Houses Built On Sand
Sermon
PENTECOST FIRE
PREACHING COMMUNITY IN SEASONS OF CHANGE
One evening the television news was filled with stories about home--owners on the west coast whose multi--million dollar homes were slipping slowly, but surely, into the Pacific Ocean. Grief--stricken faces crowded the screen, calling on the local government to come and do something. Some even tried to get the State of California to intervene as their houses inched downward in a slow, steady dance toward the sea.
It's hard not to have sympathy for someone losing his or her home. We place a lot of ourselves in the buildings in which we live; no one wants to see anyone out on the street. But there's something about this scenario that unsettles my insides. Stuck in the mind's eye are the camera shots of houses slightly askew with the Pacific Ocean in the background, beckoning. For the most part, these folks paid serious dollars for their homes. Many people, myself included, dream about a home overlooking the ocean. The land on which these houses stand - or stood - cost more than the houses most of us live in today.
And yet, they build their houses, quite literally, on the sand. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to drive around these neighborhoods and predict that sooner or later these folks are going to lose their front lawns, then their driveways, and ultimately their whole houses to the inexorable march of the tides. Yet still they build. Even today as we sit here they build. On hurricane alley in North and South Carolina, they build. In the Gulf of Mexico, on coastal plains where floods and hurricanes are normal occurrences, they build.
And then it happens. A house falls into the sea. A condo is swept off by hurricane winds; a cottage evaporates in gale force winds. We've heard it all before. Yet the next thing that happens is rebuilding: new houses on the sand ready for the next storm to come and sweep them away.
It's very interesting to note that few of Jesus' illustrations in the Gospels carry such vivid and direct application to our world today. If we stop to consider it, things don't get much simpler. If we hear God's word and don't act on it, we only need to look at coastal real estate to get a graphic picture of what our lives will look like when the storm comes.
If, on the other hand, we receive God's word and act on it, then the story is different. Then we will be like the person who built his house on the rock, and the winds and the storms came and whipped and lashed to no avail. For the homeowner had built on a firm foundation.
It all seems so simple. The illustrations are crystalline in their clarity, and the direction forward could not be more bluntly stated.
We don't get just to talk about our religion. We don't have the luxury of merely going to church on Sunday for an hour so we can hear the preacher give us some moral pick--me--ups for the week ahead. No, we are to hear God's word, and then to act on it.
This scripture issues a challenge to the Church as it has been, and to the Church as it is called to be. The Church of today is really a house built on sand. It is a shaky proposition, a rickety structure laid out on the shifting sands of doctrine and ideology. It is a wilting collection of folks - all well meaning - but all gathered in the pews to hear the word without acting on it; without actually letting it touch and transform our lives.
Yes, some will disagree and point to all the good things that the Church does. True. There is much to applaud in terms of charity and comfortable shelter from the storms of a society which teeters between dysfunctionality and insanity. But the Church of Jesus Christ was not called forth by the Holy Spirit to be a sheltering place. The Church of Jesus Christ was born of the Spirit and nourished by the Word. And if we only sit idly by and listen to that Word without being touched, without being transformed, without turning and acting on what that Word calls us to do, then we are indeed resting on the quick--sand of our own inaction.
Today the so--called mainline churches of American Protestantism stand at a critical junction in their history. The situation is tense. Membership is down. Vision is blurred. Mission is unfocused. We have become a people who hear the Word but do not act on it. And the waves are lapping at the front steps of our houses built on sand while we busily restructure and quarrel over demonic tidbits of doctrine.
Fortunes have been made by scores of writers with greeting card theology, simple solutions, and structural realignments. We can pretend the Church is a business and follow a business plan. We can de--structure and let people follow their passion. Or we can swerve dangerously into neo--orthodoxy, snuffing out the vital intellectual quest that a living faith requires.
Or we can be hearers and doers of the Word.
We can, if we choose, quit all the noise and begin to do the gospel. Saint Francis is quoted somewhere as challenging his followers to "preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words...." We would do well at the beginning of this century to heed the call of the little monk of Assisi. We have an opportunity before us to renew, remake, and revive the Church in ways that we cannot even imagine.
If Christian folk were found in the urban trenches, feeding, healing, housing, and loving in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found in the prisons and the migrant camps offering advocacy, education, and hope in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found singing their hearts out in solidarity on the picket lines where laborers are exploited and workers endangered; if they offered solid support and succor in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found dismantling the weapons of war in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found in all these places, sisters and brothers, a revival would explode as never before. If Christian folk were found placing their bodies on the line in Jesus' name, the Church would not be slithering away into irrelevancy, nor would it be wasting its time fighting over meaningless points of doctrine. For we would be both hearers and doers of the Word. We would be living out our faith in God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
And, friends, the world would respond to that.
And we, the Church, would have begun to build our house on the solid rock of lives lived faithfully in Jesus' name. We would be not only hearers, but doers of the Word. Would we be perfect? No. Mistakes would come as surely as the dawning sun, as surely as they do now when we only sit idly by and listen. Would we be free from conflict? No. But conflict, we might learn in our struggle to live the Word, is a healthy part of our being together in community and ministry.
Sisters and brothers in Christ, the gospel challenges us today to be both hearers and doers of the Word. Will we accept the challenge? Will we embrace Jesus' call? The answer belongs to us all.
It's hard not to have sympathy for someone losing his or her home. We place a lot of ourselves in the buildings in which we live; no one wants to see anyone out on the street. But there's something about this scenario that unsettles my insides. Stuck in the mind's eye are the camera shots of houses slightly askew with the Pacific Ocean in the background, beckoning. For the most part, these folks paid serious dollars for their homes. Many people, myself included, dream about a home overlooking the ocean. The land on which these houses stand - or stood - cost more than the houses most of us live in today.
And yet, they build their houses, quite literally, on the sand. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to drive around these neighborhoods and predict that sooner or later these folks are going to lose their front lawns, then their driveways, and ultimately their whole houses to the inexorable march of the tides. Yet still they build. Even today as we sit here they build. On hurricane alley in North and South Carolina, they build. In the Gulf of Mexico, on coastal plains where floods and hurricanes are normal occurrences, they build.
And then it happens. A house falls into the sea. A condo is swept off by hurricane winds; a cottage evaporates in gale force winds. We've heard it all before. Yet the next thing that happens is rebuilding: new houses on the sand ready for the next storm to come and sweep them away.
It's very interesting to note that few of Jesus' illustrations in the Gospels carry such vivid and direct application to our world today. If we stop to consider it, things don't get much simpler. If we hear God's word and don't act on it, we only need to look at coastal real estate to get a graphic picture of what our lives will look like when the storm comes.
If, on the other hand, we receive God's word and act on it, then the story is different. Then we will be like the person who built his house on the rock, and the winds and the storms came and whipped and lashed to no avail. For the homeowner had built on a firm foundation.
It all seems so simple. The illustrations are crystalline in their clarity, and the direction forward could not be more bluntly stated.
We don't get just to talk about our religion. We don't have the luxury of merely going to church on Sunday for an hour so we can hear the preacher give us some moral pick--me--ups for the week ahead. No, we are to hear God's word, and then to act on it.
This scripture issues a challenge to the Church as it has been, and to the Church as it is called to be. The Church of today is really a house built on sand. It is a shaky proposition, a rickety structure laid out on the shifting sands of doctrine and ideology. It is a wilting collection of folks - all well meaning - but all gathered in the pews to hear the word without acting on it; without actually letting it touch and transform our lives.
Yes, some will disagree and point to all the good things that the Church does. True. There is much to applaud in terms of charity and comfortable shelter from the storms of a society which teeters between dysfunctionality and insanity. But the Church of Jesus Christ was not called forth by the Holy Spirit to be a sheltering place. The Church of Jesus Christ was born of the Spirit and nourished by the Word. And if we only sit idly by and listen to that Word without being touched, without being transformed, without turning and acting on what that Word calls us to do, then we are indeed resting on the quick--sand of our own inaction.
Today the so--called mainline churches of American Protestantism stand at a critical junction in their history. The situation is tense. Membership is down. Vision is blurred. Mission is unfocused. We have become a people who hear the Word but do not act on it. And the waves are lapping at the front steps of our houses built on sand while we busily restructure and quarrel over demonic tidbits of doctrine.
Fortunes have been made by scores of writers with greeting card theology, simple solutions, and structural realignments. We can pretend the Church is a business and follow a business plan. We can de--structure and let people follow their passion. Or we can swerve dangerously into neo--orthodoxy, snuffing out the vital intellectual quest that a living faith requires.
Or we can be hearers and doers of the Word.
We can, if we choose, quit all the noise and begin to do the gospel. Saint Francis is quoted somewhere as challenging his followers to "preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words...." We would do well at the beginning of this century to heed the call of the little monk of Assisi. We have an opportunity before us to renew, remake, and revive the Church in ways that we cannot even imagine.
If Christian folk were found in the urban trenches, feeding, healing, housing, and loving in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found in the prisons and the migrant camps offering advocacy, education, and hope in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found singing their hearts out in solidarity on the picket lines where laborers are exploited and workers endangered; if they offered solid support and succor in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found dismantling the weapons of war in Jesus' name; if Christian folk were found in all these places, sisters and brothers, a revival would explode as never before. If Christian folk were found placing their bodies on the line in Jesus' name, the Church would not be slithering away into irrelevancy, nor would it be wasting its time fighting over meaningless points of doctrine. For we would be both hearers and doers of the Word. We would be living out our faith in God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
And, friends, the world would respond to that.
And we, the Church, would have begun to build our house on the solid rock of lives lived faithfully in Jesus' name. We would be not only hearers, but doers of the Word. Would we be perfect? No. Mistakes would come as surely as the dawning sun, as surely as they do now when we only sit idly by and listen. Would we be free from conflict? No. But conflict, we might learn in our struggle to live the Word, is a healthy part of our being together in community and ministry.
Sisters and brothers in Christ, the gospel challenges us today to be both hearers and doers of the Word. Will we accept the challenge? Will we embrace Jesus' call? The answer belongs to us all.
