If you read very many of my blogs you probably know that I teach a children’s Bible class on Sunday mornings. This lesson was one of their absolute favorites!
In Matthew 7:24-27 Jesus says the following:
“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 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.”
These four short verses speak volumes about how a man should live his life in respect to God’s Word. This lesson is one that adults need to be taught, yet is simple enough for children to understand.
In these verses Jesus speaks about two very distinct men: a wise man and a foolish man. The wise man builds his house upon the rock so that it will stand firm when the rain and wind beat upon the house. The foolish man builds his house upon the sand. Because the foolish man’s house was not built on a firm foundation it fell when the wind and rain beat upon the house.
For many years the paragraph above was all I really knew about the wise and foolish builders. But there is much more to what Jesus describes in these verses. Jesus does not just describe two men who built their houses on different foundations, but who those men really are. In fact, Jesus says that the person who hears His words and puts them into practice is like the wise man who built his house upon the rock. Jesus also says that the person who hears His words and does not do them is like the foolish man who built his house upon the sand. It seems the message of the story is NOT what the wise and foolish man did (how they build their houses) but who the wise and foolish men were.
The teaching in these verses is fairly easy to describe to children. When I taught this section of scripture I had to define what the terms “wise” and “foolish” meant, but they grasped that pretty quickly. After explaining what made each man wise or foolish I likened it to their parents telling them to do something. If they hear their parents, but do not obey what they say they are like the foolish man. If they hear their parents, and do what they say they are like the wise man. I then expanded to following the teachings in the Bible.
The children really liked this story, and they really seem to be able to grasp and remember the teaching. They also really enjoyed the song which goes with this lesson. I do not know the official name of the song: I have always called it “The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock.”
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