Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The text on which this morning's message is based comes from our Gospel lesson (Matthew 7: 15-29) read earlier.

Jesus' words in our Gospel lesson are very sobering, very serious. In the verses just preceding our text Jesus has said "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." Then He says: "Watch out for false prophets…. (and) Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire…. Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." These serious, sobering words come at the end of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. Within that sermon, Jesus has taught His disciples the Golden Rule and the Lord's Prayer, but He has also taught more very serious, sobering messages:

(5: 22) Whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to the hell of fire.
(5: 28) Whoever looks with lustful intent commits adultery in the heart.
(5:32) Whoever divorces their spouse, except for the grounds of sexual immorality, makes them commit adultery.
(5: 44) Love even your enemies
(6: 5) You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, then you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

Jesus doesn't mince words here in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus speaks very serious, sobering words of warning. And we cannot sit back comfortably thinking these words are for the unbelieving Pharisees and Sadduccees and scribes. No, this Sermon was being proclaimed to His own disciples, followers like us (5: 1). Serious, sobering words of warning.

"Watch out for false prophets." These are serious, sobering words of warning for me, for pastors, and for congregations. Paul told the young pastor Timothy (4: 16) "Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers." I want to save both myself and my hearers, you who I love. I never want to teach or preach something publicly that is not according to God's Word, or to have someone else in this congregation publicly teach something contrary to God's Word. I never want to be a "false prophet" not even for a moment. But, like you, I am sinful. While some of you think I have a great memory, I know my own limitations, and know that I sometimes forget the great and glorious Word of God entrusted to me. In a recent Bible study one member asked me "Pastor, how would we know if you or another pastor were teaching false doctrine? What would we do if we thought so?" To which I answered "You as members have a responsibility to know the Scriptures also, so that when you hear something in a sermon or a Bible class that doesn't ring true, you know how to go about finding the truth from the Bible. The Berean Christians in Acts 17 were "more noble… for they examined the Scriptures to see if what Paul was saying was true." All Christians are called upon to know the Scriptures, to be lay theologians, if you will. Then, if ever you do suspect I or another church leader has taught something false Biblically, according to Matthew 18, you come to me (or whoever) personally and inquire about the false teaching. Chances are it would simply be a misunderstanding. I may have phrased a correct teaching in a way that made it sound incorrect in your ears, but still you should check it out with me. But perhaps I might unwittingly teach wrongly sometime, because of my own human weakness. Then I would want your correction so that I could publicly confess my wrong teaching. I want to "watch my life and doctrine closely" because I want to save both myself and you my hearers.

There are many false prophets in our world today, voices lying to us, tempting us away from our God and his salvation for us in Christ. Some of these false prophets are in pulpits, either on TV or radio or in congregations. But most of the voices that are the plethora of messages we hear that run counter to our Lord's clear teaching in Scripture.

Sir Alexander Fleming, upon introducing his newly discovered drug, penicillin, warned against taking too little of it. An underdose, he said would permit germs to remain in the system thereby allowing one to build up an immunity to the drug. These immune germs could be "passed on to other individuals so that the thoughtless person playing with penicillin treatments may be responsible for the death of another" if not himself as well. Something similar to this carelessness takes place in the spiritual realm where masses of people seem to be playing with God's Word - taking in just enough of it to become immune to the rest of it. They are "false prophets" spilling their "anti-biotic resistant" spiritual germs throughout our culture, throughout the Christian church. Many people attend just enough religious services to temporarily quiet their conscience; they attend just enough weddings, funerals, and special observances to keep them from longing for a genuine and thorough encounter with God who is so absent from their commitment. They have just enough of God's Word, misunderstood just enough, to make them immune to the real thing, to their daily need for repentance, for their daily need for forgiveness that comes only through Jesus Christ. (modified from Echoes of Eternity, Dennis Kastens, CSS Publishing). People like that have built their spiritual lives and houses on sand, and then temptation and testing causes them to fall away. These too are serious, sobering words. But Jesus doesn't leave us with only serious, sobering words. He says "Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock." How much time did you spend last week, last month, last year receiving your regular doses of God's saving Word? Are you putting your spiritual life at risk by underdosing and building immunity to His Word? Are you listening instead to false prophets, false voices that say to you "I'm too busy to spend 15-30 minutes each day reading the Bible or listening to God's Word on an audiotape." Are you listening to voices that say "The Bible is too hard for me to understand, so I won't bother?" Let us hear God's Word and nobly search God's Word regularly, building our lives on the rock that does not fall.

And what is that rock? It is of course our Lord Jesus Christ, and the righteousness we have with him. From our Romans text: "But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus." In our Christian lives we are never comfortable, but we are comforted. We are never comfortable because we spend this lifetime needing to hear the serious, sobering words of Jesus and his law, pointing us to our need for repentance and forgiveness again and again and again. Have Jesus' serious words of warning sobered you? Do you better realize the humanly impossible expectations of God's Law? Do you better realize your need for strong doses of God's saving Word in your life?

The Christian life is never comfortable, but we are comforted. God's saving Word, our rock asserts to us again and again that He has chosen us and loves us despite our sin. He invites us to trust in Him and Him alone, not ourselves, for our salvation. He invites us, as we did a few moments ago, to confess our sin and receive His forgiveness. He bids us, come, take, eat and drink at the Lord's Table for further comfort of knowing we are unified with him. Serious and sobering words of Jesus? Yes, but words that point us back to the only comfort that is truly comfort, the rock of our salvation in Christ Jesus and his cross.

The grace of our sobering and comforting Lord Jesus Christ be with us always. Amen.