Thursday in the First Week of Advent, December 1, 2021

Matthew 7:21, 24-27

Jesus said to his disciples: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. But it did not collapse; it had been set solidly on rock. And everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who built his house on sand. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. And it collapsed and was completely ruined.”

The Gospel reading for today’s Mass is taken from the end of the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, and his words here form a perfect conclusion to it.  

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven.”  The Lord Jesus makes an enormous claim with these words, but it only caps the enormous claims he has made for himself throughout the Sermon.  In this verse, he declares that it is necessary for those who wish to enter the Kingdom of heaven to call him “Lord”.  He goes further and say that not even all of those who address him in this way can enter the Kingdom, but only those who obey his commands — for “Lord” is not the same as “teacher”.  A teacher teaches, but a Lord commands.  And the Lord commands that “only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven” will enter the Kingdom.  To belong in the Kingdom, one must carry out the will of the One who rules there.

“Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them.”  Jesus reiterates what he has just said and at the same time identifies listen and actin on the words he has uttered in his Sermon as doing the will of his Father.  Such a person who does this — acknowledges Jesus as Lord and acts on his words, thus doing the will of the Father — “will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.”  The word translated here as “wise” is better translated as “prudent”: this man knows how and where to build his house.  That is, he knows to live his life according to the will of God, and he does it.  “The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house.”  We can understand the “rain” as temptations; the “floods” as the sufferings we endure in this life; and “winds” as persecutions.  Despite all of these, those who live their lives according to God’s will shall persevere and shall be saved: “But it did not collapse; it had been set solidly on rock.”

“And everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who built his house on sand.”  Those who listen to the Lord’s words know that he has the words of eternal life (cf. John 6, 68), and so failure to act on them is foolish.  It is to build one’s house on sand: the sand that shifts with the breeze and that melts away in the tide.  This “sand” signifies the values and beliefs that are currently in vogue but which constantly change.  Falling before temptations, battered by suffering, with no certainty to which to cling, this foolish person is collapses and is completely ruined — he is lost forever.  

Many houses seem very solid but they are built poorly.  Their fanciness hides their flaws.  And sometimes we avert our eyes to obvious flaws.  But even the grandest house will collapse if it is not constructed well.  During our Lord’s lifetime, a magnificent looking amphitheater was constructed outside of Rome, seating 50,000 people.  It was filled to capacity for its first gladiatorial games.  Because the owner had urged the builders to take shortcuts in order to save money, the seating collapsed during the games and 20,000 people were killed, with many of the survivors seriously injured.  How necessary it is to stick closely to the rules that lead to life.