Listening Plus

Luke 6:46-49

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord” and do not do what I say?” This question comes up with telling frequency in Jesus’ teachings.

Become famous or rich or important in society and everyone will call you their friend. That is a trait among humans as old as the human race. Jesus knows that there are those who follow him with their lips and not with their actions. And so, he says, he will show his listeners what those people are like. Actually he makes this statement in the affirmative: he will first explain what those are like who DO follow him with their lips AND their actions.

This parable is an old and familiar one to all of us who grew up in Sunday School and learned the song “The wise man built his house upon a rock … and the rains came tumbling down.” It is a great song for kids, full of action and word pictures that bring out the kidness in all of us. And a catchy tune that sticks with us all the week through.

Even little kids who know nothing of the intricate workings of engineering know the difference between an endurable construction project and a sand castle or a lego tower that goes crash when you smash it. And who better to test such engineering feats than a kid?

In Luke’s rendering of this parable, the words “wise” and “foolish” do not appear as it does in Matthew’s. Jesus says simply enough that the one who hears and follows through responsively is like a man who, when building a house, digs down deep and lays a foundation on rock. When the floods inevitably come, the floodwaters hit the house hard, but the house is unshaken and stands firm because “it was well built.”

In contrast, Jesus then goes on to say, the one who hears his words and does not put them into practice is like someone who builds a house directly on the ground without any foundation (in this setting, neither “rock” nor “sand” are used, only “foundation”). This house doesn’t survive the floods, collapsing immediately.

Jesus isn’t focusing on the type of house built – earthen or wooden or rock. The emphasis is the house having a proper foundation. Not so much whether it is built on rock or sand, but whether the house has something that anchors it to the ground on which it sits.

A mighty city such as New York can build huge skyscrapers because the ground at “Ground Zero” is deep bedrock, something true of much of the area. Bedrock deep enough to support one of the world’s largest collections of super-structures.

Even where there is sand, however, such as at the Jersey shore only a short drive from those skyscrapers, you can build a house that will last many an Atlantic hurricane as long as you drive pilings (or foundation materials) deep into the sand. A major storm might damage the shingles or shutters, even some of the siding and framing, but the house itself will not collapse if it has a proper foundation. Ever go to the shore and push your feet into the watery sand until it sucks your legs in tight? You are unmovable with your “foundation” anchored in simple sand.

For people, Jesus says, that “proper foundation” for life is the dynamic duo of hearing his words and putting them into action. We never really know or understand something unless we do something with it after we hear or read it. This is especially the case when Jesus calls us to obey. It is not enough, he warns, to say we know him or that we call him “Lord” or master or some such word of deference. We must listen to him and then follow through with what he has said.

To tie this in with what Jesus has been teaching in the verses just prior, we are not good just because we listen to Jesus or even applaud what he has to say. We are good because we do what Jesus says.