A Firm Foundation
Luke 6:48 NKJV
He is like a man
building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when
the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not
shake it, for it was founded on the rock
I watched a show
about a fancy building built with all the latest safety features and designed
to be beautiful and functional. The
ribbon-cutting ceremony was attended by thousands and the party lasted for days. With all the fanfare surrounding the opening
of the building, I bet there wasn’t a party thrown when the foundation was
laid. The workers of the building crew
cleared the land and compressed the dirt and laid the concrete, but there were
no cheerleaders waving pompoms and no bands playing “we will, we will, rock
you.” Foundations are not exciting,
certainly not as exciting as throwing open the doors and riding the elevator to
the top and seeing the view. Foundations
are hard to build and the work is not glamorous. It’s just dirty, time-consuming work.
Yet the foundation
is more important than the style and a gingerbread façade. There’s nothing too impressive about the building
of the foundation, but if the foundation is built right you can build and
rebuild the entire building a hundred different ways. But if the foundation is faulty, nothing you
build on it will be permanent.
My prayer is
that you go to a church that has a good foundation based on God’s Word. If your faith is grounded on the Word, you can
find your way through what the world will throw at you. If you work on the basics, you will grow in
faith.
I once did a
study of the more common cults. Nearly all
were founded by well-intentioned people who were not properly grounded in the Word
and took some favorite idea and ran away with it. This is one of the greatest dangers of Christianity. The way to God is a narrow way and there is
only one Door, Jesus. Trying to find
another way is a grave danger but many try to find one. Another danger is trying to rush to maturity.
Maturity comes
from growing and that from learning and neither can be rushed. Farmers plant seeds and wait for weeks until
sprouts poke up from the ground. As soon
as a corn stalk pokes up from the ground they might want to go out and pick the
ear of corn from it but it won’t be there.
It hasn’t grown yet. Just seeing
the little sprout does not mean the harvest is ready. Too often we see a new Christina showing
signs of growth and think they’re mature in their faith and give them
responsibilities and depend on them to show mature judgment. Just because we see growth happening does not
mean they’ve reached maturity, they’re still learning the basics. They’re still laying that foundation that
they’ll need to build their lives on.
It’s always a
good idea to inspect your house’s foundation from time to time to look for
cracks and faults. It’s always a good
idea to check your spiritual foundation from time to time to look for errors
and faults. Keep yourself grounded in
the Word so your life will have a sure foundation.
Stephen Cram
February 19, 2012 Colossians 2:8
Beware lest anyone cheat you through
philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to
the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. Colossians
2:8
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