TREASURY OF SERMONS
1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003
No Foundation, House Gone!
By Rev (Dr) Timothy Tow
(Preached at Life BPC, 10.30 am service, 4 Mar 2001)
Text: Matt 7:24-29
From Matthew 5 to end of chapter 7, Jesus has
delivered to us what is known as The Sermon on the Mount. As He
concludes the long sermon that touches on many vital subjects, He
applies it to His hearers. Without application there will be no
sermon. Application means hitting the target of the hearers. What is
your reaction as you listen to Jesus’ words?
There are only two kinds of hearers, either
obedient or disobedient. Do you say, "Amen, Amen" or do you retort,
"O yeah, O yeah"? Let me first tackle the "O yeah" crowd. You hear
but you do not do what you hear. You disregard what is required of
you, taking it lightly. Or you may even resent and wilfully refuse
to do them. The result in any case will be disastrous. It is like
building a house, says our Lord, on sand, without any foundation.
When the rain pours down on the house and it is flooded all over and
the typhoon blows upon it, the house will topple over.
To understand the gravity of such a situation,
let me bring you back 15 years to 1986, to the total disaster of the
New World Hotel at Serangoon Road. For two or three days the hotel
had been cracking. Fault lines were seen here and there. But the
hotel people were so busy making money, they did not pay any
attention. During a business-as-usual morning, the foundations
suddenly gave way and the four or five-storey mansion wobbled. In a
matter of seconds or minutes the building sank into the mud below.
What was visible was only the roof top region. Fortunately, this was
daytime so many guests were out. This was like the man who heard
Jesus’ sermons and rejected them. Why did the New World Hotel suffer
this awful fate? Because the owners had illegally added many heavy
constructions to the flat roof top, such as water tanks. The
original foundations were too weak to carry this extra load, so the
house sank and disappeared. Thirty people were buried alive. This
disaster was noised around the world and reached us downunder. We
were in Perth at that time.
If we do not heed the Word of Life given by our
Saviour we will end up in death. Have you repented from your sins
and accepted Him as your Saviour? If not you will regret when you
land in the place of everlasting torment. Read the account of the
Rich Man and Beggar Lazarus (Lk 16:19-31). No foundation, house
gone!
Happily, there is the blissful side. "Therefore
whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will
liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock. And
the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and
beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a
rock."
The procedure to salvation is first of all
hearing. Take care how you hear! Not as the Chinese saying goes,
"ear in, ear out." The words entering one ear flies through the
other. Every Lord’s Day when you come to worship, how do you hear?
Do you hear attentively, drinking every word from the lips of the
preacher? Here you must hear with discernment, for he might make an
obvious mistake, misquoting a verse. He might preach a wrong
doctrine, so you can check up with him when he comes down from the
pulpit. But if he preaches the truth with substance and power, you
must accept it heartily. You must say "Amen" in your heart and
resolve to practise what you’ve been taught.
For example, you have a quarrel with a Church
member whom you have been at odds with. Having been instructed to
forgive, you make up with this person. You have carried out what God
wants you to do. You are therefore a saved person, your house stands
and falls not.
You hear God’s Word not only from the pastor’s
sermon but also by reading the Bible everyday. This is what is known
as "Quiet Time." Whether you read one chapter or three a day, the
importance of such reading is you resolve to practise what you are
told in the Scriptures. And when you keep on reading and meditating
day by day, it will give you a ready answer to life’s problems. This
is crucial when you have to say yes or no to someone who imposes
himself or herself on you. I had to face such a situation soon after
WWII.
I was going to the Philippines to fulfil a
preaching appointment. A lady wanted to export a diamond ring to
Manila. She asked me to wear it on my finger to get through customs.
In a flash I remembered the story of the young Judean prophet who
was sent by God to denounce the new Israel king, Jeroboam, who was
inaugurating a new Gold Calf religion for Israel. God told the young
Judean prophet to denounce Jeroboam the Israel king. After
denouncing Jeroboam he was not to eat there and he was to return to
Judah by another way. The young Judean prophet did a good job in
denouncing the Israel king, but disobeyed by eating there and by not
returning by another way. God punished him there and then. He was
bitten by a lion and died on the spot. But the lion did not touch
the donkey he was riding. Both lion and donkey stood beside the dead
prophet like two witnesses.
Remembering the moral of this story, I refused
to smuggle the diamond to Manila for the lady. And I have stuck to
this policy of not doing something on the side while on a preaching
mission abroad. So I have been immune from any suspicion or
interrogation. The importance of reading and meditating on God’s
Word on a regular basis is seen in the ability to make a quick
decision on the spot.
Our Church in conjunction with Calvary BPC is
resuming to publish the RPG Quarterly, Bible-reading workbooks to
help beginners. I have been requested to supply for the next two
quarters: The Book of Revelation and Psalms. Although you take six
months to study two books of the Bible, you go through them
thoroughly. The time taken is not wasted. This will help you towards
studying on your own. And you will study with the view of doing what
is required of you to do.
The house you build will not only be founded on
a rock but also be made of solid material: of bricks and mortar and
not of wood and attap (in I Cor 3:12, "gold, silver, precious
stones, (not) wood, hay, stubble").
We are called Bible-Presbyterians. But let us
not relapse into Bible-carrying Presbyterians. We bring the Bible to
Church and put it back on the shelf the whole week to carry it back
to Church again the next week. We become hearers of the Word but not
doers. But if we are Bible reading and meditating Presbyterians, we
will not only be practising Christians, but Christians "ready always
to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope
that is in you with meekness and fear" ( I Pet 3:15). We will be
able to judge immediately when it is required of us to make a
decision to do or not to do. We will be able to counsel new
Christians when they come for help.
Let us build a strong foundation for our faith,
our House of Salvation. No foundation, house gone!
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