Recorded Media

The Journey that Leads to Life, Death and Resurrection Part 2: Obedience
Luke 6:46–49

There is an iconic episode of the TV show The Office in which Michael Scott drives a rental car into a lake because the GPS tells him to turn right. Earlier in the show, Michael had spoken glowingly of the capabilities of GPS navigation. However, when attempting to get to a client meeting, Michael misunderstands the GPS directions and drives into a lake—because the voice tells him so.

We are all tempted to say, “I know a shortcut,” to God’s directions in our lives. Rather than obeying God’s laws about relationships, we may think we know a shortcut to happiness that doesn’t involve sacrifice or forgiving. Instead of adhering to God’s standards of integrity, we think we may know a shortcut to financial prosperity. There is a name for those shortcuts: sin. And Jesus told us it doesn’t end well. Jesus preached the greatest sermon ever—the Sermon on the Mount. His revolutionary teachings changed the world. For two thousand years, philosophers have studied and discussed his principles on money, loving enemies, and judging others. Leaders from Saint Francis to Mahatma Gandhi to Martin Luther King were inspired by Jesus to adopt the strategy of nonviolence. Perhaps Jesus knew many of us would be tempted to admire his words rather than act on them.

So, in Luke 6:46–49, he concluded his sermon with a parable about two homeowners. In the parable, one homeowner takes out a construction loan to build his dream home. He budgeted enough to hire excavators to dig deep and lay a foundation on bedrock, even though no one would see it. But it was worth it the day torrential rains came and unleashed flash floods that pummeled his house. No doubt he sighed with relief when he discovered that he had sustained only minor damage to his home.

In contrast, another man built his house around the same time. He had scraped together all the money he could to construct a beautiful house. Instead of laying a foundation on bedrock, he saved money by skipping the excavator and building on level ground. But his dream house became a nightmare when those rains hit. The flash floods lifted his house and destroyed it. Jesus said that the homeowner who built on the bedrock was like someone who hears his words and puts them into practice. When life gets hard, he will be able to endure. However, the man who built without a foundation is like someone who hears Jesus’ words and does nothing about them. When the storms of life come, he won’t be able to hold up. But by ending the Sermon on the Mount with this parable, Jesus was saying: “Don’t just listen to this sermon; act on it.”

Grace and Peace,
Stephen