Today’s #FiveMinuteFriday word prompt is BUILD. So glad you have joined me and would love to have your input! Read other great posts on the same thought here.

Building a house can be an exciting time or your worst nightmare. A Methodist minister and his wife bought their dream home in North Carolina but the joy didn’t last long. They soon noticed cracks and bulges in the walls and defects in the flooring and discovered, to their horror, that the house had no footings beneath it and was literally falling off the mountain. They were forced to sell for the value of the lot alone!

Two builders. On the outside, their two homes might have even looked similar, maybe identical. They both went to church, they both participated in life groups, Sunday School, maybe sang in the choir. (You can read the story here.)

But one thing was missing. 

One builder had dug deep. He knew that his life, the life of his family, his church, his community, depended on the foundation that he would build his house. If it was all superficial, just looked good on the outside, but had no depth, no relationship, no firm foundation, it would crumble.

The other builder had started out on the top, on the surface, just building his house on the sand, so to speak. He had no depth, he had not dug deep, he did not keep going until he hit the Rock. He was satisfied with the outward structure, the facade of his house.

The dictionary gives the definition of the word build as to construct (something, typically something large) by putting parts or material together over a period of time. And there is where the difference will show…even though the houses looked the same on the outside, the foundations were hidden but showed up when the storms came. The storm would blow away the house that wasn’t built on a firm foundation, and the Bible says, “…and great was the fall of it.” But the other stood because he had not just heard the words of Jesus, he had done them.

Even though I have heard this story countless times in my life, today I looked at it as both builders being Christians because the Bible said they both heard His words. One acted upon them, one followed Him, one came to KNOW Christ whereas the other also went to church but just went through the motions and never pushed past the sand to find the Rock!

I’ve used this version from The Message before, not normally my go-to, but I like a couple of things it says here:

“But if you just use my words in Bible studies and don’t work them into your life, you are like a stupid carpenter who built his house on the sandy beach. When a storm rolled in and the waves came up, it collapsed like a house of cards.” Matthew 7:26-27 The Message

If you just use my words in Bible studies, if you just go to church, if you just look the part then you are going to fall. You won’t be able to stand in a storm; you will have no foundation. And when your house falls, and it will fall, it will affect those around you because they thought you were like the other builder!

No one lives to himself, our lives are connected a thousand times over and if you are professing to be Christ-like, it will show…when the storm comes.