Well, hello everyone and welcome back. This is our daily devotional for Thursday, October 30th, 2025. And I am delighted to be with you this morning or midday or afternoon or evening or late at night, whatever it happens to be that you find this. Now I'm going to go ahead and do this. I need to apologize already for the state of my voice. I realize I'm recording this on Wednesday, so I'm trying to be careful, too, so my voice will hold for tonight. So by the time you see this, it's actually going to be Thursday. And I don't know this for a fact. I'm not a prophet nor the son of a prophet. But I will tell you that it is my suspicion that the meal by the time this comes out last night will have been fantastic. So if you missed our Wednesday night, then y'all you got time to plan. So we would love to see you actually not next week. We are not having it next week or the week after that because I am going to be out of town as I have said before. But Nevertheless, nevertheless, it is good to be with you today as we come to an end, the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter seven, which is fitting because tomorrow being Halloween there, all saints, whatever you want to call it, Halloween, right? And no, I'm not in league with the devil, that kind of thing. We'll be focusing on something else entirely different than the Sermon on the Mount. I haven't made up my mind yet. I think we're just going to continue on with Matthew. All that being said, today we come to the end of Matthew 5-7. I should have looked at how many devotionals we've had in the Sermon on the Mount, or on the Sermon on the Mount. It's been a lot, but for very good reason. I mean, think about all the different things that Jesus covers here, even yesterday. This whole idea of not everybody who cries out to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven. He says, only the one that does the will of the Father is going to do that. Yesterday we talked about the difference between knowing about Jesus and knowing Him, knowing about God and knowing Him. Knowing all the right answers, you know, pray, read your Bible, Jesus, those universal Sunday school answers where it doesn't matter what the question is, generally speaking, those are probably going to be one of the answers for it. You can know all that stuff until you're blue in the face, you can be baptized, you can come to church every single Sunday, and at the same time still not be trusting in Jesus alone for your salvation. That's what it comes down to. That's why he says this. And of course we read from the parable of the sheep and the goats. I don't know if it's fair to call it a parable. Jesus uses that metaphor to describe what's gonna happen on the last day when he judges. But the reality is, either by Jesus returning and us being judged, or your time being up and you being judged, you will stand before the Lord. And when you do, Either you will know Him or you won't know Him. Either you will be covered in the blood of the Lamb or you will not be. If you are, then you enter the kingdom of heaven. You enter eternal rest. You go to be with all those that have gone on before you, that have known and loved the Lord in paradise, or you're separated forever from God. And there's a reason why that, I believe, is his last teaching leading up to the capstone here. Jesus has been talking about how to live. He's been talking about what's pleasing to God. He started out by talking about the beatitude, showing us what it is to be a follower of Christ. But where we come to today is kind of the capstone statement in light of everything that he said. Spoiler alert, starts with a therefore. That's what the therefore is there for. It's pointing to everything else that he said thus far. So let's pray, and then we'll see how the Sermon on the Mount comes to a conclusion. Father, we thank you for this time that you've given to us, and we come asking for your help, that you would help us to understand and to put into practice the things that are taught here. And we ask for help with this because we know that in and of ourselves, we can't do any of these things. We need the power of the Holy Spirit. We need your guidance. Father, we want you to work in our hearts and minds. We need you. So please give us wisdom, give us understanding, show us how your word applies to us, and give us the courage to do what Jesus is talking about here. And we pray it all in Jesus' name, amen. All right, y'all, so as I just said, spoiler alert, picking up in Matthew 7, verse 24, and it starts with a therefore. What do we do? We ask what the therefore is there for. It's there for the purpose of pointing to what Jesus has just said. the difference between knowing him and knowing about him, but also everything that he has said since Matthew chapter five, verse one. Now, when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him and he began to teach them saying. So everything after that. the Beatitudes, what it is to fulfill the law, what he said about things like murder, and divorce, and oaths, and being merciful, and giving, and prayer, and fasting, and not worrying, and seeking, and knocking, and the narrow, and the wide gate, and the tree, and the fruit, and the false promise, all of that stuff, in light of all of that stuff, therefore, Matthew 7, verse 24, therefore, Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock." Y'all, this is a very interesting passage here, and it has so many echoes in different places throughout God's Word. Yet again, I wanna start with this concept. The idea that Jesus does not claim to be God, which is what Mormons say, it's what Jehovah's Witnesses say, it's what Muslims say, Jews don't even wanna get to that, but y'all, the idea that Jesus is not claiming to be God There's only one other entity that ever claims to be the rock in all of the scripture. And you see it all over the place in the Psalms where God is continually called our rock. And what does Jesus say here? Everybody who listens to all of these different things that I've said, everything from what I said about murder and not hating your brother to not judging people and at the same time judging with wisdom and righteously, all of it, Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like the man who built his house on the rock. Jesus is referring to himself as the rock. That makes it very interesting what happens later when Peter confesses Jesus Christ is Lord, and the Roman Catholics have that thing where they're like, and on this rock I will build my church. They believe that Jesus is talking about Peter. What Jesus is actually talking about is himself, and he's talking about the confession that Peter made when he said, who do people say I am? You are the Christ. He said, you're wise for this, but this didn't come from you, it came from God. And on this rock, I will build my, the rock is confessing, the church is built on people confessing Jesus Christ as Lord, because Jesus Christ is the rock. It's happenstance that Peter's name is Petros, though that's the name given to him. Later on, Jesus is gonna refer to him as Simon and Peter interchangeably. Jesus is talking about himself when he says, I will build my church. The church isn't built on Peter. If you thought it was, and we got some serious problems in the New Testament when Paul ends up having to rebuke Peter publicly because Peter's got a problem. A lot of Ps here. Peter's got a problem paying special honor to Jews over Gentiles and all that kind of stuff. So the idea that he's the first Pope, ludicrous, absolutely ludicrous, especially when you get this whole Presbyterian system of government given in the book of Acts, and it's just a carryover from the Old Testament, but it's for a different time. Jesus is calling himself God here. He's saying, these teachings that I've given you, if you follow them, you're gonna be like the man that has built his house upon the rock. And y'all, the reason it talks about the rock is it all comes back to foundations. You remember the song, the rains came down and the floods came up, rains came down and the floods came up. Rains came down and the floods came up, but the house on the rock stood firm. as opposed to verse 26. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, the winds blew and beat against that house and it fell with a great crash. Rains came down, floods came up, rains came down, floods, and the house on the sand went, what? Right? You remember the song from when you were a child? Maybe you learned it at Bible school. The principle is very simple here. Your faith, the foundation of your existence is either based on Jesus Christ, the rock of our salvation, our fortress, our ever-present help in trouble, take your pick of any number of things that the Bible says about him and his identity. It's either based on Jesus and your foundation is sure, or you're building on sand. Now y'all, what happens when water and dirt come together? This is a particularly sensitive subject right now. Obviously, I'm not feeling very good. I woke up in the middle of the night coughing. I'm trying to save my voice for the Wednesday night program, which will happen later today. But got ready this morning, got in the shower, felt better, looked out, and Russer. Russer the puppy. We have in our entire yard, and I think the lot, I don't even know how many acres it is, grass, they cut part of it for hay, all right? In our entire yard, there's like a rectangle of two feet by three feet that has no grass in it. It's because I get a little aggressive on the zero turn going around the garage, okay? I admit it, it's my fault, I shouldn't be mowing over it, but I do it anyway. It's kind of like a groove, fits in well. Yeah, sometimes I pretend when I'm on the mower that I'm on something other than a mower, but nevertheless, nevertheless, in the whole yard, and it's really sandy soil, okay? It's not red clay. Thankfully, it's not red clay, because I got an old English sheepdog puppy who's white and black right now, and he would be orange if it wasn't. But even though in that entire yard, there's only about a two by three foot strip where there's no grass, what do you think Russer did this morning in the rain? I looked out as I was limping through the living room, trying to get to the office here, after feeling like I was going to pass out after taking a shower, and I look. And you know what happens to sand and soil when it meets with water? It's not very stable. It turns into mud, in fact. And so anything on top of it is just going to fall apart or get absolutely covered in nasty, which is what happened to Russer the puppy. And yeah, he had a bath this morning again. But my point is this. If you're building on a material that's ever shifting, If you're building on a substance that won't stand up to storms, that won't stand up to water, anything you put on top of that is just gonna come down when the soil moves, when the sand shifts. That's what sand does, that's what soil does. And what Jesus is saying here very clearly is this, either the core of your existence, the way that you live your life, your mode of operations, whatever you want to call it. Either it's based on me, not just for this life, but for eternity. Either it's based on me, the rock, and no matter what happens, when the storms come, your house is going to be solid because it's based on me, or you're going to build on something else. And y'all, we can build on so many things. There are people that build their entire hope for the future on their bank account. One economic downturn should show us how good that is. A Madoff scandal, an Enron scandal, whatever, Great Depression. There are some people that build their whole foundation just on other people. Let me just tell you something. I have disappointed people, and I've been disappointed by people. I have failed people and people have failed me. And I would wager that it's the same way with you because that's like life. We're not perfect. So if your foundation is built on another person, you're done. If your foundation is built on an ideology or a philosophy, what God tells us through Paul in 1 Corinthians 1, that he's going to make the wise things of this world look foolish. And I would argue if you look at what's going on in the world around us, especially in politics right now, God is keeping his promise. So if the basis of your foundation is on anything other than Jesus, it's woefully temporary. And it will ultimately result in not just calamity, but like this house is described at the end of verse 27, it's gonna end with a great trash. And so what do you do? Well, you make sure that your foundation is Jesus. That begins with trusting in him alone for your salvation, but it continues through striving to be like him. Remember why God gives us the laws that he gives us. It's because he loves us. It's because he knows what's best for us. He knows what we need. So all of that being said, devotional thought, what's your foundation? Is it built on Jesus Christ or is it built on something else that's ultimately going to fall? Thus, the Sermon on the Mount ends in verse 28 and 29, where it says, when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority and not as the teachers of the law. Now, it became very apparent to people that Jesus wasn't just some rabbi. He wasn't just some guy giving his opinion. This is the living word, giving the word of God. Oh, to have been there. Oh, to have seen it. But we don't have to wonder that much because if you want the living word giving you the word of God, we just finished reading it. And we're gonna keep on reading it. Don't miss the value of God's word. It's not just a guide. It's not just a nice thing to have. It is to be the foundation for who we are. Make sure you're trusting in Jesus alone for your salvation. and make sure that you're pursuing Him to live as He calls you to live, not because you got to, but because He loves you and He knows what's best for you and because you get to. Keep these things in mind. We'll continue with Matthew 8, maybe tomorrow, we'll see. That's great. But God and our Father, we thank you so much for this time that you've given to us and we pray your blessings upon it. Let us be like the man who built his house on the rock, on you, not like the man who built his house on sand or however else we might fill in the blank. We wanna be yours, Father, and we thank you for saving us through Jesus, but let us have hearts and minds that are focused on you, on seeking you, on following your will for our lives because you love us. You know what's best for us. So please help us to that end. We pray it all in Jesus name. Amen. Well, thank you all for being a part of this time. Lord willing, we'll be back tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. Unless I don't have a voice when it's time to record this, but we shall see. Until then, take care and have a very pleasant Thursday or whatever day it happens to be. Take care.