This was a sermon I preached very early in my ministry, and the sermon illustration is almost embarrassingly simple. But I hope some folks appreciate a sermon they don’t have to work too hard to understand. And I’ve always liked the irony of a people trying to build a monument to their own greatness winding up with something that gets famous for all the wrong reasons.
Way back in 1173, the people of an Italian city wanted to show the world how magnificent and powerful they were. They boasted about their sailors who went around conquering other cities and making them lots of money. And they especially wanted to show the people of Florence, their bitter and hated enemies, that they were really the better city.
So they started building this elaborate bell tower to go with the city cathedral. This bell tower was to be their showcase to the world.
They started building, but had to stop to fight another war with Florence, which took all their money and time, so work on the tower got suspended for a while.
When they finally got back to it, they built three floors, and then had to stop again for yet another war with Florence.
Years and years later, they started up again, but noticed what they built previously was no longer standing up straight. No problem, they thought. They would just sort of cheat up on one side for future construction, making succeeding floors a little higher on one side to compensate for the lean.
Then they got in a scrap with another city, the city of Genoa, and lost an embarrassing sea battle due to the betrayal by their own count. Now they were not so keen on showing off. So construction got postponed.
Again it took years. When they got back to work on the tower, the cheating up on one side made it sort of banana shaped. But it started leaning even more.
They kept building and finished it anyway, and moved the bells to the top in 1350 – about 150 years after they started on it.
And then, to their utter humiliation, Florence took over their city, and with it, of course, their newly constructed showcase. They tried to rebel a couple of times, but they lost both times, and they wound up enslaved by the Florentines.
And that sort of ended the history of Pisa as an independent city state, and the tall tower originally meant to show how powerful they were now belonged to their worst enemy – becoming a rather ridiculous symbol.
But its still there today, and it still leans.
In fact, it kept leaning a little more each year, until finally part of the bell system came crashing down. They had to close the tower in 1989. It finally reopened a couple of years ago, after a massive construction project to shore it up and keep it from falling.
What made it lean, of course, and what had to be shorn up, was the foundation. From the very beginning of the project, they experienced nothing but problems because of the foundation. But instead of fixing the foundation at the beginning, they just kept assuring themselves it would never fall down, and they wound up with a funny banana shaped building, that does not stand up straight.
And it’s famous. It’s famous precisely because it leans. Millions of people come to see it every year: the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa.
But do any of the millions who come to see it marvel at how powerful and mighty the people of Pisa were? I doubt it. They probably think they were idiots to build this massive tower on bad foundation in the first place, and marvel that it is only by the grace of God it did not fall down centuries ago.
In the gospel lesson this week, Jesus talks about foundations. He was a carpenter, after all; He knew about such things.
He said, in effect, we build foundations for our lives based on what we do or don’t do when we hear His words.
If we hear His words and do what He tells us to do, we will have houses built on solid foundations. Storms will come – we will be tested, and assaulted, and beat upon – but we will hold up.
If we hear the words and don’t do what He says, then the same storms will come, but we will collapse.
It sounds pretty simple, at least conceptually.
But all of us who try to live as Jesus taught find the way more difficult than it sounds.
Love everybody, even those – maybe especially those – who hurt us or hate us.
Be meek and humble before God. Thirst after righteousness. Forgive others, over and over.
Be selfless and generous; feed the hungry, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger.
Don’t judge others. Don’t seek revenge. Don’t carry grudges.
Pray – a lot! Be faithful in worship. Sacrifice your comfort and your security for the sake of others.
This is really hard stuff.
Yet these are all words of Jesus – words He expects us to live by. If we don’t, He says He will not know us. He won’t know us even if we call Him our Lord, and boast of doing some mighty works in His name.
To have the sure foundation, the foundation built on solid rock, we have to be sincere in our faith, and demonstrate our faith by doing what He says, not by flashy, show-offy stuff – like building a big tower or something!
And I suppose He means we affect our foundation little by little every day. Like the building project in Pisa, our progress takes a long time. It is built by all the decisions we make.
Do we help this poor beggar, or do we pass by on the other side? Do we take time out to pray, or just collapse in front of the television? Do we volunteer to help out when help is needed, or do we make up excuses?
Every day; hundreds or even thousands of decisions.
Well I don’t know about you, but if having a sure and solid foundation means making the right decision every single time, then I think my foundation may be in trouble.
Oh, I don’t mean I always ignore my Christian duty. There are times when I do good things, give generously, forgive others, pray.
But there are many other times when I act selfishly, or lazily, or forgetfully.
I think I must be like that leaning Tower of Pisa. My foundation gives way a little on one side, and I start leaning. I may try to shore it up, by doing some good work that gets me a nice pat on the back, but that just makes me tilted and banana shaped – not something to be proud of.
And of course, it is only by the grace of God that I don’t topple over and come crashing down.
But the good news is the grace of God counts more than all the good works and good thoughts I can ever accomplish. No amount of good works will ever get me to heaven. That’s why Jesus says simply calling Him “Lord, Lord,” or performing mighty acts in the name of God won’t cut it. We have to depend on the grace of God as the only thing that does not keep us from our own destruction.
Trying to remain faithful to the teachings of Jesus is still important. As Moses says, we need to fix these words in our hearts and souls, and teach them to our children, and talk about them day and night. These words mean a blessing for our lives. Those who keep them will have richer lives.
And when those storms come – and they will inevitably come whether we are good Christians or bad Pagans – it will be easier for us to depend on the grace of God if we’ve built up a good relationship with our Lord during the calm and prosperous times. We have to practice our faith in order to strengthen our faith.
But practice will not make us perfect; not by our own works. In fact, we will surely die trying.
God knows we are sinful people – all of us. But as John said, God did not send Jesus into the world to condemn the world, but because He loved the world, and wants us to have eternal life in spite of our sins.
This is what Paul means in his letter to the Romans by righteousness apart from the law.
This is a curious thing. The word Paul uses for righteousness has a legal connotation. It means something akin to our “not guilty.” But to be “not guilty” in those times meant to be in a right relationship.
Paul says all of us have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God. In other words, all of us are guilty under the law. But God gave us a way to be declared not guilty anyway, apart from the law, by being in a right relationship.
Jesus Christ made bail for us; He paid our ransom. And if we depend on His grace, depend on it as though our very lives were at stake, (which they are), then we can be declared justified. This justification by grace is a gift, a gift we receive through our faith.
So maybe in our heart of hearts, we don’t have much to show how magnificent and powerful we are. Maybe we look a little ridiculous, leaning precariously, about to fall down. The monument we try to build by our own pride becomes a symbol of our failure.
But as long as we depend on the grace of God to keep us from crashing to the ground, we will weather the storms, and survive the floods.
So we don’t just say “Lord, Lord”; we say, “Lord have mercy.”
The grace of Jesus Christ is the only rock we depend on, and it is upon this rock we have our sure foundation.