44  Empty Words and  Empty Hearts (7:21-29)

Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?” And then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.”

Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine, and acts upon them, may be compared to a wise man, who built his house upon the rock. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and yet it did not fall, for it had been founded upon the rock. And everyone who hears these words of Mine, and does not act upon them, will be like a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and it fell, and great was its fall.

The result was that when Jesus had finished these words, the multitudes were amazed at His teaching; for He was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes. (7:21-29)

Jesus is still giving the invitation of his sermon—calling people from false religion to the true kingdom. He has said that few enter the narrow gate of salvation because first of all it must be found (v. 14), implying that it must be sought and searched for. No one stumbles into the kingdom inadvertently. Second, the narrow and demanding way of salvation is the complete opposite of the way of the world, which is broad, easy, and indulgent. Third, the narrow gate into the kingdom requires going through alone and naked, taking no possessions, no works, no pride, no self-righteousness. Fourth, as the Lord mentions in the parallel account in Luke 13:24, we must strive to enter in penitence and brokenness of heart. Fifth, false prophets must be avoided, because they deceive many people by luring them into the broad way that leads to destruction (vv. 15-20).

Now Jesus gives a final reason why so few enter the narrow gate of salvation: self-deception. J. C. Ryle says, “The Lord Jesus winds up the Sermon on the Mount by a passage of heart-piercing application. He turns from false prophets to false professors, from unsound teachers to unsound hearers” (Expository Thoughts on the Gospel: St. Matthew [London: James Clarke, 1965], pp. 69-70). Not only can false prophets deceive us about the way of salvation, but we can deceive ourselves. After warning us about false prophets, the Lord now warns men about themselves. Sinful man is biased in his own favor and, because of pride, tends to reject the true gospel.

The two categories of self-deception are those of mere verbal profession and of mere intellectual knowledge. The first, described in verses 21-23, involves those who say but do not do, and the second, described in verses 24-27, involves those who hear but do not do.

The Lord is not speaking to irreligious people, to atheists or agnostics. Nor is he speaking to pagans, heretics, or apostates. He is speaking specifically to people who are devotedly religious—but who are deluded in thinking they are on the road to heaven when they are really on the broad road to hell. They are not unlike those in the last days who Paul says will hold a form of godliness but will deny its power (2 Tim. 3:5).

Various polls in recent years have estimated that perhaps fifty percent of Americans identify themselves as born-again Christians. But on the basis of the Bible’s description of true believers and the fact that few (cf. Matt. 7:14) really come on God’s terms, those estimates could not be remotely correct. By scriptural standards, it is hard to believe that even half of the church members in the United States are true believers.

The New Testament not only gives extremely high standards for judging the true Christian life, but also gives many warnings about spiritual self-deception in regard to salvation. In Matthew 25 Jesus tells of the five foolish virgins who pretended devotion to the bridegroom but missed meeting him because of their unpreparedness (vv. 1-12), and of those professed believers (symbolized as goats) who are surprised that the Lord rejects them because they never truly served Him (vv. 32-33, 41-46).

What lulls people into such deception? First of all, many professed Christians—and even many true Christians—hold a false doctrine of assurance. Often it is because the person who witnessed to them told them that all they had to do was make a profession of faith, walk an aisle, raise a hand, say a prayer, and never doubt what the Lord had done in their lives. Perhaps they have been taught that to ever doubt their salvation is to doubt God’s Word and integrity. Unfortunately, many evangelists, pastors, and personal workers attempt to certify a person’s salvation apart from the convicting work of the Holy Spirit and the evidence of fruit with continuance in obedience to the Word (John 8:31). But we have no right to assure a person of something we cannot be certain is true. God’s own Holy Spirit will witness His reality to those who truly belong to Him (Rom. 8:14-16).

Peter makes clear that one’s calling and choosing are made secure by increasing qualities of fruitfulness that demonstrate the genuineness of salvation and eliminate stumbling over doubt (2 Pet. 1:3-11). And our Lord teaches that some people appear saved, but are not (see Matt. 13:20-22). Quick and easy assurance can deceive.

A second contributor to self-deception is failure of self-examination. Through a faulty and presumptuous view of God’s grace, some professed believers blithely go through life oblivious to and unconcerned about their sins. Yet the Lord tells His people to examine their lives each time they come to His table (1 Cor. 11:28). Paul tells us, “Test yourselves to see if your are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?” (2 Cor. 13:5). Such examination looks at the heart and the inner motives and desires to see if they are set toward God’s holiness and glory. Even the weakest Christian has pure longings in his heart for righteousness—even though he lets his flesh hinder their fulfillment (Rom. 7:14-25).

John tells us, “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8-9). A person who is not concerned about having his present sins cleansed has good reason to doubt that his past sin has been forgiven. A person who has no desire to come to the Lord for continued cleansing has reason to doubt that he ever came to the Lord to receive salvation.

When a couple lives together without being married, when a person practices homosexuality, is deceptive and dishonest in business, is hateful and vengeful, or habitually practices any sin without remorse or repentance, such persons cannot be Christian—no matter what sort of experience they claim to have had or what sort of testimony they now make. God’s Word is explicit: “Do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:9-10). Again Paul warns, “For this you know with certainty, that no immoral or impure person or covetous man, who is an idolater, has an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience” (Eph. 5:5-6). In each of those extremely somber warnings Paul pleads with his readers not to be deceived.

The person who professes to be a Christian but who habitually and unrepentantly continues in known sin makes out God to be liar, because His Word expressly denies that any such person belongs to Him (1 John 3:6-10).

A third cause of self-deception is inordinate concentration on religious activity. Attending church, hearing sermons, singing songs of the faith, reading the Bible, attending Bible studies, and many other perfectly good and helpful activities can actually insulate a person from the very God he is supposedly worshiping and serving. Those things can cause a believer to think he is being faithful and obedient, when in reality he may not be; and they can cause an unbeliever to think he is saved, when in reality he is not.

A fourth cause of self-deception is what may be called the fair exchange, or balancing out, approach. Instead of confessing and asking forgiveness for his sins, a person may give himself the benefit of the doubt and rationalize his salvation by thinking that the good things he does balance out the bad, that the positive cancels the negative. But in the first place, apart from God it is impossible to do anything that is truly good, because “there is none who does good, there is not even one,” Paul tells us (Rom. 3:12), quoting David (Ps. 14:1-3; 53:1-3). In the second place, it is the sin itself—not an excess or imbalance of it—that separates us from God and brings death and damnation (Rom. 5:12; 6:23). Whatever good we might somehow accomplish would not cancel those consequences of sin, any more than eating right and exercising will save the life of a person infected with a deadly disease. His only hope is in receiving a cure for the disease, not in trying to balance off its deadly effect by keeping his body otherwise healthy. Isaiah said that the best deeds of men before God are as “a filthy garment,” that is, a menstrual cloth (Isa. 64:6).

Apart from outright hypocrites and the blatantly disobedient, there are two other common kinds of deceived people who believe they are Christians when they are not. One is the superficial person, the one who has had little or no instruction in the gospel and who thinks that his attending Sunday school as a child, having been baptized, being a church member, or other such things put him in good standing with God.

The other type of person is much more knowledgeable about the Bible and the gospel, and is often heavily involved in church activities of various sorts. But he lives in a constant state of sinfulness, with no thought of confessing and forsaking his sin or of seeking after righteousness. He looks to feelings, experiences, healings, angels, earthly material blessings, promises, and a host of other external things for proof of his salvation. He is not concerned about decreasing sin or increasing righteousness. He is not concerned about God’s commands, God’s standards, or God’s glory, but only what he can get out of God for himself. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones suggests, he is more concerned about the by-products of the faith than the fruit itself (Studies in the Sermon on the Mount [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977], 2:285).

This group includes those who are more committed to a denomination or Christian organization than to the Word of God. It includes those who are academically interested in theology—even orthodox, biblical theology—but not in obedience to the Bible on which that theology is based. It includes those who overemphasize and distort a particular aspect of biblical truth, to the exclusion and sometimes contradiction of other truths. It encompasses those who are overin-dulgent in the name of grace but lack penitence.

Just as there are many people who are deceived by the broad road that leads to destruction (Matt. 7:13), there are also many ways in which those people are deceived, of which the ones mentioned above are only a sampling. There is almost no limit to the means by which men can be deluded by Satan, by other men, and by themselves. In every case there is failure to come through the narrow gate with repentance, submission to the Lord, humility, and a desire for holiness. It is therefore of immeasurable importance to recognize and be on guard against beguilings of every sort. But the most important objective is not to identify all of the many deceitful ways but to find and follow the one true way.

The many delusions found in the broad way of destruction are evidenced in two basic manifestations, which Jesus focuses on here: empty words and works and empty hearts. Those in the first group make mere verbal profession of faith and works. Those in the second have mere intellectual knowledge of the gospel they hear. Those in the first group say but do not do; those in the second hear but do not do.

EMPTY WORDS

Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?” And then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.” (7:21-23)

A Jew could use the term lord simply as a title of respect and honor, given to any political, military, or religious leader, including teachers. But for those people to say, Lord, Lord, suggests much more than human respect, as their following comments make clear. That they claimed to have prophesied, cast out demons, and performed miracles in Jesus’ name indicates they acknowledged Him as Lord in a supernatural way. Lord was a common Jewish substitute title for Jehovah, or Yahweh, which name they considered too holy to utter. Therefore to address Jesus as Lord was to address Him as the one true God. To address Him as Lord, Lord was to add a spirit of intense zeal to demonstrate strength of devotion and dedication. In verse 22, the three references to your name are emphatic and convey the significance of who He is. Jesus is therefore talking about those who make a profession of faith in Him.

These people claim to be followers of the God of Israel, the Creator and Lord of all earth. Not only that, but they acknowledge Jesus Himself to be divine, because they will say to Me [that is, to Jesus] on that day, “Lord, Lord.” And the fact that they have claimed so many outstanding works in His name tells us they are especially fervent religious workers.

The final judgment, on that day, is presented here in general, without reference to the distinction between the separate tribunals for believers (2 Cor. 5:10) and for unbelievers (Rev. 20:11-15). That day is a frequently used reference to the era of divine judgment known throughout Scripture as “the day of the Lord” (Isa. 2:12; Joel 2:1; Mal. 4:5; 1 Thess. 5:2; 2 Pet. 3:10; etc.). Matthew uses that day here and in 24:36, where it refers to the second coming of the Savior. It is noteworthy that the second coming parable of the ten virgins (Matt. 25:1-13) makes reference to those virgins who are shut out of the kingdom as crying out, “Lord, Lord,” to which He also replies, “I do not know you” (vv. 11-12). These few passages together reveal that Matthew has in mind the unspecified season of judgment that will accompany the return of Jesus Christ.

That some of the ones Jesus is talking about here are true believers is shown by His saying, Not everyone and many. The same many who entered the wide gate (v. 13) are now at the end of the broad way facing the Judge. For some people, however, the claim Lord, Lord will be legitimate, because Jesus will have indeed been their Lord on earth and they will have served Him genuinely.

If Jesus is speaking about the great white throne judgment, many professing believers who are not genuine will already have spent centuries in hell awaiting their final judgment (see Luke 16:23-26; Acts 1:25). Because they were so zealous and active and diligent in religious work—in the Lord’s own name—they are incredulous that they are even standing before Christ to be judged. Even at that time they will address Christ as Lord and speak to Him in desperation with the greatest respect and sincerity. Their words and their works will seem impressive to them, but their lives will not support the claim of their lips. In Luke 6:46 Jesus said, “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”

It is not the one who simply claims the Lord, but the one who does the will of My Father who is in heaven who is saved. The issue is obedience to the Word of God. “If you abide in My Word, then you are truly disciples of Mine,” Jesus said (John 8:31; cf. 6:66-69; Matt. 24:13; Col. 1:22-23; 1 Tim. 4:16; Heb. 3:14; 10:38-39; l John 2:19). Salvation and obedience to the will of God are inseparable, as the writer of Hebrews makes clear: “He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation” (5:9; cf. Rom. 1:5; 6:16; 15:18; 16:19, 26; 1 Pet. 1:2, 22).

Jesus’ word to the disobedient claimers will be, I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness. All their words of respect and honor and all their works of dedication and devotion will be declared empty and worthless. They may have had God’s name in their mouths, but rebellion was in their hearts.

His saying, I never knew you, does not, of course, mean that Jesus was unaware of their identity. He knows quite well who these persons are; they are deceived professing Christians whose lives were spent in the practice [of] lawlessness.

“To know” was a Hebrew idiom that represented intimate relations. It was frequently used of marital intimacy (see Gen. 4:1,17; etc.; where “had relations” is literally “knew,” as in the KJV). It was also used of God’s special intimacy with His chosen people Israel and with all of those who trust in Him. In a unique and beautiful way the Lord “knows those who take refuge in Him” (Nah. 1:7). The Good Shepherd knows His sheep intimately (John 10:1-14).

Jesus therefore will say to those who claim Him but never trusted in Him, I never knew you. “I have never known you as My disciples, and you have never known Me as your Lord and Savior. We have no intimate part of each other. You chose your kingdom, and it was not My kingdom.” Depart from Me is the resulting final sentence to hell, and is identical in thought to the judgment of Matthew 25:41 at the Lord’s return: “Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels.” The lake of fire awaits all false professors (Rev. 20:15).

Practice lawlessness is a present participle in the Greek, indicating continuous, regular action, and identifies the unforgiven sin and unrighteous life patterns of those claimers of salvation. You continually and habitually practice lawlessness is the idea. Profession of Christ and practice of lawlessness are totally incompatible. A good tree cannot bear that sort of fruit (Matt. 7:18; John 3:4-10).

A good tree not only can but will bear good fruit, and a life that professes to be Christian, but in no way reflects Christ’s righteousness, has no part in Him. That kind of profession comes from the kind of faith that has no works and is dead (James 2:17). It is the demon faith James refers to (James 2:19), which is orthodox and accurate, but unholy. In the ultimate and most tragic sense such a false profession is to take the Lord’s name in vain. “The blasphemy of the sanctuary,” G. Campbell Morgan observed, “is far more awful than the blasphemy of the slum” (The Gospel According to Matthew [New York: Revell, 1929], p. 79). Mere professed devotion to Christ is but another Judas kiss.

The Lord knows well that even His most faithful disciples will fail, stumble, and fall into sin. Otherwise He would not have told us to pray, “Forgive us our debts” (Matt. 6:12). And when “we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). No Christian is sinless, but the fact that we continually confess our sins, seek the Lord’s forgiveness, and long for righteousness (Matt. 5:6) is evidence that we belong to Him. God’s will may not be the perfection of the true believer’s life, but it is the direction of it.

Those who continually practice lawlessness, however, give evidence that they do not belong to Christ. They do not recognize or confess their sins or hunger for righteousness, because they have no part of Christ. All religious activity, no matter how orthodox and fervent, that does not result from obedience to the lordship of Christ and the pursuit of His glory is rebellion against the law of God, which demands heart conformity.

This passage is all the more amazing when one considers the impressive works that those professing believers claim to have accomplished. They tell the Lord, Did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?

As already mentioned, we know from verse 21 (not everyone) that some of these claims will be made by genuine believers. And because Jesus does not question the factualness of the claims, it is possible that actual prophecies were made, demons cast out, and some kind of miracles performed even by those who were not genuine believers.

There are three possible explanations for the claim of the false believers. It may be that they were allowed to do those amazing works by God’s power. God put words in Balaam’s mouth, even though that prophet was false and wicked (Num. 23:5). King Saul, after he became apostate had the “Spirit of God [come] upon him mightily, so that he prophesied” (1 Sam. 10:10). The wicked high priest Caiaphas unwittingly and unintentionally “prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation” (John 11:51).

A second possibility is that those amazing acts were accomplished by Satan’s power. Jesus predicted that “false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so as to mislead, if possible, even the elect” (Matt. 24:24). The unbelieving sons of Sceva, for example, were Jewish exorcists, who made their living casting out demons (Acts 19:13-14). Mark 9:38-40 tells of someone outside the apostles casting out demons. Paul promises false signs in the last days, lying wonders of Satan (2 Thess. 2:8-10). Acts 8:11 describes the work of a satanic sorcerer. Today there are miracle workers, healers, and exorcists who claim to work for Jesus Christ but are satanic deceivers.

A third possibility is that some of the claims were simply false. The prophecies, exorcisms, and miracles were fake and contrived. No doubt all three will be represented.

But whether the works themselves were done in God’s power or not, the people who did them did not belong to Him and did not truly recognize Him as Lord, despite their profession. They had no part in His kingdom or its righteousness, and those works, whether genuine or false, divine or Satanic, would stand them in no good stead before the judgment seat of Christ.

The words of an engraving from the cathedral of Lbeck, Germany, beautifully reflect our Lord’s teaching here:

EMPTY HEARTS

Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine, and acts upon them, may be compared to a wise man, who built his house upon the rock. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and yet it did not fall, for it had been founded upon the rock. And everyone who hears these words of Mine, and does not act upon them, will be like a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and it fell, and great was its fall. (7:24-27)

The second evidence that the many (vv. 13, 22) who are in the broad way will not enter the kingdom is that their lives are not built on the foundation of Christ and His Word. Again Jesus picks up the theme of man’s own righteousness, the righteousness that is totally unacceptable to God and that will in no way qualify a person for His kingdom (Matt. 5:20).

In the first illustration (vv. 21-23) we see a contrast between the true and false verbal professions of faith and good works. Here we see contrasts between obedient and disobedient hearers. Both groups hear God’s true Word, but some hear and obey, and some hear and disobey; some turn their trust to God’s righteousness, and some continue trusting in their own, though that does not become visible until the judgment.

The implication is that even those who disobey believe that they belong to Christ and make a convincing profession of faith in Him. They hear God’s Word and recognize it as God’s Word, but wrongly believe that simply knowing and recognizing it are enough to please God and guarantee them a place in His kingdom. Like those who say, “Lord, Lord,” and do amazing religious works but really “practice lawlessness,” the false hearers build their religious house, but are self-deceived as to its viability.

In the illustration of those who make false professions, the true believers are mentioned only by implication (“not everyone who says to me,” v. 21). In the illustration of the hearers and builders, however, both the true and the false believers are clearly described. In these two groups we see many similarities but also some radical differences.

SIMILARITIES

First of all, both builders have heard the gospel. Everyone who hears these words of Mine applies both to the wise man (v. 24) and to the foolish man (v. 26). They both know the way of salvation.

Second, they both proceed to build a house after they have heard the way of salvation. The wise man builds his house, which represents his life, on these words of Mine. The implication is that the foolish man, although he does not act upon Christ’s words, thinks that his house is secure simply because he has heard and acknowledged the words. He believes the life he lives is Christian and therefore pleasing to God. He does not intentionally build a house he thinks is going to fall. Both builders have confidence their houses will stand; but one man’s confidence is in the Lord and the other man’s is in himself.

Third, both builders build their houses in the same general location, evidenced by their apparently being hit by the same storm. In other words, the outward circumstances of their lives were essentially the same. One had no advantage over the other. They lived in the same town and possibly attended the same church, heard the same preaching, went to the same Bible study, and fellowshipped with the same friends.

Fourth, the implication is that they built the same kind of house. Outwardly their houses were very much alike. From all appearances the foolish man lived much in the same way as the wise man. We might say they were both religious, theologically orthodox, moral, served in the church, supported it financially, and were responsible citizens of the community. They seemed to believe alike and live alike.

DIFFERENCES

The differences between the two builders and the two houses they built were not noticeable from the outside. But they were immeasurably more important than the similarities. The key is to understand that one does act upon God’s Word (obedience) and the other does not act upon His Word (disobedience). One builds using the divine specifications, the other uses his own.

By far the greatest difference between the specifications of these builders and the way they build is in the foundations they laid. The wise man… built his house upon the rock, whereas the foolish man … built his house upon the sand.

Petra (rock) does not mean a stone or even a boulder, but a great outcropping of rock, a large expanse of bedrock. It is solid, stable, and unmovable. Sand, by contrast, is loose, unstable, and extremely movable. The land agents selling lots on the sand are the false prophets Jesus has just warned about (vv. 15-20).

The scribes and Pharisees had a complex and involved set of religious traditions which they regarded as having great value before God. But all those traditions were external, superficial, and unstable. They had no spiritual or moral substance or stability. They were shifting sand, composed entirely of the opinions, speculations, and standards of men. Those who created and followed them took no account of obedience to God’s Word, purity of the heart, spirituality of the soul, or integrity of behavior. Their only concern was for appearance, the compelling desire to be seen and “honored by men” (Matt. 6:2).

As Arthur Pink says of such people,

But the wise man builds his house upon a rock, and I believe the rock spoken of here is God’s Word—these words of Mine. This builder is one who hears Jesus’ words … and acts on them. Building on the rock is equivalent to obeying God’s Word.

After Peter confessed, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Jesus said, “flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church” (Matt. 16:16-18). This “rock” (petra) is the same rock as that in Matthew 7:24-25. It is the bedrock of God’s Word, His divine revelation. It is the divine revelation such as was given to Peter by the “Father who is heaven,” and is the only rock on which the Christian life can be built.

The mark of true discipleship is not simply hearing and believing, but believing and doing. The true disciples of Jesus Christ, the only true converts of the gospel, are those who are “doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was” (James 1:22-24). In other words, a person who professes to know Christ but does not obey Christ, has no lasting image of what the new life is all about. He glimpses Christ, and glimpses what Christ can do for him, but his image of Christ and of the new life in Christ soon fade. His experience with the gospel is shallow, superficial, and short-lived.

“By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments,” John declares. “The one who says, ‘I have come to know Him,’ and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked” (1 John 2:3-6). Paul powerfully and convincingly asserts the same thing: “To those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but both their mind and their conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient, and worthless for any good deed” (Titus 1:15-16).

To profess knowledge of God and His truth but not follow God obediently and live His truth is to be deceived. It is to have entered by the wide gate and to be walking on the broad way that leads to destruction. It is to have a house built upon the sand.

The only validation we can ever have of salvation is a life of obedience. That is the only proof Scripture mentions of our being under the lordship of Jesus Christ. Obedience is the sine qua non of salvation.

The house built on the rock is the life of obedience, the life Jesus has been explaining throughout the Sermon on the Mount. It is the life that has a scriptural view of itself, as described in the Beatitudes. It is the life that has a scriptural view of the world, and sees itself as God’s means for preserving and enlightening the world while not being a part of it. It is the life that has the divine view of Scripture and that determines not to alter God’s Word in the slightest degree. It is a life that is concerned about internal righteousness rather than external form. It is a life that has a godly attitude toward what is said and what is done, toward motives, things, money, and other people. It is a life of genuineness rather than hypocrisy, and of God’s righteousness rather than self-righteousness.

The house built on the rock is the life that empties itself of self-righteousness and pride, that is overwhelmed by and mourns over its own sin, that makes the maximum effort to enter the narrow gate and be faithful in the narrow way of Christ and His Word. Such a builder does not build his life or place his hope on ceremony, ritual, visions, experiences, feelings, or miracles but on the Word of God and that alone.

The sand is composed of human opinions, attitudes, and wills, which are always shifting and always unstable. To build on sand is to build on self-will, self-fulfillment, self-purpose, self-sufficiency, self-satisfaction, and self-righteousness. To build on sand is to be unteachable, to be “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim. 3:7).

To build the house of one’s life on the sand is to follow the ultimate deception of Satan, which is to make a person believe he is saved when he is not. Because that person is under the delusion that he is safe, he sees no reason either to resist Satan or to seek God.

Besides the great difference in the foundations they lay, the wise man builds his house the hard way, whereas the foolish man builds his the easy way. The one chooses the narrow gate and the other the broad. The one searches carefully for a solid foundation of rock on which to build; the other simply finds a section of sand in a desirable location and starts to build.

The easy way is attractive for several reasons, the first of which is that it is quick. The foolish person is always in a hurry. His first desire is to please himself, and he takes the shortest route to that end. In church work he wants the quick, easy solution, the one that causes the least controversy and hassle, with no consideration of how the solution may square with Scripture. He is for easy evangelism, easy believism, and easy discipleship, because they bring quick results that are simple to see and measure. He has no time for searching the Word for the right truth with which to witness, or for soul-searching or sound conviction. He sees a verbal profession, a card signed, or a prayer prayed as sufficient to bring a person to Christ. He is perfectly willing to declare a person saved without his having any awareness that he is lost.

The foolish person also likes the easy way because he is basically superficial. That which is superficial requires little planning, little effort, little care to detail, and little concern for quality or standards. The person who is superficial looks for what is pleasing rather than for what is right, for what is enjoyable rather than for what is true, for what satisfies himself rather than what satisfies God. He looks to Christianity for instant results, instant pleasure, and instant rewards. He cares much about spiritual “highs” but nothing about spiritual “depths.”

Of his own day Charles Spurgeon wrote,

In His parable of the sower Jesus spoke of the person who “hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away” (Matt. 13:20-21). He receives quickly and falls away quickly. He likes God’s promises but not His requirements.

The foolish man always has excuses when Jesus makes demands on his life. When he first hears the gospel he says to the Lord, “I will follow You wherever You go.” But when he hears, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head,” he suddenly remembers that he has to bury his father (that is, await his father’s death in order to receive the inheritance) or “say good-bye to those at home.” Such a person who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back, Jesus says, is “not fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:57-62).

The rain, the floods, and the winds do not represent specific types of physical judgment but simply sum up God’s final judgment. The storm is the ultimate test that the house of every human life will face. As the angel of death in Egypt passed by the blood-sprinkled homes of Israel’s children while slaughtering all the first-born in the rest, so the same judgment that harmlessly passes over the house that is founded upon the rock of Christ and His Word will utterly destroy the one that is built… upon the sand—which is anything other than Christ and His Word.

Whether one’s religion is true or false, one day it is going to be tried. And that trial will prove with absolute finality what is wheat and what is chaff, who are sheep and who are goats, who have entered by the narrow gate to walk the narrow way and who have entered by the wide gate to walk the broad way.

Those whose houses are on the rock of Jesus Christ and His Word will be delivered “from the wrath to come” (1 Thess. 1:10), and will only have praise from God, says Paul (1 Cor. 4:5). That wrath is ultimately poured out at the judgment at the great white throne, which John describes in Revelation 20. “And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds.… And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire” (vv. 12,15).

The only difference about the storm in regard to the wise and the foolish men is in the way it affects their houses. The house of the wise man may have been shaken, yet it did not fall, for it had been founded upon the rock.

But when the same adversity came upon the house of the foolish man it disintegrated—and great was its fall. It was utterly demolished, leaving its builder with absolutely nothing. That is the destiny of those who build on the sand of man’s ideas, man’s philosophies, and man’s religions. It is not that such people will have little left, but nothing left. Their way is not an inferior way to God, but no way to God at all. Always and inevitably it leads to destruction; its absolute destiny is to fall.

The greatest problem in evangelism is not follow-up but conversion. Right follow-up is not nearly so difficult as right conversion. Follow-up is the hardest when conversion is the easiest, because easy conversion is frequently no conversion. It results from seed falling on rocky soil, where it springs up quickly and dies just as quickly. The unconverted are indeed hard to follow up, whereas those who have truly come to Christ are eager to learn from His Word and associate with His people.

I heard of a large church that one year claimed 28,000 conversions, 9,600 baptisms, and 123 additions to the church! After reflecting on those figures, one of the church staff members decided that something was terribly wrong and decided to minister elsewhere. It is quite impossible that so many true conversions would produce so few Christians who would want to identify with their new brothers and sisters in the Lord.

The wise man builds carefully, because there is substance and great importance to what he is building. In the parallel passage in Luke, Jesus says, he “dug deep and laid a foundation upon the rock” (6:48). He is not satisfied with superficial confessions of faith, with quickie conversions that involve no repentance, no mourning over sin, and no despairing of self.

Knowing that he owes everything to the Lord, this man desires to give Him his maximum effort. After he does everything his Lord commands he declares that he has only done his duty (Luke 17:10). Yet he does not consider his work for the Lord burdensome. For one thing, the work we truly do for the Lord is the work He does through us. For another, the work that is truly done for the Lord is done out of love, not out of compulsion or fear. As the anonymous writer of the hymn “How Firm a Foundation” says, the Lord promises this man:

The soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose,

I will not, I will not desert to his foes;

That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,

I’ll never, no, never, no, never forsake!

The most tragic difference between the builders is in their final destinies. Jesus’ unequaled and unparalleled sermon masterpiece ends with a devastating warning of judgment. Its final words are: and great was its fall. The bottom line of the gospel for those who reject Christ is not that they forfeit a great deal of blessing or even that they forfeit a life of eternal bliss with God in heaven—though those things are absolutely true. The bottom line for those who reject Christ is that they are destined for everlasting torment, destruction that keeps on destroying forever. To reject Christ is to look forward to being “cast into hell, where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:47-48). Because of this inevitability every professing Christian needs to hear the words of the Holy Spirit through James: “Prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves” (James 1:22). As we learn from Proverbs, “There is a kind who is pure in his own eyes, yet is not washed from his filthiness” (30:12).

RESPONSE TO THE SERMON

The result was that when Jesus had finished these words, the multitudes were amazed at His teaching; for He was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes. (7:28-29)

The response to this most magnificent discourse ever given was as astounding in a negative way as the sermon itself was in a positive way. It seems certain that some of those in the multitudes who were there that day believed in Jesus. But the number who then entered the narrow gate proved what He had said: “few are those who find it” (7:14).

But any conversions that may have taken place are not reported. We are only told that the multitudes were amazed at His teaching (cf. John 7:46). Ekplss (were amazed) literally means to be struck out of oneself, and was used figuratively of being struck in the mind, that is, of being astounded or beside oneself. The crowd was totally dumbfounded by the power of what Jesus said. They had never heard such comprehensive, insightful words of wisdom, depth, insight, and profundity. They had never heard such straightforward and fearless denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees or such a black and white presentation of the way of salvation. They had never heard such a fearful warning about the consequences of turning away from God. They had never heard such a powerful and demanding description of true righteousness or such a relentless description and condemnation of self-righteousness.

But the most remarkable thing that struck the audience that day was that Jesus was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes. Authority (exousia) has to do with power and privilege, and is a key word in Matthew’s presentation of Jesus’ kingship (9:1-8; 21:23-27; 28:18). In the New Testament it is used for the power that proves and reflects the sovereignty of Jesus. The scribes quoted others to lend authority to their teachings, but Jesus quoted only God’s Word and spoke as the final authority on truth. He spoke eternal truth simply, directly, with love (in contrast to the bitter hatred of the Pharisees), and without hesitation or consultation. That astounded the crowd.

All of those things were important for them to hear, and it was entirely appropriate, in fact unavoidable, that they should be amazed, because His teaching was indeed amazing. But what they needed was not amazement but belief, not astonishment but obedience. Jesus did not tell them all of those things for their amazement, or even simply for their information, but for their salvation. He did not intend merely to show them the narrow gate and the narrow way, but pleaded with them to enter that gate and to follow that way, which He would make accessible by paying the penalty for their sins.

But most of the people only watched and listened, only heard and considered—but did not decide. Even by not deciding, however, they decided. For whatever reasons—possibly for no conscious reason at all—they decided to stay on the broad road.

C. S. Lewis gives a remarkable illustration from his own life of what the attitude is of many who hear the gospel:

It is that very sort of thinking that keeps many people out of the kingdom: the price is more than they want to pay. Lewis goes on to say, in the imagined words of Christ, “You have free will, and if you choose, You can push Me away. But if you do not push Me away, understand that I am going to see this job through…. I will never rest, nor let you rest, until you are literally perfect—until My Father can say without reservation that He is well pleased with you, as He said He was well pleased with Me” (p. 158).

That is the decision the Lord demands before He can turn empty hearts, with their empty words and empty works, into full hearts that produce the good works for which they are recreated. It is God’s great desire that no person perish and that every person “come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9), that he might “be filled up to all the fulness of God” (Eph. 3:16-19). That only became possible through the Savior’s death and resurrection, which climaxed His work for sinful man and will be the great conclusion to Matthew’s good news.