11.07.07

Therefore whoever hears these sayings 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. But 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. - Matthew 7:24-27 NKJV.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa has been famous for centuries, however, it is no longer the most leaning or tilted tower in the world. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the tower with the most lean in the world is to be found at Suurhusen, Germany. The new world record holding tower of lean is a church steeple that is 25.7 meters in height with a tilt angle of 5.07 degrees. The Tower of Pisa tilt angle is only 3.97 degrees. However, the Tower of Pisa is more than twice as tall as the steeple, and in the opinion of many is more beautiful than the steeple, but it no longer holds the record. At least it is scheduled to lose that status with the publishing of the 2009 edition of the Guinness book.

This story was especially interesting to me since the tornado we had induced a very severe lean to our church steeple (It is only 26 feet tall.). It knocked the steeple completely over and it was barely hanging on by a twisted bolt immediately after the tornado. Our steeple has now been repaired and reinstalled. On the day that our steeple was reinstalled, the crew working on the project kept adjusting the steeple so that it would be straight. Depending on what direction you are looking from, the steeple does appear to be straight, although from one direction I am not sure. I have told everyone to just remember that our steeple has gone through a tornado. It just has a little more character than it had in the past.

The reason for the leaning of the Tower of Pisa is a poorly laid foundation on soil that allowed the foundation to sink, causing the entire tower to lean. The faulty foundation was the cause of the entire problem. There has been a large amount of money spent in the last century, and this century to try to stabilize the structure, and they hope those efforts will succeed.

In a very real spiritual sense, our lives are buildings. Each day we build our lives a little more. The success of all of this building effort is dependent upon the foundation. What is it that we are building our lives upon? Matthew 7:24-27 is the ending of the Sermon on the Mount by Jesus. If we want the right kind of foundation for our lives, we will build as Jesus describes beginning in Matthew chapter 5. If we have that kind of foundation for our lives, when the tornado comes it may knock us down, but we will rise up and continue on with even more character than before. However, without the right kind of foundation we will not just lean or fall, but we will be washed away when the storms of life come our way.

You can work hard all your life and have billions of dollars in your bank account but without the right foundation, your life will not stand when judgment comes. We need Jesus as the foundation of our lives, or everything we do in life will have been wasted.

What is the foundation of your life? Who is the foundation of your life?