Build Your House on the Rock: What Matthew 7:24 Actually Asks of You
The Roberson family wants to be farmers. That’s how Pastor Keith Roberson put it at New River Church, with the immediate clarification that they do not, in fact, live on a farm. They just act like they do. They keep chickens, “‘cause we’re those people.” During the pandemic they built a garden to raise tomatoes and harvest them (“I think that’s the farmery word”). And this past year, they decided to build a greenhouse.
Had Keith ever built a structure a human would be willing to stand underneath? No. He had not. But his wife had a vision, and they’d watched a father-daughter duo on YouTube build a greenhouse in a day and a half. How hard could it be? One year later, the Roberson greenhouse was finally finished. “Curse you, YouTube.”
Here was the detail that mattered, though. The hardest part of the whole build, the part that took the most time, the most attention, and the most backbreaking work, was the foundation. Because if you’re going to build a building made mostly of glass, you’d better be sure the thing will stand. They dug, laid rock and stone, and leveled out a one-foot drop from the front of the building to the back, so that when the winds and the rain came, which happens often around Nashville, Tennessee, it would not be shaken. By the grace of God, the greenhouse survived the spring storms.
Jesus told that story first, of course, minus the chickens. It comes at the end of what Pastor Keith called the greatest sermon ever preached.
What this sermon is about
This message opened the Foundations series’ look at Matthew 7:24-27, the wise and foolish builders at the close of the Sermon on the Mount. The big idea is uncomfortable and clarifying at the same time: everyone is building on something, and storms reveal what it is. Two houses can look identical on the outside. The rain and floods and winds are what expose the difference underneath.
And the way you build on rock, according to Jesus, is two-fold: hear his words, and do them. This sermon takes on the first half, hearing the word of God, and it lands somewhere most of us don’t expect: not at duty, but at delight.
Storms reveal what your life is built on
Jesus closes the Sermon on the Mount, the teaching that turned the entire world upside down, with a warning wrapped in a picture:
Matthew 7:24-27 — “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand… and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
“Storms tend to reveal the quality of what we’re building our lives on. They have a way of exposing what our actual foundations are, because Jesus knew that storms would come.” — Pastor Keith Roberson
You can’t escape the fact that your life is built on something, Keith said. Every day we’re taking in all kinds of messages: commercials, editorials, news channels, books, celebrities, social media accounts, bosses, friends, parents. Everyone’s got a point of view about how to live. So the question Jesus presses, like a faithful shepherd closing out a life-altering word, is: what is the preeminent messaging you build your life on? What informs how you see the world, what you believe, what you say, what you do? This sermon will end, he was telling them, and you’ll go back to your everyday lives, and there will be days of sunshine, and there will be days when rains come and floods sweep through, and those days will reveal it.
Faith comes from hearing: let the word come in
So how do we partner with the presence of Jesus so we’re standing on rock when the rain starts? Jesus gives two ways: hear his words, and do them. The doing would come in the following weeks; this Sunday was about hearing.
Romans 10:17 — “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”
The faith, the belief, the hunger you want to have, Keith said, is fueled by the word of God coming in. It doesn’t happen magically out there somewhere. If you want great faith, it gets ramped up, built, pushed forward, and burned hotter by bringing the word in and letting it wash over you. That’s part of why the church gathers on Sundays, to hear the scripture heralded and proclaimed, and why New River meets in groups, to sit with other people and hear them say: here’s how the word touched my life this week; here’s how I had to hang on the word because every circumstance felt against me.
James, the brother of Jesus, makes it intensely practical:
James 1:19, 21 — “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger… Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.”
When winds blow against you, Keith observed, the easiest thing in the world is to get stirred into a frenzy: to speak, to fix, to accuse, to manipulate circumstances, to spew at people because you don’t like how they’re operating. James says slow your mouth down for a moment and hear. Let the word have its way before you take a step. You might even have to turn some things off and let silence do its work. Do you have a regular rhythm for turning off the noise?
And that word “receive,” Keith pointed out, is a hosting word in the Greek, the same root used when the Galileans welcomed Jesus. We don’t just process the word. We host it. We welcome it in like a guest. Which changes Bible reading a little bit.
Taste and see: come to the word to delight, not to perform
Keith knew exactly what a sermon about Scripture reading does to a room: it makes people feel a metric ton of shame about how they have or haven’t engaged the Bible. “I don’t read the Bible enough, crud.” “I wish I did Bible study like that person does.” But an angry pointing finger is not how Scripture talks about coming to the word.
Psalm 34:8 — “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!”
Taste, Keith said, is a delight word. It’s the picture of that scoop of ice cream where you go, “Oh, that’s so good.” Really good meals are just a small shadow of what we’re meant to have with this King. There’s an invitation from the God of the universe to delight in him this way.
“Let your coming to the word, let your Bible reading, be about finding delight in Jesus. Enjoy. Taste. Let the word cover you.” — Pastor Keith Roberson
And the verse holds both halves: taste, and take refuge. All kinds of things get slung at you all day long, Keith said. The voice of the enemy is rampant; your own voice accuses you from the old way of living; the scripture says the accuser comes night and day. The word of God gets to be the refuge, the place where you get tucked in and covered. Every command in Scripture is looking out for your best interest, your best possible life in him.
One thing is necessary: choosing the Mary moment
For the picture of what this looks like in a busy life, Keith went to a house in Luke 10:38-42. Martha welcomes Jesus into her home, and her sister Mary sits at the Lord’s feet, listening to his teaching, while Martha is distracted with much serving. Martha finally appeals to Jesus: tell her to help me. And Jesus answers, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”
Keith was quick to defend Martha’s instincts. The Son of God just came to your house; somebody’s got to make the sandwiches (“not ham… turkey sandwiches”). Every one of us would be sprinting for the vacuum and the bathrooms. We can all identify with the chores of life, and you don’t have to repent for having chores. You do have to get the kids to school and dinner made and people to soccer games. Jesus isn’t condemning any of that. He’s saying: don’t miss the one thing that will anchor your life through the storms. Don’t miss the chance to delight. Mary just came to listen.
And then Keith aimed the point at the best Bible students who ever lived. The Pharisees knew the word forwards and backwards, all the rules, all of it. They were professionals. And Jesus says to them in John 5:39-40 — “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.” It is possible, in other words, to master the text and miss the person.
“Do you ever just come to the word to enjoy Jesus? The point of coming to the word of God is to be with God. To be with him. To drink deeply, to get covered, to get washed. It is the power of our lives.” — Pastor Keith Roberson
The room stood, and Keith’s charge was simple: whatever you have to do to orient yourself around the word of God, do it. Build your life on a rock. Let the word wash over you, and come to it to delight in him, to be touched and moved and shaped, so that when the winds come and the rains fall, you are anchored with him.
What this means for your week in Franklin
If you take this sermon seriously, four things change about this week.
- Pick a daily way to actually hear the word. Read it out loud over yourself, your spouse, or your kids. Use a Bible audio app on the commute. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing requires the word actually entering your ears this week, not just sitting on the nightstand.
- When the storm hits, be quick to hear and slow to speak. Before you fix, accuse, or fire off the text message, slow your mouth down and let the word have its way first. Turn off the noise long enough to receive.
- Schedule a Mary moment in a Martha week. The chores are real and nobody’s asking you to repent for them. But put one unhurried sit-at-his-feet block on the calendar this week, and guard it like it’s the one thing necessary. Because it is.
- Come to the Bible once this week with no agenda but enjoyment. Not for prep, not for duty, not to win an argument. Taste and see. If your reading has felt like an angry pointing finger, let this be the week it becomes a scoop of ice cream.
Watch the full message
The full sermon — “Building A Life On A Rock” from the Foundations series — is in the video above. We post a new message every Sunday from New River Church in Franklin, TN. Browse our message library for more from the Foundations series and other recent teaching.
Coming Sunday at New River Church in Franklin, TN
If this message resonated and you’d like to experience worship and community in person, we’d love to have you with us. New River Church meets Sundays at 9:00 AM and 10:45 AM at 1153 Lewisburg Pike in Franklin, TN 37064 — just minutes from downtown Franklin and easy to reach from across Williamson County, Brentwood, and Spring Hill.
You don’t need to dress up. You don’t need a good voice. You don’t need to know much about church or the Bible to come. We’re a community of ordinary people walking through ordinary life, trying to do it together with Jesus at the center. Whether you’ve been a Christian for forty years or you’ve never set foot in a church, you are welcome here.
If you’re new to the area or new to faith, our First Time Guest page walks through everything you need to know before your first visit: parking, what to expect on Sunday morning, what your kids will experience in River Kids, and how to find us when you arrive.
If you’re looking for deeper community beyond Sunday morning, our Community Groups meet across Franklin and the surrounding area throughout the week. Groups are where Sunday morning faith becomes Tuesday afternoon real life.
Whatever you’re carrying right now, you don’t have to carry it alone. There’s a place for you at New River Church in Franklin, Tennessee. Come as you are.
Watch more sermons: newriverfranklin.com/messages Plan your visit: newriverfranklin.com/firsttimeguest Find a group: newriverfranklin.com/groups
📍 New River Church | 1153 Lewisburg Pike, Franklin, TN 37064 | Sundays 9:00 AM & 10:45 AM
