Christian Living

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In Luke 20, there's a very curious passage where Jesus refers to himself as the Cornerstone, and then proceeds to say, "Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but anyone on whom it falls will be crushed."

Uh, okay, so which of those is the GOOD outcome? I don't want to be crushed, but neither do I want to be broken into pieces. Are those really my only two choices?

Short answer: yes. Jesus was talking about himself as the Cornerstone, the most important foundational stone in putting up a building, so let me use the analogy of construction. Imagine that your life is like a house. Prior to your salvation, you went (or are going) through your life trying to build your own house. The problem is that you've never built a house before, so you have no idea what a good one is supposed to look like. You picked a sense of humor that you thought worked well, you chose tastes in music that you feel make you happy, you made friends who you thought would satisfy you, and you selected a career that you thought you would enjoy. Many times, you're simply wrong. You don't know you as well as God knows you, so you have no clue what will truly make you happy, or what is truly the best way for you to live. Only God knows those things. He built you from scratch, created you and placed you on this earth with a blueprint in mind of what he wanted your life to look like. Before you get saved, you're not listening to him, so you build your life some other way, and you shouldn't be surprised that the life you've built for yourself is difficult and not very fulfilling. You didn't build on the Cornerstone!

Here's what Jesus was getting at: there's no way to encounter him and still remain you. If he's going to give you a satisfying life, he has to shatter that ugly, lopsided, misshapen lump of a life that you've built for yourself up to this point. He has to break you to pieces before he can rebuild you into a beautiful and well-built house - the house that God intended for you when he made you.

In that context, being broken to pieces is a very good thing.

You want a satisfying life, right? And you realize that God invented satisfaction, right? So why would you seek your satisfaction anyplace else? You've never lived a life before, so what makes you think you're qualified to shape your own life however you want to? Do you really think you can do a better job on your life than God can, even though he has shepherded billions upon billions of people through life already?

I'd like you to consider the idea that the life you have built for yourself is not the best that it could be. There are things about you that are not good. There are aspects of your personality that harm you and the people around you. You have hurts from your past that still impact the way you treat others. Doesn't it pique your interest just a little bit to know that God could rid you of all those things?

The problem is that having him strip them from you can be a terrifying thing. If you've spent your entire life using sarcasm as a defense mechanism to keep from getting hurt, what will happen when God says he wants to change your attitude so you're not sarcastic anymore? Letting go of something like that is not easy! It will definitely feel as if your life is being shattered at the seams, like everything you know is ending. That's because it is ending! But Christ is the Cornerstone, and when God reconstructs your life with Christ as the foundation, you know that what he creates will be infinitely better than what you created!

The alternative, of course, is to keep relying on your own strength, to keep pretending that you're already doing life the best way it could possibly be done. If you attempt this, you will be crushed. You will be crushed both in this life, where your bad habits and bad attitudes will keep you from true peace and joy, and after death, when God judges you for the fact that you never trusted him.

Examine your life. Did you build it, or did God build it? Are you still harboring bitterness, unforgiveness, destructive behaviors, or simple self-sufficiency that are keeping you from the life God wants for you? Is the foundation for your life your own strength and wisdom, or is it strength and wisdom that have stood the test of time?

If you have built your own life up to now, I urge you to repent and remedy that today. Don't spend another day in an ugly and misshapen life. Let God break you to pieces and start rebuilding you on the one true Cornerstone.

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