Jesus reminds you students attending Southeast Missouri State University and all people in Matthew 7:24 ff.: “Therefore whoever hears these saying of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. Now everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, and it fell. And great was its fall.”
As you attend college, I urge you to reflect regularly on these eternally important words of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Please do not build your life on the sinking sands of materialism. Don’t make money your god. Don’t make money your main goal. I would often ask my 8th Grade students in religion class what they wanted to do when they got out of high school. More than 80% of them said. “I’m not sure. But one thing I do know. I want to make lots of money.” Is that your main goal? The Bible tells us that those whose god is money have strayed from the faith and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
Please do not build your life on the shallow sands of pleasure. Many students want to attend college away from home where they can become “party hounds.” They want to drink to excess, engage in “free” sex, and forget the Christian values they have been taught by their parents and home church. Don’t destroy your health, your beautiful bodies and your clear conscience simply to enjoy the “empty and fleeting pleasures of sin” for a few years and then live with regrets the rest of your life.
Please do not build your life on the shifting sands of popularity and power. Cheering crowds, empty titles and backslapping multitudes change from one inning of life to the next. Sand shifts quickly. Sand shifts fatally.
Please do not build your life on your own gifts and goodness. You need more than your talents and education to fight the daily battles of life – and you will face these battles on a daily basis in your campus life. Your gifts and goodness – in and of themselves – mean zilch, nada, zero in the presence of God. The Bible teaches us that in the presence of God, “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.” They are worth nothing!
On what, then are you and I to build our lives! Jesus tells us that in the words of Matthew 7:24 ff.
PLEASE DO BUILD YOUR LIFE ON JESUS CHRIST, THE SOLID ROCK. You build on Jesus Christ, the Solid Rock, when you hear His words and do them, that is, when you daily confess and repent of your sins, trust only in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and find pleasure in walking the way of God’s commandments.
God tells us that those who hear His Word and keep it are building on Jesus Christ, the Solid Rock. They are truly blessed people. They are blessed with a life that has been cleansed from all sin in the precious blood of Jesus Christ. They are blessed with the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit Who gives them the power to forsake evil and to follow after godliness. They are blessed with abundant life in this present world as they look forward to eternal life in heaven that awaits all true believers in Jesus Christ. They are blessed with the nourishment of God’s Word, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism and the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper that enable them to remain firmly built on Jesus Christ, the Solid Rock.
Yes, as you go through this phase of your life at college and every other phase that follows, it does make a difference whether you build your life on sand or on rock.
You and I, by the grace of God that He has showered upon us in His Word and the Holy Sacraments, are to build our life well. We are to build on Jesus Christ, the Solid Rock. We are to build solid. We are to build deep. We are to build daily.
Please join us in our regular worship services at Lutheran Chapel of Hope on Sundays and for our Bible Study at noon on Wednesdays. Please continue your DBR degree at SEMO. (Your Daily Bible Reader degree.) Join us in ourm Chapel of Hope family in confessing:
“My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness,
I dare not trust the sweetest frame
But wholly lean on Jesus’ name:
On Christ, the Solid Rock, I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand.”

In Christian love and concern,
Rev. David V. Dissen
Vacancy Pastor
Lutheran Chapel of Hope
Rev. 2:10b