting body of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
