Yes, it’s been a long time since I last wrote a Chi-Rho Newsletter. I’ll be honest, I’m terrible at blogging! But the good news is I’m back again, this painting is 16″ x 20″ acrylic on canvas. I originally intended to just paint a mosaic in peacock colors – blues, turquoise, greens and edging it in black. But as I continued I started pondering upon how difficult life has been since this whole pandemic thing has begun, how it’s basically been a HUGE wrench in everyone’s life. Globally. But some of us our lives are still standing other people’s lives have spiraled out of control.
I pondered upon the Words of Jesus…in Matthew 7:24-27.
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. 25 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. 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 sand. 27 The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”
Jesus had just finished telling them since Matthew chapter 5, how He expected people to behave. From the Sermon on the Mount, to being Salt and Light in the world, how He’s the fulfillment of the Old Testament Law, how God and Jesus see murder and adultery, divorce, retribution and revenge, what giving to the poor and needy should be done, how to pray, the correct way to fast, securing treasures in Heaven not on earth, telling them not to worry and how God the Father will take care of you before you even ask, to stop making hypocritical judgements, to ask, seek, knock….
Then Jesus get’s down to the real nitty-gritty of behaving and living a life God requires. This Christian born-again life, it’s going to be difficult but Jesus tells us to stay on the narrow path for it leads to life eternal because the popular wide easy broad way eventually leads to death and destruction.
But wait there’s more!
Jesus warns us about true and false disciples….oh we can fool others all throughout our life…. but we can never fool a Holy God! He ends His lengthy discourse with the story of the wise and foolish builders….one took Jesus’ words to heart and put them into practice the other totally ignored Jesus’ words, or at best cherry-picked which sayings to keep and tossed out the others, they did it their way believing Jesus’ Words as being too antiquated, not relevant to 21st century post modern person….and when the storms of life come…only one house remained standing.
And while I was painting this artwork, it got me thinking, how much of society is really taking Jesus’ Words as truth? And how many Christians are as well? Have we substituted trusting in the stock market, trusting in our IRA over trusting in the God we say we believe in? Have we become so obsessed with getting lots of material possessions, climbing the corporate ladder as quickly as possible, getting a famous name for ourselves, socking enough money away for retirement so that we only have a decade to enjoy it before we die realizing only then, it’s too late, we ran after earthly things that are temporary and not the everlasting true riches? Are we having faith in another person instead of trusting in Jesus and putting into practice what He says to do?
And though a person’s life may at first look lovely, firm and strong, like the first couple rows of the mosaic stones I painted, oh there may be a hairline crack or too but seriously it’s barely noticeable…who’s going to see it, right?
“I’ve got it under control, when life gets out of control I got a joint, my bottle, my drug, my [fill in the blank] it’s all cool.”
“But no worry man, I’m good. I don’t need your Jesus…”
Unnoticed to the one who builds foolishly, they don’t realize further down there are more cracks growing joining with other cracks until the very bottom is a fragile crumbling mess of stone mosaics….a loud crash just waiting to happen.
No matter how pretty and solid it looks like, if a person is not putting all their trust, hope and faith in Jesus Christ and His Word, and they are not actively putting His Words into practice… when the storms come….forget it…everything they’ve trusted in…will fail, their life will crash down like it was built upon unstable crumbling mosaic…or sand.
What have you built your life’s foundation upon? Is it Jesus the Solid Rock ….or something else? If something else, you can make the change. Do it today! May this post encourage us to take inventory.
In Christ Jesus,
Donna
