The One Who Does Not

Well, we come this morning to perhaps the last formal part of the

Sermon on the Mount, although next week we'll conclude Matthew 7 entirely with verses 28 and 29.

And as I mentioned last week, we began last week by focusing on the one who does, that's really verses 24 and 25.

This morning looking at verses 26 and 27, the counterpart to this parable of the two builders is the one who does not.

And then next week, as we marvel with the crowds about the one who never spoke words like this, we'll look at the one who did.

And I hope in light of the whole Sermon on the Mount, but especially these last few weeks, that that will all become very clear in the life of Jesus as reflected in the

Gospels that we will see the fulfillment of the very sermon that He preached. If ever there was a man who practiced what

He preached, it was the Lord Jesus. And I hope even what I lay out this morning as far as the parable of the two builders, that we'll see in the one who did, a man who lived his life unto

God and not unto others in the way that we are prone to do, but in living his life unto

God, he was able to live his life for others. Very big difference. He did not live his life unto others.

He lived his life unto God. Because he lived his life unto God, he was able to live his life for others.

So we're going to look at that a little bit next week, along with everything else that will hold Matthew 5, 6, and 7 together in the one who did.

But this morning, we want to set the tone in a much more solemn way. We come to really the conclusion of this sermon, and it's significant how

Jesus ends this sermon. Of course, He's been warning us. He's been demanding a response to everything that He has taught, and He's warned us in the way that James would warn us.

We cannot be mere hearers. We cannot say, what a great sermon that was, Lord. Thank you for preaching it and go on our merry way, unaffected, unchanged.

We have to actually carry out the things that we've received. We must put into practice what has been taught to us.

As Jesus said a little bit earlier in this chapter, many will say at the end, Lord, Lord.

Though they did many mighty things in His name, they never knew Him. They never did things unto Him. They never put into practice what

He taught. And He will say of them, I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who have not done the will of My Father, you workers of lawlessness.

So the big focus from last week, as well as this morning, is doing. Doing what Jesus is telling us to do.

These are the words of life. These are the words that lead to life. These are the words that if we fail to do them, we will not enter into the kingdom.

These are the words that if we do not do them, we are mere hearers only and we're deceiving ourselves. It's really easy to go to church week after week after week after week after week deceiving yourself.

Demas departed for love of the world. There were so many things that he saw, so many things that he learned, so many things that he received.

But because he failed to hide them in his heart, because he did not live them out unto God, in the end, he was a mere hearer only.

He had deceived himself, was deceived by the world. And so, listen to Jesus' words.

Again, these words of life, the conclusion to the Sermon on the Mount. And notice what Jesus is putting here at the very end.

If there's anything he wants to leave us with, it's this. 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 rains descended, the floods came, the winds blew and beat on that house, and it did not fall because 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 rains descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, and it fell, and great was its fall.

Well, very clearly, Jesus is giving us this contrasted image of two builders and two very different foundations.

The foundation that stands is built on the rock. The foundation that endures the storm is that which is solid and stable.

And Jesus says, that's the one who's not only heard, but actually carries out the things that I've taught. And so essentially,

Jesus is saying, what is your life built on? How is your life being built up? All these things that we considered last week.

Are you building on the sand of your own agenda, of your own desires? Are you building on the sand of what the world would say your life ought to look like and what it must be comprised of?

Are you building on the rock of what Jesus says your life must look like? The rock that is

His own life, His own person and work. Are you being built on His doctrine, on His teaching, on His very person and work?

Is your life staked out on the foundation of Christ? Or is it being stilted up on shifting sands that will surely collapse if not sooner than ultimately at the end?

Will our lives, in other words, in the context of the parable, will the house that we are building endure the winds and the rains and the storms of life?

And most importantly, will it endure the final flood to come? The storm to end all storms.

There's winds and there's rains in life. There's seasons, there's moments in life that will press us and try us and shake us to the very core of who we are.

And some might skip some of those crises. Some might make it to the very end, but there's no one that will not face the storm to come.

Jesus, as a prophet of God, is warning us, there's a storm coming.

There's a storm coming for you. There's a storm coming that you cannot escape.

Every aspect of your life will be rocked and beaten upon to its very foundation.

And if your foundation is anything less than rock, your whole life, your whole soul, your eternal state will collapse upon itself and destroy you forever.

There's a storm coming. One thing that we can notice here is how Jesus likens our life to a house.

It's a whole structure, and what goes into a house? Well, there's many rooms and there's furnishings, there's decorations, there's passageways and thresholds, perhaps there's stories.

There's all sorts of things that comprise a house, just like there's all sorts of things that comprise our lives, different rooms that we enter into and depart from, different furnishings and decorations, things that we've amassed in our lives, stories to our lives, we could say chapters of our lives.

And yet our life is viewed here as a whole, it's a whole house. I don't think that we think of our lives in that way, as something entire, as something whole.

We like to sort of compartmentalize our lives. We want to think of our life as one room, as one page, as one moment, as one label.

We don't want to think of it in terms of its entirety, but Jesus wants us to think of our lives entire, not any specific step or time or period or season, not as I grew up going to Bible camps in the summer and always raising my hand, always going up to nail my name on a wooden cross or to pray the sinner's prayer.

I've done that dozens of times throughout my young life. I shouldn't think that that is what my life is reflective of, that one moment, that one encounter, that one act of sincerity.

Jesus says, no, not one brick, not one moment, not one chapter, but the whole of your life, the whole house.

That's what the storm is coming for, the entirety of who you are, the entirety of what your life amounts to.

Everything within it, every aspect of it, every part of your character, every word that proceeds from your mouth, the thoughts hidden within your heart, all that must face this storm that is coming.

Everything must be laid bare before the judgment seat of Christ, as Paul says in Romans 14.

And so here we see this image of an impending judgment, and we're reminded that the

Father who knows our needs, who cares for us, the Father that we've been pointed to, the Father that we pray to throughout the

Sermon on the Mount will at the end also be our judge. Hard for us to hold that together.

How can we hold together the idea that God is my heavenly Father who cares for me, knows my needs, whose eye is on the sparrow, but also is the one to whom

I must give account, my judge at the end of time. Not for one moment, not for something

I can give counter evidence to, but for the entirety of my life laid bare before Him. Things I did yesterday, things

I did last Sunday, ways that I thought, acted, things I've desired, all that laid bare before Him.

We flock to relating to God as our heavenly Father. We're repelled from relating to God as our divine judge.

And Jesus says, don't dull yourself. If you could put it this way, the

Sermon on the Mount amounts to do not be afraid, for you have your Father who is in heaven. Do not be dull or fallen asleep, because you have your judge who sits enthroned.

That's what He ends the sermon with, is this glaring, unflinching focus on the judgment to come, the storm that comes for us all.

There's a storm coming. We recognize as the Lord reveals through 1

Samuel 16, He does not see man as man sees man. Man looks at the outward appearance, the

Lord looks at the heart. We're reminded that that's not a

Valentine's Day fluttering image. For Him to look at my heart, to see the hidden evils of my heart, that's something

I cannot bear to see. What have we said in times past? It's one of the hardest things for us to do, is to see ourselves in the mirror.

See ourselves as we are. Well, the day is coming where God will show us what we are.

The storm will shake us down to the very foundation of who we are. How are we building? What are we standing upon?

What are we staking our life, not just now in the present, but in the life to come, in ages unending?

What are we building upon? We recognize that God is going to render us according to our work.

What we're building upon matters as much as what we're building. Are we doing the things that He told us to do?

Why do you call me Lord? You don't do what I've commanded. I don't know you. You're not my servant, if you don't follow my will.

So we render works unto

God that will be judged by God, or works unto ourselves or unto others that will be judged by God.

Either way, that storm will reveal exactly what the building is, exactly what it's built upon.

So throughout the Scriptures we see this idea of God having no partiality in His judgment. He will render each according to their work.

We like to skip past that. We don't want to dwell upon it. We don't want to sit and contemplate on the reality of divine judgment.

And this is how Jesus ends His sermon. He says, stare at it. Reflect on it. Don't blink. Don't flinch.

Don't miss it. This is what's coming for you. This is what your life is hurtling toward. This little vapor that you have, this little moment in the sun, it's not for nothing.

It's not capricious. It's not arbitrary. There's an accounting. There's a reckoning. There's a storm to come.

Jesus, as we'll see next week, Jesus had to live His whole life in that reality.

He had to live His whole life with, as it were, rumbling thunders and flashes of lightning and storm clouds until that storm came upon Him at Golgotha.

He lived His whole life in light of that coming storm. And that storm comes for us all. God is without partiality.

The book of life is opened in Revelation 20, and the dead who are raised are judged according to their works.

The earth gives up those who sleep in her breasts. The seas give up those who are buried in the deep.

Death and Hades deliver up all those who are contained, and each one is judged according to their work.

And as Peter says in Acts 10, God shows no partiality. Or as Paul says in Romans 2, we know the judgment of God is according to truth against those who practice evil.

And do you think this, O man, you who judge those participating in such things, doing the same, that you will escape the judgment of God?

Do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, longsuffering? Not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance, but in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart, you're treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath, revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render each according to his deeds.

For Paul, this is the reality that we live unto.

For most Christians today, it's a reality we turn a blind eye toward. How different our lives would be if we could even barely be conscious of this reality.

There will be a judgment that accords with our house. Every part of my life laid bare before Him.

Every thought of my heart, every intention, every desire. The movement of my will, the way that I've formed my character, the ways that I've given in and fallen into, the sinful patterns of this world.

That all is laid bare before Him, to whom I must give account. And He will render judgment according to that house.

Listen to how our confession puts it from chapter 32. God has appointed a day wherein He will judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ, to whom all power and judgment is given of the

Father, in which day not only the apostate angel shall be judged, but likewise all persons that have lived upon the earth shall appear before this tribunal of Christ to give an account of their thoughts, their words, their deeds, and to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether for good or for evil.

Now that's simply language taken right out of 2 Corinthians.

This is 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Paul says, We make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well -pleasing to Him.

For we must all, that's we, must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad.

That's just the reality that you and I face this morning. There's a storm coming.

There's a storm coming. Jesus is not so much warning about the occasional waves or the heavy rains, the occasional things that would cause our phones to begin to send out that national weather alert.

It's not the crises and the deep valleys and the darkest trials of our lives that Jesus has in view, so much as how those are all just microcosms of the greatest storm to come.

Just like every time you go to bed at night, it's a microcosm. It's a daily picture for you of what it's like to sleep your final sleep.

And every morning you open your eyes and draw in breath is a microcosm of that resurrection yet to come.

God is patterning into our experience a microcosm, a parcel of what is coming, and the deepest trials, the darkest distresses of life are just a shadow of the storm that's coming upon us all.

And Jesus says, when that storm comes, and it must come, if your life is not built on the things that I've taught, as you've built and practiced and done what

I've commanded, your whole life will collapse. Great will be your fall.

That's how he closes his sermon. That's the last thing that Jesus says in the

Sermon on the Mount. Great will be that fall. Amen, let's pray.

That's how he closes his sermon. Can you understand the urgency that he's putting before us to not be deluded, to not be distracted, to not live in some false reality?

At some point in the past, I must have given my life to Christ, and look at the hoops I'm jumping through.

I must be okay with him. And Jesus says, no, you're not hearing me at all. You're not going to be able to endure this storm.

Do you know me? Is your life built squarely upon me? Are you doing the things that I command? That's the urgency, that's the weight, that's the burden he's putting upon us at the close of his sermon.

And of course, every part of me is dying to get to next week. Every part of me wants to immediately footnote and qualify.

Well, let's talk about justification. Okay, you're all feeling a little bit heavy now. Don't worry about it now. Here's why we can actually rejoice in judgment.

And I want to do that, but I feel like I'm missing exactly what Jesus is trying to get across. And so this morning,

I'm not here to pull the teeth out of how Jesus closes this sermon, and to have only 10 minutes reflecting on what it means to endure this storm and face this judgment.

And then let's quickly move on to how we can feel a little bit better about ourselves and go right on to our distracted way of living.

That's not what Jesus wants us to do. That's not how Jesus closes this sermon. What Jesus wants us to see is it does not matter what we profess.

It does not matter what catechism's answers we can recite. It does not matter the things that come out of our mouth if our lives do not bear the fruit of that profession.

If our lives don't match the things we claim to believe, our house will collapse upon itself.

The entirety of our lives will be brought to bear in that storm. Not everyone who says to me,

Lord, Lord. Or as Titus 1 says, those who profess to know

God, but in their works they deny Him. And so He denies them. I never knew you.

Why does Jesus warn us of this coming storm? Why does the flood come upon all of life?

Of course, we're brought all the way back to the beginning of Scripture and we have the sort of type of God's judgment, the type of this world -ending storm, this life -ending storm, and that's the flood judgment in the days of Noah.

And if Genesis 6 emphasizes anything, it's that the flood is coming upon us because of the corruption, because of the sins of humanity.

That's inescapable. No sin, no judgment. No sin, no storm.

The storm only comes for one reason, and that's because of what humanity is like after the fall, because of the things that we do, doing the things we ought not to do, doing the things we hate.

And so God, beholding the corruption of sinful humanity, says, Behold, I Myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth to destroy from under heaven all flesh, and which is the breath of life, everything that is on earth shall die.

That's the God whose eye is on the sparrow. That's the God who numbers every hair on your head.

It's also the God who sits enthroned above the flood. The God who sends a storm that will shake the world to its core and harvest all that have died within her midst to be raised unto

Him, unto that judgment at the end. We don't need to wonder at the reason for the flood. It's made abundantly, tragically, repeatedly clear.

It's the increase of sin on the earth. The Lord saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth.

Every intent of the thought of his heart was only evil continually. And the result of that is, verse 7 in Genesis 6,

I will destroy. What a contrast to where Genesis had begun.

The Lord saw that it was good. Three chapters later, the

Lord saw that it was only evil continually. Now, is this a

God who's so abstract, the blind watchmaker who can see that some things are getting a little out of control, and he throws his hands up in the air and decides to send a judgment?

No. In fact, we see this grief in ways that we have to tread very cautiously upon lest we deform a right understanding of God as He's revealed

Himself. In very human -like language, anthropomorphic language, he bares his heart and says,

I repent that I've made man. I don't even know what to do with that.

This is the one who breathed the breath of life into humanity, who sends the rain on both the wicked and the just.

And when he sees the increase of wickedness on the earth, he could grieve to such an extent that in this man -like way of speaking, he says,

I repent that I created man to begin with. That's not something for theologians to explain.

That's something for poets to stare at. That's for something to be silent toward. I don't even want to press in upon that.

The point is simply this. We live in the midst of this crooked generation, this adulterous generation, and we're so deluded that even as Christians, we think somehow we're not that bad because we're a little bit better than the world, and look at the verdict that God gives upon the world.

It's not the verdict of prejudice. God's not partial. He's not bigoted.

He doesn't have some slant or bias like we all do as human beings. This isn't some revelation that's written by primitive prophets.

This is not men and women with very limited knowledge and perspective trying to unload their own hatred and depravity for others upon holy writ.

This is the verdict of God. This is the storm that came upon the earth.

God looking inwardly to the thoughts and the motives and the secret intents of the heart, but also outwardly in all of the compass and detail and objectivity of His righteous judgment,

He brings this verdict. I must destroy. I must. He sees in ways we cannot see.

He looks where we dare not look with a clarity we can never possess, an infinity, an omnipresence, an omniscience.

We see, as was even prayed earlier, we see the best in ourselves and the worst in others, but even that worst is outward and bound to our own blindness and partiality.

We don't actually see the worst that really is evident before God. And so we might be horrified as we read certain headlines or we see examples of the depravity of man, but we're not nearly as horrified as we ought to be.

If we could see as God sees, if we could know as God knows, if we could discern not only around us but within us, within our own hearts, we would understand why

Jesus closes His sermon in this way. There's a storm coming. God's grief in light of this judgment is a window that I think can build us some level of hope.

God, again, is not some cosmic dictator who coolly presses a button.

He's not one who somehow is less merciful than we would desire to be, less loving than we could hope for.

We don't know what love is. Our greatest acts of love almost look like hatred when they're compared to the way that God loves.

We can't even begin to understand the depths of the perfections of God's attributes, not least among them

His love. And so when we find Him repenting in this way and sending judgment, we should neither see

Him as wringing His hands and not really wanting to do it anxiously but feeling obligated, but we should also not see it as something cool and abstract and dictatorial.

We should rather see a holy God full of love, loving

His holiness, and in holiness desiring to rectify the things that are wrong.

And He brings about this judgment, and He wipes the face of the earth clean.

Where do we see the loving kindness of God? And this is very important for where we're going in the Sermon on the

Mount. We see the loving kindness of God upholding a world that is increasing in evil.

How many years was Noah given the task to build the Ark? Every hour of every day within that construction was

God's loving kindness upholding a world that was rebelling against Him in hatred and spite, increasing in wickedness against Him and against others, giving days and weeks and months and years filled with holidays and gatherings and birthdays, harvests and sunsets and laughter around the dinner table, all good things to those who despise

Him, whose actions degrade themselves as image bearers and degrade their neighbors as image bearers.

That's why Peter can say, when once the divine long -suffering waited in the days of Noah, do you see?

All the apostles look back to this judgment, this global judgment, as a foreshadowing of the storm to come, of the judgment to come.

The flood that God wrought upon the earth in Genesis 6 was just a type and a forecast of the greater flood yet to come, the eschatological flood.

And so the New Testament writers are always looking at the storm imagery. You think about how the prophets take up storm imagery in terms of God's judgment, and Jesus is leaning right into that, reminded that even in judgment,

God shows forth His long -suffering. Listen, God is long -suffering with you, that He's given you more days before the storm comes for you.

That is long -suffering. What a mercy it is to be warned, if we have ears to hear it.

It's a mercy to be warned. Do you want proof of God's love to you? He loves you enough to warn you that the storm is coming.

Bare minimum that is love. Bare minimum. Without even getting to the good news of the

Gospel. He loves you enough to warn you. To give you time to examine what you're building upon.

To give you time to weigh out this structure and its integrity. Have you actually understood the words of the

Lord? Are you actually carrying that out in your life? Do you know a storm is coming? If you're living unto others, it won't matter.

They won't be the judgment that you face. They won't comprise the storm you're up against. It's His sight.

It's His verdict. It's His calling. It's His command. That's what's coming against you.

That's what your life must withstand. We see, if I could give you another example of Jesus showing us a judgment that must come, but giving us a divine insight.

The world thinks of God as angry, violent. That's not fair.

It's not just. I would be more loving than that. I would show mercy. It shows how ignorant we are. We don't even understand our own depravity.

We can't even imagine the long -suffering nature of our God. This is what Jesus says as He speaks in parables.

He says, A man planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a place for the wine vat, built a tower. Now he leased it to vinedressers.

This is, of course, a shot against a Sanhedrin. This judgment that's going to come upon the leaders of Jerusalem.

They're the vinedressers that are in lease. Now at vintage time,

He sent a servant to the vinedressers that he might receive some of the fruit of the vineyard. The vinedressers took him and beat him, sent him away empty -handed.

So He sent them another servant. And at him they threw stones, wounded him in the head, sent him away, shamefully treated.

And again, He sent another. Well, that one they killed, and many others.

Beating some, killing some. Now just pause there.

What do you understand Jesus saying about the nature of this vineyard owner? He's the creator.

He's the one who's built up this vineyard. He's given it over to vinedressers. And He sent servant after servant after servant after servant.

What is Jesus saying and reflecting upon when it comes to the judgment of the Father? He is long -suffering.

Long -suffering. Swift to show mercy. Slow to anger.

That would be enough. I draw the line here. You've killed

My servants. You wicked vinedressers. Look at the judgment that is wrought upon you.

He doesn't do that. The parable keeps going. You get the idea that He's run out of servants.

He sent everyone that said, here I am, I'll go. We see your love. We see your glory. We love you.

Send us. We'll go. He sends everyone, and He has no one left except one. Therefore, still having one son,

His beloved, He also sent him to them at the last, saying, they'll respect my son.

But the vinedressers said, this is the heir. Come, let's kill him. The inheritance will be ours.

So they took him and they killed him and they cast him out of the vineyard. And Jesus asked this question, what will the owner of the vineyard do?

Now the world wants to look at God's judgment. The world wants to see the close of the Sermon on the

Mount and say, oh, all these Baptists and their hellfire preaching. Oh, all the

Turner -Byrne rhetoric. All we ever hear is judgment. You know, what we really need is a church of refugees.

We need a church that's just love. We're actually never going to talk about. We never use that word.

That's the word we don't want to use. We don't want to talk about sin. We certainly don't want to talk about H -E double hockey sticks.

We don't want to actually cause anyone to reflect deeply on judgment. Is that how

Jesus preaches? How does He close this sermon? He wants us to stare at the very center of what's coming our way.

He asks the question, what will the owner of the vineyard do? The world, because of the church, being unfaithful in these ways, wants to pretend there really is no sin.

We're really, all we just need to do is just be more loving. Let's form the circle and sing Kumbaya. We'll all make it to glory.

That's not how Jesus teaches. They want to begin here. Oh, this seems so harsh.

They want to begin with the vineyard owner would destroy these poor vinedressers?

What they miss is the overture of servants sent and sent and sent and sent again the warnings, the urgency, the giving of His own

Son. What more could He do to try to bring people out of wrath and destruction to come? And so when you come to that question, what will

He do? What will the judge do when He puts the earth to right? You have to begin with what the judge has done all along.

Long -suffering mercies, good gifts upon good gifts, rain falling even to the wicked, good sunlight and harvest, glories given to image bearers that despise

Him and deform themselves and others. You begin there. Only then can you rightly ask the question, what will

He do? What will He do? If you're having any moral integrity or moral compass in your conscience, you must give the answer,

He will destroy them. There's something that even though we repress the righteous revelation of God in unrighteousness, even sinners know something of the thirst for justice.

There is an outcry in this world for justice. We all might have it warped, might have it slanted, but every one of us knows something about a thirst for justice until it's

God's justice against us. Well, what we see very clearly is

Jesus asking this rhetorical question to get at, have you rightly understood what's coming?

He's saying it essentially to the Sanhedrin in this parable, what will the owner of the vineyard do?

What's coming your way? Here at the end of Matthew 7, Jesus is saying to us, there's a storm coming.

And of course you can hear within this parable the echo of the owner sending his beloved son.

He had one left, his beloved. That's the echo of Jesus at the baptism. That's the echo at the transfiguration.

That's the echo from Genesis 22 of Abram giving over Isaac to the altar, the one son, the son whom he loved.

And that only heightens the drama, the sense of loss. We're almost shocked. Is the owner ignorant?

Is he aloof? Why is he being so gracious? This is his vineyard. Why would he allow even a servant to be insulted, much less beaten, much less killed, and he would send his own son into that?

What do you see of the nature of God? We want to inwardly scream, don't do it.

Don't give your son to these people. Destroy them.

Spare the son. I said

I wouldn't go gospel this morning, but I can't help myself. But instead, he sends his son to be destroyed, that they might be spared.

The owner has lost his due, his right, what he's built with his own hands, all that he invested into it, all that it was meant to be.

He's lost all of his servants, and now he's lost his only beloved son. We would never love evil men like this, not even once, much less 70 times 7.

But then we're reminded, God did not send his son into the world that the world would be condemned, but that it might be saved through him.

So the son comes. He comes into the vineyard. He comes to see the hate -filled faces.

He comes to their murderous thirst. He comes to the shadow of that cursed tree, and he too is killed.

And Jesus asks the question, what will the owner of the vineyard do? If we're reading rightly, we're thirsting for justice.

Rise up, O Lord. Listen to what

J .C. Ryle says. Men never saw God face to face but once. When Jesus became a man and lived on earth, they saw him, holy, harmless, undefiled, going about doing good, yet they wouldn't have him.

They rebelled against him, and they killed him. So let's dismiss from our minds the idea that there's innate good in our hearts.

Let's put away the common notion that seeing and knowing what is good is enough to make a man a Christian.

We don't have to talk about judgment. We don't have to talk about sin. There is no need for repentance. We just need to show you how

Jesus was good, and you try to be good too, and we'll all make it to glory. That's not how Jesus preaches. That's not apostolic doctrine.

That's not scriptural revelation. Those are deceiving words that deceive the hearts of the simple. You know,

I remember years ago when we were outside Planned Parenthood, there was a woman on the sidewalk, and we were going up and trying to make conversations, trying to witness to her, you know, do you go to church?

Are you a Christian? Have you ever heard the gospel? Oh, well, don't go to church. You know, it's just, oh, there's so many different views, so many different perspectives, and you know, it would be so easy if Jesus would just come.

If he would just come, then it would be so easy to follow him, and you know, so I just kind of have my own relay, and I said, man, if Jesus came, you know what would happen?

We would crucify him. That's what happened when he did come. That's the owner sending his son.

The vineyard is us. We think, if I could just see the Lord, then

I'd follow. If I could just be with Jesus, then I'd build. Have you not read the gospels? Is that what happened?

When the light shone in the darkness, what did the darkness do? Couldn't comprehend it. Sought to extinguish it.

If I could see man, and if I could see man's sin as God sees, I would know

I can never have more pity than God. It's a blasphemous thought to think

I am more merciful or have more pity than God. How dare we ever even entertain that as a passing thought.

If I were God, I would show mercy. I wouldn't allow this to happen. I would change things.

If you were God, no one would be in heaven. Hell would be overflowing. We don't even know what pity or mercy is unless it's some glimmer, some heavenly light that descends from him above.

So the natural import of this is simply asking this question, are we viewing

God's judgment rightly? Do you recognize it's a storm that's coming and it's inescapable?

So many people are obsessed with learning about the last days or the end time and that ends up, from my experience, being more of a distraction than a help.

There's a need for end times study. There's a need to devote yourself to eschatology and eschatology is a doctrine that has tentacles in almost every other doctrine.

Eschatology holds up and holds together all of God's revelation. In fact, you can't even begin to work through the issues of creation without thinking about them in light of the end.

So eschatology is indispensable. I'm not throwing shade against that. But what

I am saying is this. I grew up and working at the bookstore, saw a lot of people that they only ever cared to read books about some blood moon or something happening in Iran.

They were fascinated by tracking the headlines and trying to do the chart with all the yarn going everywhere.

They wanted to try to understand how's this all going and can we read the days of his appearing? What's it going to be like?

What's it going to happen? Have you heard what's going on with those Russian helicopters? Jesus, I don't think, would have us so distracted.

If you're excited to study the end in this way, you probably haven't even understood the first thing about the end.

To deeply reflect upon the judgment that awaits, the inescapable storm that we all must face.

It should silence us. Those who can make hell a punchline have never understood the first thing about hell.

Those who can flippantly think of standing before the judgment seat of Christ don't know the first thing about the judgment seat of Christ.

Has no effect, no impact on their conscience or on their life. Does God so hate sin?

Does the owner of the vineyard not show his mercy in vain? Though he's long suffering, we know what

Jesus is saying when he's asking, what will the owner do? We almost want to chant. We almost want to push.

Get that owner onto the judgment seat. We demand that kind of justice.

This means at the very least, can we rightly understand God's judgment and his hatred for sin if we do not also feel a humiliation for our sin and a hatred of our sin?

If sin grieves God to the point of creator repentance, if we could put it in that way, should it not grieve us to the point of creaturely repentance?

And so we see this idea of knowing him bound to these very things. Do I know him?

Not do I know him as my heavenly father. Anyone on the sidewalk wants to claim they know him that way.

Do I know him as the judge who sits enthroned? Hundred people you run into will claim they know him as their loving father.

Scarcely one will say they know him as their judge to come. Jesus is saying there's a storm coming.

It doesn't matter what you profess. Your whole house is at stake. That storm is going to beat upon it.

Will it endure? Are you listening to my words? Are you doing the things that I have commanded?

Are you building on the Christ which is the sure foundation? Is your life hidden in him with God?

God who is a long -suffering God, but also a sin -hating God. God who is a merciful God, but also a just and holy

God. God who will destroy the vineyard owners, but also gives

His Son as a ransom for many, that all who believe on Him will not perish, but have everlasting life. As we come to a close this morning,

I want to give three needs that must be fulfilled. Three needs that must be fulfilled if we're to have a right understanding of God in this way.

If we want to do justice to how Jesus closes this sermon, we'll need to fulfill three things in this house of our lives.

Three things that ought to be in this house. Three things that your life ought to look like. And the first need is this, the need to watch.

We already talked last week about surveying. You can't build without surveying what needs to be built.

Looking at new construction requires surveying. Looking at repair work requires surveying. Looking at the areas of weakness requires seeing that weakness.

So this is seeing, but with perhaps a forward -looking effort. It's a watchfulness.

So building the house that will endure judgment requires both seeing where the house is and what the foundation looks like, but also watching for the storm to come.

If there wasn't a storm coming, you wouldn't need to watch. In fact, if there wasn't a storm coming, it doesn't matter what your foundation is.

Rock, sand, jello, it doesn't matter. There's no storm to face. If we're just meatbags that take a dirt nap, don't waste your time listening to me.

Go live your life. Eat, drink, be merry. Tomorrow you'll die. It won't matter. But if our life is given from God and returns to God, then you not only need to see what's damaged, what's broken, or what must be built and how it must be built upon the rock of God's teaching,

God's revelation, you must also watch for the storm. You will not build wisely, carefully.

You will not build on the rock if you're not building in light of the storm. Listen, if there wasn't a flood coming, Noah wouldn't be building an ark.

If he really was not convinced that this flood was going to come, he wouldn't have been so careful to make sure this ship was watertight.

Will it endure the storm? Every beam matters. Every beam of my life matters.

No crevice, no crack, no place that's not covered over with mortar. Do it over again.

No, it has to be right. No, that's not good enough because there's a storm coming.

That's watchfulness. This is an issue for the very first Christians. They looked, they watched for the return of Christ.

Again, especially early on, they thought that return, and at various times throughout church history, they felt that return was imminent.

In my experience, that thought is rarely helpful for those that are already preoccupied or fixated upon rapture theology.

That's not very helpful. We need to watch for his appearing, and I think generally what that looks like for us is we watch to appear before him.

It may be, I need to have my lamp full because he can return as a thief in the night. But as a preacher said, we may be the early church yet.

The point is this. That storm comes, whether at the end of time or the end of my time, the storm comes.

I need to have a watchfulness whether he appears to me or I appear before him. I need to watch. That's the storm.

That's what my house has to endure. That's what will be subject to him who sees all. So the early

Christians, they looked forward to the return of Christ. That became the ground of their endeavor, their hope, their comfort.

Come quickly, Lord, was their prayer. I don't think we pray with that kind of urgency.

I see it in my own life. My prayers rarely end with Maranatha.

I want more life, more time. Ancient Christians prayed, there's too much time, come now.

I want to be young again. I want to be 20 again. I want a do -over.

I want a round two. The ancient Christians said, Lord, just come. Just come now. Don't tarry, don't wait.

It's a watchfulness. And it's not that their task was any different. There was a world around them that was in need of being heralded the good news of the kingdom, of being discipled.

They knew that that faith was going to grow like a mustard seed into a great tree and that people from all over the east and the west of the empire would come to nest in its branches.

They knew also that that wouldn't be accomplished quickly. They had an empire to overturn, but they were still watchful.

They were still praying and praising Maranatha, Lord. From the time of at least Peter, Christians have been aware that they would grow old and die before Christ returned.

That knowledge never prevented them from being watchful. Remember, it was Peter that was told he'd live to be an old man and would be carried to die a martyr's death.

He knew that he wasn't going to be caught up in the air. But that didn't stop him from looking for the coming of Christ.

2 Peter 3, looking for, hasting unto the coming day of God. He was looking for it.

He was living his whole life in light of it. How different would our lives be if we were looking for and hastening the coming day of God?

Every trial you endure, every medical test that comes back to you with bad news hard to bear, every evidence of this decaying humanity, every news report of a splintering world should only be a means, a fuel for you to hasten the coming day of God.

Just think about how often this is a refrain in Scripture. What do we do every time we take the bread and the wine?

Well, if we're thinking rightly in 1 Corinthians 11, we proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.

We're not doing this merely to reflect on the past week and then help me this week. Do not live your life in two -week intervals as a

Christian. Don't do it. Don't live your life in 14 -day blocks. Don't live,

Lord, forgive me for last week, help me this week. You eat and drink until He comes, Lord. I'm building toward that coming day.

Each one, Paul says later in chapter 15, in His own order, Christ, the firstfruits, afterward, those who are

Christ at His coming. Then comes the end. That's the end. What is our hope?

What is our joy? What is our crown of rejoicing, he says? It's you in the presence of our Lord at His coming.

He says in 1 Thessalonians 3 that He may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our

Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints. Chapter 4 Until the coming of the Lord. Chapter 5

It's just this constant refrain. The coming, the coming, the coming of the Lord. James 5 Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the

Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth. The coming of the Lord is at hand.

What does he say about grumblers? He says, Do not grumble. Behold, the Judge is at the door. This idiomatic way of saying it's imminent now.

You don't have time to grumble if you're thinking rightly. It's going to be transformative about the way you not only live your life unto

God, but the way you live your life with others. If you're understanding this day is coming. The storm is coming.

So we're not told to predict the dates. No one can know. But we have a duty to be prepared and waiting.

That means that we carry on with our tasks. We have a calling. We have jobs. We have families. We don't abandon that and sit on a hilltop and just stare up into the sky.

But we are to occupy until he comes, and you cannot occupy until he comes if you're not watching for his coming.

What did Jesus command his disciples to do? Watch and pray. So I need to look at my life.

By God's grace, if we get to Ecclesiastes in the new year, it is a deep meditation on the vapor, the mist of life, and all that comprises life under the sun, all that's part of the warp and the weft of this world that's under the curse of God awaiting its redemption.

When we look at that, we're meant to reflect on the fact that there's a storm coming. Jesus mercifully warns me to get my house in order.

What am I building upon? Am I compartmentalizing my life? Am I saying, well, I'll get there some other time, some other day.

Today's the day. Because there's a storm coming. The foolish builder is also the fool who says,

I've got time. I'll figure it out after. I've got some other things to address. It's sand.

You think you're in control of your life? You think you can arrange your own times? You think you can schedule God to meet you?

Doesn't work that way. To say I'll do it later is to say, God, I refuse you. God, I reject you.

God, I harden my heart and my ears to your word. If anyone has ears to hear, do not harden your heart.

While today is still cold, today is the day of repentance. And that's the whole idea of watchfulness.

The second need is to persevere. It's one thing to watch and to see the storm clouds coming. It's another thing then to turn back to our work and persevere in building.

Are we building on the rock? Are we building wisely? Are we building comprehensively in light of all that God is showing us?

Listen, you don't need to master it all. You don't have to have it all figured out. But you need to be faithful to the thing that God is pressing upon you.

If you're a Christian sitting here this morning, God has pressed something upon your heart, something on your conscience. There's something that's at the top of your prayers to Him.

Lord, forgive me for this. Or Lord, help me with this. Well, that's the thing that He's pressing.

That's the thing that He's showing. Don't be a mere hearer. Be a doer of what He's commanded you to do in light of that.

You have to persevere in that. Another way of thinking about it is, in Luke 16, this image of pressing into the kingdom.

He says, since the time of John the Baptist, the kingdom of God has been preached and everyone is pressing into it.

And Jonathan Edwards, in a great sermon on that passage, says by pressing into the kingdom of God, we are breaking through opposition and difficulty.

If there were not opposition, there'd be no need to press in. That's the point. You have to persevere in that.

The world, the flesh, the devil, that's what you're up against. That's not something to take lightly. Jesus said you're going to have to carry a cross.

Jesus said it's going to look like entering the kingdom without an eye or without a hand. What is that but pressing into the kingdom by all means?

If I'm getting there by a pinky, I'll get there. That's the mentality of someone pressing into the kingdom of God.

Listen to what Edwards says. Everything that is a weight that hinders him in running this race, he casts behind him, even if that weight is of gold or pearls.

We like to think of the weight as all the negative things in our lives. Oh, if only I can cast off this weight of my tongue or my lust or my attitude, my ingratitude, my pride.

Those are the weights that so easily entangle me. Well, there's more weight than that too. It's the good things of your life as well. It's the gold and the pearls and the gifts that can also drag you down so you don't finish.

You need to persevere. What are golden pearls?

What are achieved ambitions in this life when you recognize a storm is coming? Who is going to spend more time using a dremel to get every little detail right on their house when they recognize a storm is coming that's going to beat upon the house at the end anyway?

You're not going to dremel the details of your life if you're living in light of that storm. Again, a life lived unto

God is a life that is free to live for others. I'm not going to perfect my house in this life because I can't perfect my house in this life.

I can't. The whole point of the vanity of vanities, it's under this fallen sun.

The whole earth is convulsing in birth pains, groaning, awaiting its redemption. My life is part of that too, so I'm not looking for a perfect house in this life.

I'm living for a perfect house yet to come. It's okay for me to dwell in a tent in this life. If I have the faith of Abram, I'm looking for the city whose builder and maker is

God. It means you're going to persevere through the wilderness. This was really the point of Augustine when he wrote

City of God. And the whole point of the City of God, one of the major motifs in the

City of God is the idea of the Christian as a pilgrim, the Christian pilgrimage. That's because he said there's something corrupting about this world where we see the imminence of the world and we want to comprise and tie up all of our hopes, all of our drives, all of our desires in this life, in this world as it is.

And it's only by faith that we come to realize we have to pass through the form of this world.

Its present form is passing away, so we have to hold things in this life loosely. Things will be pulled from us in life or will be pulled from them, but we have to live as pilgrims.

And do you know one of the major rationales that Augustine had for living as a pilgrim?

The sobering realization that we must stand before the judgment seat of Christ. You want to let go of things in this life that you can't hold anyway?

Listen to how Jesus closes the sermon. Don't dremel the details of your life. Persevere in the hardest things because the hardest things that you build will be the things that endure the storm to come.

And then lastly, and I close with this, the need to stand. So we need to watch, we need to persevere, and having done all, to stand.

At the end of the day, we're building our hope on something.

We have a hope and judgment. We should not so start with that hope that we're dull and thoughtless about what that judgment will mean.

Again, every instinct, desire, daydream, word and thought and intent of your heart laid bare at that reckoning.

I don't think we can even confront the magnitude of that. I don't want my thought life on a projector just from last week.

And I have to have my whole life open before Him. So I don't start,

I don't start with the hope, I start with the reality of judgment. And as I feel the crushing weight of that reality, then my hope can become an anchor.

There is a storm that's coming, but I can have an anchor for my soul that will withstand that storm.

And that's the idea of standing, of having a hope that is built. The point is, the whole point of the parable of two builders is not being a mere hearer, not being a hypocrite, but being a doer of God's word.

That's building wisely on a strong foundation. We recognize, of course, that Jesus alone,

His finished work wrought out in us by the very Spirit of God is going to be what endures on that day.

So that all praise, all honor, our glory goes to Him. And that means, in some ways, as much as I need to watch, as much as I need to persevere in building and dragging my cross,

I also need to stand on Him who alone is my surety and my hope. I need to stand, and having done all to stand.

It's where I begin, it's where I end. Some are given 20, 50, 100 talents.

Some have three -story houses, five -story houses, a skyscraper. If you're one who enters the kingdom, your plea will be the same.

I can only be accepted because I'm covered in the blood of the Lamb. He alone is all of my hope and stay.

I have no other claim. I have no other plea. I have no other argument, no other defense.

I simply plead the blood of Jesus, who died to ransom my soul. Forgive me that I've wasted and squandered so much,

Lord. The great hymn, My Hope is Built, it was actually written by Edward Mote.

He was trying to come up with a hymn. He had this idea, I want to write about the gracious experience of a

Christian. So he came up with the first few lines as he was working throughout the week. Then he came across a brother on the way to going to a worship service.

And the brother said, you know, my wife's taken very ill and this might be it. Would you come in and see her? And he said, you know, we're about to go to service and we have a habit of doing a reading of Scripture and singing a hymn and then engaging in prayer, but I left my hymn book and I don't have it.

And he said, that's okay, I've been working on a hymn. So Mote went into the bedside of this dying woman and they began to sing together this hymn.

And he was so moved by that experience of seeing the hope that it gave to her that he went home and he finished it and soon it was printed and passed out to thousands.

Because it's one thing for us, I think we sang this last week, it's one thing for us to sing this. I've sung this hymn 800 times in my life.

Easily. It's easy to sing. It's easy to profess. It's easy to say,

I know. It's easy to say, I believe. It's easy to say, I'll do. It's another thing to face the storm and to find that word, that faith to be true.

And so whatever Mote wanted to accomplish, he didn't even feel the weight of his own words until he saw it at work in this woman's life.

As she was dying, as the storm winds were beginning to beat against her body, as the storm clouds were darkening over her hopes for life, as the bodily pains rose up within her like a flood, he saw that these words actually meant something to her.

They reflected something true in her life. He said at the end of this as a reflection, not in the hymn, life with Christ is an endless hope, but without Him it's a hopeless end.

My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

I dare not trust the sweetest frame. I could almost imagine

Mote sitting by the side of this poor woman. I hope that I could have been a better mother.

I mean, I did do this and I was trying to be faithful in this area. No, no, no. Don't trust in the sweetest frame.

You dare not put your trust in that. There's nothing that can commend you to God. Have you understood this judge is perfect in righteousness?

All we offer, all that we produce is crooked. It's unworthy. It falls short. You dare not trust the sweetest frame.

The best thing that amounts in your life is not good enough to bear that sight, to bear that day.

Holy trust in Jesus' name. I can picture him by her side when he writes, the darkness seems to hide his face.

I rest on his unchanging grace. My life is now changing. I'm coming to an end.

All the seasons, all the chapters, all the building, it's all come to naught. My life is changing.

My glimpses of him, my hopes in him are now getting covered in darkness. But behind that darkness, I know there is one who changes not.

So I rest on him who changes not. In every high and stormy gale, my anchor holds within the veil.

In other words, I can't see where the anchor is, but I know that it's holding. I know that it will hold. His oath, his covenant, his blood.

Don't you love that? His, his, his. Support me in the whelming flood.

I know there's some people in this room that know more than others what it's like to see someone pass from this life into the next. It could really only be described as a whelming flood, an overwhelming flood.

Something that's building and building, and though you tread, and though you desperately gasp, you can't escape it.

It's going to overtake you. That's what a flood does. When all around, my soul gives way.

Everything that comprised this house. Every aspect of my life.

Every ambition, whether fulfilled or not. Every desire, every relationship. Those things that I've mustered, those things that I've changed.

The character that I've developed, the experiences I've come together. An endless scroll of 10 ,000 photos that capture moments of glory and grief.

And when all of that is stripped away, and all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay.

He's all I have left. When He shall come with trumpet sound.

Now it's beyond. The flood's overtaken me. That's okay. When He comes with trumpet sound, oh may

I then in Him be found, Dressed in His righteousness alone. And now what? Faultless to stand before the throne.

Faultless. You see the power of that refrain at work in that storm?

On Christ, the solid rock, I stand. It's not even the watching.

Brothers and sisters, it's not even the persevering. It's in the standing. It's standing on this rock who is

Christ. All other ground is sinking sand. That's it. There's nothing else in this life that can support you in that storm.

There's nothing else that you can cling to in that flood. Christ and Christ alone is the rock upon which you can stand.

And whoever hears these sayings of Jesus and does them is likened to a wise man who builds his house on that rock.

And when the rains descend and the winds beat and the floods rise up, it will not fall because it was founded on the rock.

Amen? Let's pray. Father, we thank

You for Your precious warnings, for Your words, Lord, that don't allow us to just go on in our own ignorance, but they sober us,

Lord, to the realities that we live in, spiritual realities of things yet unseen. Lord, help me, help each one here to live in light of the storm, live in light of Your judgment.

Let us feel that soul -transforming power of recognizing that everything that we are, everything that we will be in this life must be brought to You and given answer for, whether for good or for ill.

May this sober us, may this restrain us, Lord. May it peel our ego and our pride in such a way that we no longer live for the sight of men, live unto others and further and further and further apart from You.

But Lord, live unto You, live in light of the judgment. What will these others mean? What will any of the relationships or things we amass in this life mean when we have to stand and answer before You?

What will anything that we amass and muster in this life mean when that whelming flood begins to rise up in our life?

Thank You for mercies, Lord. You give us time to hear Your warnings, but may we not squander that time. May we not say tomorrow, because tomorrow only breeds tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow until tomorrow never comes.

May today be the day of Your salvation. Do this work in our midst, Lord. Sober this church to the reality of Your judgment.

For we know not only as individuals, but even as a church, we would live and behave and worship very differently if we had this heart song of Maranatha, if we lived in light of Your righteous judgment, if we saw the brokenness and sorrow of man's depravity and the havoc that it wreaks and felt that thirst for justice rise up within our souls, knowing that the vineyard owner not only must come, but will come, is appointed a day to come and put that vineyard to right.

May we long for that day. As part of that coming day, Lord, may we even here and now chase out the foxes in the vineyard and repent of and mortify all those things that withstand

You or oppose Your will, that we would be not mere hearers deceiving ourselves, but doers of Your will, wise men and women who build on the solid rock of our hope, who is