All Shook Up

"There's my dad. Want a ride home, Thomas?" Wesley asked after school one day. Thomas nodded, and the boys climbed into the car in time to hear a news report about the clean-up efforts in an area where an earthquake had recently occurred. "What causes an earthquake?" Wesley asked his dad."Well, the earth's crust has splits in some places called faults. Sometimes the sides of a fault shift against each other and cause the earth to tremble. If they move against each other hard enough, it may shake the earth so much that buildings crumple."Thomas frowned. "Can that happen here?" He imagined his own house tumbling down."Earthquakes occur all over the world, but according to the most recent geological maps, we're not living near any major faults in the earth's crust," said Wesley's dad. "Since we're on a more solid foundation, we're not likely to experience an earthquake. Even if we did, it probably wouldn't be a severe one.""Good!" said Thomas. "I'm glad my house is on solid ground."Wesley's dad nodded. "So am I." He smiled at Thomas. "But do you know that we need to build our lives on a solid foundation too? That's even more important than having our homes built on a firm spot in the earth's crust."Thomas looked puzzled. "Build our lives on a solid foundation? How do we do that?" Wesley chimed in. "We talked about that in my class at church last week! The lesson was on the story in the Bible about a wise man who built his house on rock and a foolish man who built his house on sand. When the storms came, the wise man's house stood strong, but the foolish man's house blew away.""In the story, the men's houses represent their lives," Dad explained. "We can either build our lives on a solid foundation or on one that will crumble in life's storms."Wesley nodded. "People who trust in Jesus are like the wise man. They're building their lives on the Rock, which is another name for Jesus.""That's right," said Dad. "Jesus is our firm, strong foundation. He died and rose again to save us from sin and give us eternal life, and He can hold us steady even when things in life get all shook up."–Nance E. Keyes