Dear Friends,

According to the children's song, the wise man built his house upon a rock and the foolish man built upon sand. You all know what happened - the house with the firm foundation withstood the stonn but the other collapsed in ruins. But the song is not really about build ing houses - it challenges us to think about our lives. Are our foundations firm and rocklike or are we n the process of building everything on something that is essentially unstable. The big question is, what can we rely upon? Many seem to rely on material things. Their security lies in the abundance of things they possess. But riches have wings and bad times follow good times - what happens then? Others pin everything upon human relationships - they trust people and completely depend on them. This is heart-warming, but sadly even the best of people fail at some point and they die. If people provide the only security we have, this can lead to emotional disaster. Even religion is not to be relied upon. Like everything that involves human beings, religion in the widest sense is a mixture of good and evil. Sadly, as usual, the bad hits the headlines and gets talked about Jesus told the story about the wise man and the foolish man. It belongs to the collection of sayings known as The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew, chapters 5,6 and 7). It is a wide-ranging address full of spiritual authority and touching subjects like:

Blessedness - the nature of happiness.

Humility and what true greatness is.

Anger - lust - divorce - retaliation.

Love for one's enemies.

Giving to the needy.

Prayer and not being anxious.

These words come right at the end:

"Everyone then who hears these say ings 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 mne and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it."
[Matthew 7:24-27.ESV]

As Christians we have great confidence in the words of Jesus - they stand the test of time and trouble.

With our prayers,

Eddie Jones

Pastor