Bedrock

 

“Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock…but everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.”

—Matthew 7:24, 26

Maybe you saw the 60 Minutes^® story about the Renaissance Tower in San Francisco. This story featured the tallest building west of the Mississippi River. It contains condominiums that sell for millions of dollars, drawing the richest and most well-off buyers in the Bay area.

The problem with this posh building doesn’t appear to the naked eye. But engineers, who have studied the cracks in the foundation and say it leans, report that the building sinks about two-inches a year, or about 17 inches so far.

Upon close study, these engineers learned that the builders went down 80 feet and built the foundation on very dense sand. Below the sand, the ground consists of years of packed rubble, mostly from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. To reach bedrock, one must extend the foundation of the building downward at least 200 feet below the surface. The question now becomes, how to fix this $350 million mistake.¹

Immediately upon hearing the story, I remembered the parable that Jesus told about two men. The wise man built his house on the solid rock of God’s written Word. The foolish man built his house on the sand of his own willful ways. Though on sunny days the houses may have both appeared stable, when the storms came only the one founded on the rock stood firm.

This parable, while a reminder for us all that God warns us about trying to build our lives on anything but His truth, also urges us to consider how we will build the next generations.

We could say that Christians, in general, desire their children, grandchildren, students, and congregational members to love God and follow in His ways. But, I sometimes wonder if we really aim for bedrock, or simply settle for something that appears good, but has its foundations built upon sand.

Do our churches aim to produce in our children strong, obedient, wise, and serious Christians? Or, do we remain content to develop polite, well-rounded, and knowledgeable young people with the appearance of a fine Christian upbringing, but with little to hold them up through the storms of life—even the temptations of college life or the workaday world? Do the programs we offer children in our churches spend more time on the “appeal factor” rather than actually drilling down into the will and consciousness of these young people?

Thankfully, I have seen, in recent years, parents and churches that have genuinely laid brick upon brick on a solid foundation of the Rock, the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us pray for all who influence the next generation of young people that our families and church produce!

May the Christian leaders of the next generation have what it takes to stand strong and powerful in Christ.

______________________

1 Wertheim, Jon. San Francisco’s Leaning Tower of Lawsuits. 60 Minutes (television program) for August 5, 2018. New York, NY: CBS Interactive Inc., 2018.

 

 

Bluster or Blessing

 

Those of us from the early Boomers remember the “Howdy Doody Show” on black-and-white TV. My sister and I loved to watch Buffalo Bob Smith and his puppet friends: Howdy, Flub-a-Dub, Dilly Dally—and the live characters: Chief Thunderthud, Princess Summerfall Winterspring, and of course, Clarabell the Clown.

I was always intrigued by the name of the mayor of Doodyville, Mr. Phineas T. Bluster. He had eyebrows that shot straight up when he was surprised and his grumpy nature never changed.

Imagine my surprise when I read about another Phinehas in Scripture (spelled differently). His story can be found in Numbers 25. His anger over the practices of the Israelites, called by God’s name, caused him to act against their sin. We read in Numbers 25:10:

“The Lord said to Moses, ‘Phinehas son of Aaron, the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites; for he was zealous as I am for my honor among them, so that in my zeal I did not put an end to them. Therefore, tell him I am making my covenant of peace with him. He and his descendants will have a covenant of a lasting priesthood, because he was zealous for the honor of his God and made atonement for the Israelites.’”

“Zeal,” a word Scripture extols, is a word that we don’t use very often. It means “passion” and Paul told us in Romans 12:11 to:

“…never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.”

When Jesus got angry over the money changers in the temple, his disciples referred back to Psalm 69:9 and said:

“Zeal for your house consumes me.”

Now before we go wrecking furniture or polishing our spears, we do read this warning in Proverbs 19:2:

“It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the mark.”

We see a live example of zeal without knowledge in the life of Peter. He made a bizarre suggestion to build shelters on the Mount of Transfiguration for Jesus, Moses and Elijah as recorded in Luke 9:33. I have to think, though, that Jesus especially loved Peter for this characteristic of zeal in his Christian life.

Paul showed zealous action too, without knowledge, and arrested Christians before he himself met Jesus on the way to Damascus as described in Acts 9:1-31. Yet his zeal as a Christian helped establish the church and gave him the perseverance necessary for the task.

These negative examples should not frighten us from our own zeal, as we go about passionately doing God’s work. God loves those who guard the honor of His name and courageously fight to hold His banner high. And that’s no bluster!

 

 

The Bow

 

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring the clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”

—Genesis 9:12-16

Noah and his family must have felt terrified once they left the ark and, for the first time, saw storm clouds begin to form in the sky. In their experience, clouds meant devastation, loss, and probably provoked in them intense fear.

God had seen what His clouds had brought upon the earth. He had spared just this one family of godly people and a select number of animals. He wanted His creation to know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that, above all, He is faithful and interested in having an everlasting relationship with mankind, not in causing their destruction.

God created something new after the flood. Never before had mankind seen such a spectacular sight in the heavens as the rainbow. This massive curve of refracted light meant promise, protection, and covenant between God and His creation. What an assurance this sign must have been to Noah and his family. As they gazed at the rainbow, they had a visible sign that God had spoken and He would keep His word.

Why the symbol of the bow? We can only speculate on God’s reasonings because we cannot know the true depth of His great wisdom and love that oversee all that He does. But, we can speculate a bit, in light of our knowledge of Him. Charles Spurgeon comments in this way:¹

The rainbow is thus made the lovely symbol of God’s truth. A bow unstrung, for war is over; a bow without a string never to be used against us; a bow turned upward, that we may direct our thoughts and prayers thither; a bow of bright colors, for joy and peace are signified by it. Blessed arch of beauty, be thou to us ever the Lord’s preacher.

When clouds form over our lives, we must remember the rainbow. It never appears without the clouds. And, just when we need to know that God sees and remembers us, He will show us a sign of His love and faithfulness.

______________________

1 Spurgeon, Charles Haddon, Spurgeon’s Devotional Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, reprinted 1982, Public Domain. p. 16.

 

 

Old Paths

 

This is what the Lord says: ““Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.”

—Jeremiah 6:16

Most of us stop, even momentarily, at the turn of a new year and consider how we would like to make the next 365 days better than the last 365 days. While many people make resolutions—and quickly break them—sometimes when we consider some potential new paths, God leads us to change our intended direction and return to the old paths. No, not the tired, worn out ways of the last year, but the old paths on which God has led His people for centuries.

I can imagine our Lord Jesus standing and looking over our lives in the same way that He looked over the city of Jerusalem and wept. I can see Him weeping over the empty churches and the full sports stadiums. I imagine Him seeing the unopened Bibles that belong to His people, in contrast with the cellular phones full of text messages, photos, and social media posts.

I hear Him saying to me, as well as to His other children, the words Jeremiah used in Lamentations 3:40:

Let us examine our ways and test them and let us return to the Lord.

Isaiah saw God’s people restored to a former way of life and lively worship—the old paths—as recorded in Isaiah 25:10:

The ransomed of the Lord will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads.

What would happen in our lives if we made and kept a promise to get back to regular daily prayer, to regular daily Bible reading, and to regular attendance at Worship Services, costly though keeping these promises may seem to us. Wouldn’t the singing and the everlasting joy, the exuberance and excitement of a new and lively spiritual walk with God be worth it? Wouldn’t the rest for our souls prove life-giving?

A Prayer:

Lord, have we sent You away by ignoring Your written Word? Have we sent You away by too proudly denouncing our need of You? Have we sent You away by making decisions for Your church based on our poor human calculations?

Have we sent You away by cowering before the enemy, when You remain fully available to conquer the evil one? Have we sent You away by neglecting those means of grace, through which You long to abundantly bless us?

O Lord, please return us to You. Please return us to You before we are swept away. In the depths of our hearts, we long for the beauty and delight of the “old paths” that lead us to new growth in You.

For the honor of Your name, we pray. Amen.