That which cannot be moved

 A reflection on Matthew 7:24 - 25 

24 “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. 25 Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. (Matthew 7:24 – 25 NLT)

Recently, as I heard a sermon on Mt. 7:24 - 25, I had a vision of swirling mists. Everything was evanescent and insubstantial; nothing was solid; nothing could be counted on. Then, out of the swirling mists, came a solid foundation. The mists parted around the foundation; the foundation was impervious.

It struck me that the world today is like that vision. Those things I thought I could count on, my job, the routine of my day-to-day life, going to church, my government, the generally healthy US economy – all those things that I had thought steady – had suddenly been revealed for what they are: Insubstantial wisps subject to the vagaries of time. It occurred to me that the solid foundation in my vision was the one thing which could not be changed. It occurred to me that the solid foundation was God and his word.  

As the old hymn says: “There is no shadow of turning with thee; Thou changest not, thy compassions, they fail not. As thou hast been, thou forever wilt be.” 

How good it is, in times like these, to be built on that which cannot be moved.

Notes:  Originally written in May 2020 amidst the uncertainty of the early stages of the Coronavirus pandemic.  Slightly revised August 2022.