Thought for the Week: Building on rock, not sand
Michael Wright reflects on wisdom and foolishness
Hurricanes, rain and floods have been very much in the news recently, whether in the Caribbean or in Asia. Jesus is reported to have said: ‘Everyone who hears 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 beat upon that house, but it did not fall.’ He contrasts this man with the foolish one who built on sand, whose house was destroyed… and ‘great was the fall of it’ (Matthew 7:24-27) in a statement that concludes the Sermon on the Mount.
The wise are those who understand the contribution that toxic human activity over the past 200 years has made to changes in our climate and environment, and the steps we need to take to halt and, where possible reverse, this impact. The foolish are those who ridicule the observations that demonstrate the need for such actions.
The wise, surely, are those who seek to build a just and fair society, while the foolish are heavily engaged in ensuring the poor are oppressed and get poorer as the rich get extravagantly richer. This divide is growing rapidly in our own country, as is the gulf between south and north. The foolish are those who ignore the damage that this does to our society and our common wealth. They are committed, in principle, to an economic policy that is doing profound damage to society. They play fast and loose with our obligations to contribute through a fair tax system to the wellbeing of society as a whole.
The wise are those who care about truth, whereas the foolish are those who peddle in ‘false truths’. The damage that a lack of honesty and integrity does to the body politic is enormous. Here the foolish are not only foolish, they peddle evil.
The wise are the salt of the earth and are called to let their light shine before others so their good works are seen and recognised. If salt has lost its taste it is worthless and to be discarded. The foolish seem to be those who ‘don’t give a damn’ about society, and contribute little to the common good.
The wise are called to do good to those who hate us, and to love even our enemies. The foolish, it seems, are prepared to send hate mail, to kill, to threaten, to abuse, to control and to dominate, and in some cases destroy not only the lives of those they hate but their own lives as well.
The actions of the wise benefit even those who are foolish. The actions of the foolish damage even those of the wise. How can we witness, challenge, encourage ourselves and others to be wise, and avoid the damage we cause when we build on sand?
Building our house on a rock with firm foundations is surely what we Quakers are called to do, and to try and persuade others to do so too. That foundation is of values, convictions, effort and enterprise, living out gospel values, with spiritual foundations, and doing our utmost to try and convince others that those values are the true foundation of a society built on a rock, speaking and acting to our core values and convictions. Building on sand has no future worth working for – has it?
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