Episode Transcript
I want to read a number of scriptures this morning, all to do with the matter of foundations.
Psalm 40:1-3: “I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined unto me and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and He set my feet upon a rock and established my going. And He hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God. Many shall see it and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.
Proverbs 10:25 “When the whirlwind passeth, the wicked is no more, but the righteous is an everlasting foundation.”
Isaiah 28:16: “Therefore thus saith the Lord God, behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone of sure foundation. He that believeth shall not make haste.”
1 Corinthians 3:11-15: “Or other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid which is Jesus Christ. But if any man buildeth on the foundation, gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, stubble, each man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it is revealed in fire, and the fire itself shall prove each man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work shall abide which he built, thereon he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved yet so as through fire.”
2 Timothy 2:19: (This is speaking of false teaching and mixture and wavering, and some being overthrown in their faith.) “Howbeit the firm foundation of God standeth sure having this seal. The Lord knoweth them that are His, and let everyone that nameth the name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness.”
There's a lot of scriptures, but the scriptures in themselves are a message.
Ephesians 2:19-22: “So then ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but ye are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom each several building fitly framed together, groweth into an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are builded together for a habitation of God in the spirit.”
Luke 6:46-49: “And why call ye Me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say, every one that cometh unto me and heareth my words, and doeth them, I will show you to whom he is like. He is like a man building a house, who digged and went deep and laid a foundation upon the rock. And when a flood arose, and the stream brake against that house, and could not shake it because it had been well builded. But he that heareth and doeth not is like a man that built a house upon the earth without a foundation, against which the stream brake, and straightway it fell in. And the ruin of that house was great.”
And lastly, Hebrews 12:26-29: “Whose voice then shook the earth, but now He hath promised, saying, yet once more will I make to tremble not the earth only, but also the heaven. And this word yet once more signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that have been made, that those things which are not shaken may remain. Wherefore receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us have grace whereby we may offer service well pleasing to God with reverence and awe. For our God is a consuming fire.”
Now, there's one thing that links all those scriptures together, and it is the matter of foundations.
I suppose there is nothing more vitally important than our foundations. Certainly it's true, of course, of any building. The all important factor, at least initially, is to have a really strong foundation. If the foundation is weak, if the foundation itself is cracked, if the foundation is superficial, then sooner or later there's going to be trouble. There's going to be a collapse, there's going to be trouble. This is precisely true of the Christian life.
There is no greater fallacy than this: to believe that just because you're a Christian, everything is wonderful, just because you've made some decision, all you've got to do is float along with God's people, coast along with them, and everything in the garden will be lovely. You can do it for months, you can do it for years. You can even do it for a decade or two. But finally you will be found out. Life has a habit of finding us out.
If our foundations are not sure, well-laid, strong, deep, then sooner or later, the weakness in the foundation is going to show up in the whole building, when the earthquake comes, when the storm comes, when the flood comes. In every life, such things happen sooner or later. Inexplicable things; problems, bereavement, collapse in one way or another, unknown pressures that are suddenly placed upon us, upon our circumstances, upon our lives comes. And what has appeared to be perfectly all right up to that point, we suddenly discover, has got a serious fault.
Now, this matter of foundations is inherent in our salvation. So don't fear. It's not as if some kind of spiritually elite people find a foundation. The fact of the matter is it's inherent in the weakest, weakest believer's salvation. Inherent in his salvation, there is, as it were, this whole matter of a foundation. Now this is what comes out in these scriptures. Listen to the psalmist in Psalm 40. He says, “He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay”, the thing that sucks you down. “And He placed my feet upon a rock and established my goings”, that is salvation for you. Every time a person is saved, their feet are set upon a rock. It's right there within their salvation, the rock. “No other foundation can be laid than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ”. And even when trouble comes and heresy comes, and even when some go back, when some get infected, the apostle says, don't worry. The firm foundation of God standeth sure. The foundation is there.
Now, it doesn't matter who you are, what you are, however young you are in the Lord, young in age, old in age. If you're young in the Lord, the fact of the matter is that in your salvation there is a foundation, an eternal foundation. God has laid “in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone of sure foundation. He that believeth shall not make haste”. In other words, you won't need to get neurotic, which is what most of us do. We become neurotic, spiritual neurotics. But if only we discover the foundation that God has given us, if only our feet can get right down on that rock and stand on that rock, not on the top soil, but dig down through the topsoil, the superficial layer, as it were, between us and the rock and get our feet right on the actual rock, then there can be relaxation. The storm can rage around us. Darkness may come to us at times. We may go through deep valleys, we may go through all kinds of waters, go through fires, all these things we've read in this morning’s scriptures. But the fact of the matter is that under our feet there is an eternal foundation. No H-bomb, no nuclear war, no antichrist, no satanic cunning can destroy that foundation. It's laid eternally by God, the city which has the foundations.
So it's inherent within our salvation. Now that's the first point I just wish to make and leave it with you, if you take note of those scriptures, you'll be able to go away and pray over them, the all important nature of foundations.
Now, the second thing I want to just ask, to challenge you about, is false foundations. Now this seems to be a paradox, a contradiction. We've just said that within every Christian's conversion, within their salvation, there is this foundation. Why then are there so many collapses? Why do so many who've run well no longer run? Why do some, having loved the Lord, now love this world and turn back from the Lord? What is it? I'm old enough in the tooth now to have seen over these years some who I thought would go through thick and thin, go out like lights, and others that seemed to be devoted and really moving on with God, seemed to have understanding, where are they? Gone! What then has happened?
The fact of the matter is this, that as soon as you and I have our feet placed upon the rock, the devil is after us to get us unwittingly to shift our foundation to the topsoil. Isn't it interesting the way Luke points this out? Matthew doesn't. Matthew just speaks about two houses being built, one on rock, one on sand. It's Luke who points out this interesting thing that in fact the sand visibly was everywhere. One man dug through the sand to the rock underneath and built on the rock. The other man didn't bother. He built on the top soil. When the storm came, when the flood came, it removed the topsoil and the house fell.
Now, what is this that the enemy seeks to do? Simply, to get us to build on another foundation. Now, what is the other foundation? All kinds of things. I just suggest a few. Start with my opinions. You know, many people build their whole Christian life on what in the end, they discover, is an opinion, their viewpoint of Christian things, their concept. Oh, I thank God my Christian life is built on Christ and He's far beyond me. All the time I remind myself, now, this is how I see it. This, in my little finite mind, is the way I've grasped it. By the grace of God, He's shown it to me, but the truth is far bigger than me, far beyond me. Now, that's objective, you understand - “he that heareth My word and doeth it”. It's not that somehow or other you think you've got a system of theology and your whole Christian life is built on your system of theology. Smash the theology and we've smashed your life. And this is what happens with many Christians. They build on what is really, after all, their own viewpoint, their own opinion, their own outlook, a kind of system of theology, whatever it may be. Pentecostal or Anglican, Brethren or Baptist, Calvinist or Armenian, they build the whole thing and then when the shock comes, they begin to say, it doesn't work out, or they're disillusioned. The whole of their life collapses in an instant. They go deep into darkness and they're out like a light, I’ve seen it again and again and again.
Topsoil, foundation. Sometimes we build our lives on our own resources. Oh, some of us have got the gift of the gab. It's no bother to us. We're the outgoing type of people, exhibitionist type of people, extraverts, it doesn't bother us standing up and yapping in the prayer meeting or standing up here and giving a little contribution. Now, don't all go fearful and say, well, I'll never speak again. But there are those of us who are like that, who can build on our own resources and think this is God. And just in the other way, there are those who never open their mouth and think they're so humble, but they never would have opened their mouth anyway. There are some people who'd never go to a cinema anyway. They become Christians and they seem to be terribly otherworldly, so spiritual. Not spiritual at all. If they had been left unsaved, they would never have gone to a cinema. It's as simple as that. It's not true spirituality. It's something built on our own resources. Now, this is not to say we haven't got resources or that God doesn't use what we are once it's gone through the sieve of His grace. But the fact remains, you can build your whole Christian life on yourself, a self-manufactured Christian life.
There are these people who are by nature disciplined. They can build a whole system of discipline, so they become spiritual tartars. There are others who are this kind of naive, sentimental type of people who go out to everything and everyone and they think they've got the love of God. They haven't got anything of the kind. It's not love at all, it's just naivety. It's their temperament. They would have been like that if they'd been unsaved. There are people who are like clockwork. Don't you all know them? In the office, these are people who work by the clockwork, you know, 11:00 out, take a cup of tea down. So the whole life is clockwork. Up in the morning, out. I know some people who, if the alarm clock doesn't go off exactly on the moment, have a terrible headache. But if you're that kind of person, you can't help it. But it's you. You can't spiritualize it. You can build your life on that kind of thing and think it's spiritual and it's not. False foundation. When the enemy finally finds you out on it, you're collapsed.
But there are more subtle ways, too. Some of us build our lives, I did for some years, on our own devotion. Oh, that was my foundation. I got up in the morning to pray. I read the chapter of the word. I sought to be zealous in every way, and without realizing it, that was my foundation. Now, this is not to say that that's wrong, not at all. But what I'm saying is, I made it my foundation. It was subjective. Again, instead of Christ being my foundation, my devotion to Him was the foundation. So if the enemy can freeze my devotion, he's destroyed me. And all of us go through those times when suddenly we don't feel. And then we think, what's happened to me? What's happened to me? Something's gone wrong with my life. I don't feel anymore. I don't feel love. I don't feel any devotion. I don't feel any fire in it. And our life has collapsed - false foundations. Well, we could go on, and we could go on.
Sometimes it's someone else. Oh, my word. We've all got someone else somewhere tucked in our lives, and that someone else can be the foundation. Oh, we think dear old so and so. Then we find so and so has got a fault. Especially when you're young in the Lord, whoever led you to the Lord, you think they're the most wonderful person in the whole world. They're like an angel from heaven. Look at their scrubbed face. Look at the shining radiance that comes out. Everything they say is the word of God. It's so wonderful. And then suddenly we find one day they get irritable or they do something, and suddenly our whole life collapses in a heap. Now, you laugh, but this is so true. Sometimes it happens on a corporate level. We're in a church. We're in a church group. We're in a group of believers and we think they're absolutely marvelous and wonderful, until suddenly we find out the truth. We find they're just human beings with all the failings and faults of human beings, but saved by the grace of God. But we forget they're saved by the grace of God. We're so disillusioned, so disgusted. We walk out. Our life has collapsed. I had that experience. The bottom fell out of my life when I went into a church meeting and saw, when I was a young believer, people so angry they had to be restrained from hitting each other. Then the whole bottom of my life fell out because we had two pastors and everyone ranged up behind one or other of the two pastors. I remember one church officer coming to me and saying, “you won't go to tea with Mrs. So and So,” the wife of the other pastor, “you won't go to tea with her - dangerous.” Now, I was only a young believer. I thought all Christians were the most wonderful people in the whole wide world. And all that my parents had said about hypocrisy waltzed back into my ears and into my heart and I collapsed. I collapsed in a heap.
Now this kind of thing happens again and again. We build on one another. We have a friend, we have someone we think the world of, someone who's a child of God, and we build unwittingly upon them secondhand. When the storm comes, we collapse. Sometimes it's fellowship in general. We can just build on the fellowship. There's Halford House and there's the believers, all of them. You know, we come along, we come to the meeting, we sit there and we sing and we stand when they stand, and we sit when they sit. And we fold our hands when they fold. And now and again, if someone lifts their hand, we might even lift our hand. We coast along with the whole.
And then the storm comes and suddenly we find that for us it doesn't work. What's gone wrong? What's happened? False foundation. Some of you who've got a Christian background, suffer this word. When you've got a Christian background, being brought up in a Christian home, you must always thank God for that privilege. But it can also become a false foundation. For without knowing, if you're not very careful, you become a second generation. Now, with God, there are no grandchildren. There's no second generation. You can take on things you've heard from childhood, you can take on things you've been taught at Sunday school. And then comes the storm. Now what are you to do? You've been taught these things, you've been brought up in these things. It would be entirely wrong to cast them overboard. But you see, the whole point is to find your own original way with the Lord, to really get your feet on the rock.
Now, I've just mentioned a few false foundations, and we don't want to stop there because the fact of the matter is that Christ is Himself the foundation, and we must find the Lord as He is, not even my conception of Him, but as He is, infinite, always infinitely beyond me, to discover Him in that way and to find that I've got a rock under my feet that I can dig down through the topsoil of all these other things, down to the rock right below it all and be built on that.
Now, finding the foundation, let me very briefly just give you five things. You'll have to go away and think about them yourself. But let me just give you what I think are five things that are features in finding this foundation. Obviously, the first is salvation. I'm not going to go into that, because I take it that all of us here are the Lord's children.
But of course, obviously, as we've said from Psalm 40, we find the foundation when we're saved by the grace of God and he's taken us out of the horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set our feet upon the rock and established our goings. That's the first thing. Now, the second thing is very important. You can never find that sure foundation unless Jesus Christ is Lord in your life. You may start on the foundation but before very long, you'll be off it if He is not Lord. Now, in Luke, chapter six, verse 46, Jesus said, “why call ye Me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?” It's as simple as that. If you and I want to find the foundation, the eternal foundation, so that whatever happens in this generation in which we live, and fearful things seem to be coming, whatever it is we are going to go through, because we've got an eternal foundation under our feet. The only way to know it is to make Jesus Christ Lord. And the only way Jesus Christ can be Lord is by the blessed ministry of the Holy Spirit. No one can call him Lord, but by the Spirit.
Now, I know people who can say Lord, but it doesn't mean anything. But to say Lord from the heart, you can only do it by the Spirit of God. We have within us, in our very lifeblood, rebellion.
It's in our lifeblood, it's right in us. We distrust the Lord. We want Him to save us, but we distrust Him. We think He'll ruin our lives, He'll make us miserable, He'll make us go a way that we don't want to go. He won't give us the things we want. Oh, we've got so many ideas about the Lord and this rebellion deep down within us comes up again and again. Only when the Holy Spirit comes to us, when the cross starts to work in our life by the ministry of the Holy Spirit, can we really, from the heart say, Lord, Lord.
Now this is exactly what the psalmist says in Psalm 40. Having spoken about his feet being on the rock, he says, verse six, ‘Sacrifice and offering Thou hast no delight in. Mine ears hast Thou opened. Burnt offering and sin offering, thou hast not required. Then said I, lo, I am come. In the roll of the book, it is written of me, I delight to do Thy will, O God.” This is spoken of the Lord Jesus, but it's spoken of every single servant of the Lord Jesus, every child of God as well.
Feet on the rock. I delight to do thy will, O God. You'll never stay on the rock unless you get through on this matter of His lordship. That's the first thing. Is He Lord, in your life? Can He direct you? Supposing He were to say to you this day, “I want you in Indonesia, or I want you in South America, or I want you here or there, or I want you to stop wearing this, or I want you to stop doing that, or I want you to go and do this.” Are you ready for it? Why do you call Him Lord if you don't do the things that He says? There can be no foundation without His lordship.
And the second thing, very simply, hearing and doing. Hearing and doing. Luke six again, verse 47: “Every one that cometh unto Me and heareth My words and doeth them” - hearing and doing. Now, don't mistake this hearing and doing. But hearing is also very important. There are some believers who seem to think they can do without hearing. They seem to think they're so old they no longer have to read the word of God. They no longer have to study the word of God. They no longer have to meditate in the word of God. They seem to think that some spiritual experience has put them on another level. But you can never do what you don't hear. You must hear to do.
What do you do when you hear? You read the word of God. You meditate on the word of God. You study the word of God and, remember this, don't forsake the assembling of yourselves together. That's where you hear the word of God as well. Sometimes in the mouth of this one or that one, you hear the word of God. Remember that. I've seen it again and again, People say, “Oh, I'm so busy, I won't go along. I won't go along to the Bible study anymore. Anyway, I'm old in the Lord, I know so much.” And what happens? You find that these very people get into troubles.
Those are the kind of things that happen again and again because you must hear the word of God. Hearing is important. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So when unbelief comes, it comes because your ears have got stopped, stopped to God, opened to the enemy, propaganda from Satan, and you don't hear the word of God. Hearing and doing, practical action. What does that mean? It surely just means this: there must be faith and obedience. Trust and obey. What's the good of studying the word of God when it tells you something and then after that you don't do a thing? It was a little mental exercise. “Oh, it was lovely. It was lovely. Take up your cross and follow Him. Deny oneself. Oh, it's so true, you know, because if there was more than that in the world, we wouldn't have the trouble.” And off you trot. You don't take up your cross.
Doing means you not only read, you not only hear, but you do. It doesn't mean, by the way, that anything you hear some preachers say, you trot off and do. You search the scriptures, whether these things are so, and when they are, you do it, whatever the cost, whatever the sacrifice. Once you are clear that it is the word of God and God is speaking to you, you do it.
Hearing and doing.
Then there is another point. I just have to mention it. Open confession. Do you know why many people don't find a clear foundation, that foundation of Jesus? They never confess the Lord. Some people have been in their offices for years and have never confessed the Lord in their office. So all the time they have that awful feeling of emptiness, uncleanness. What does the psalmist say in Psalm 40:9? “I proclaim glad tidings of righteousness in the great assembly. Lo, I will not refrain my lips, o Lord, Thou knowest I have not hid Thy righteousness within my heart. I have declared Thy faithfulness and Thy salvation” - open confession. Do you know that sometimes some of us who are all sort of up and down and all over the place, the one thing we need to do is confess Jesus with our lips.
It's a strange thing. I noticed at the festival for light, whatever people may feel or think, that in those wonderful times of the teachings, I noticed again and again that when all the kids came back, the next day, there were certain faces that were radiant and it was the same story in everyone. They'd spoken to others for the first time in their lives. We heard it again and again. It wasn't the rallies. It was after the rally. “We went down to Soho and we talked to someone about the Lord!” They'd never done it in their lives before. Their whole Christian life had been sitting in a pew listening to the vicar or the pastor or the minister. No confession. But when they confessed with their lips, suddenly a joy came and suddenly a clarity came in. Now this I have found - that a clarity and authority comes when you confess with your lips. You see, the confession of your lips is faith. Oh, how the devil would like to stop us from confessing with our lips what we know to be the truth.
Well, I just mention that. And then again, I'd like to mention suffering. In one Peter, chapter five and verse ten, “After ye have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who called you unto His eternal glory in Christ Jesus, shall Himself perfect, establish, strengthen you.” Now, evidently, you've got to suffer a little while before He perfects, establishes and strengthens you. So, dear child of God, you've got to face it. If you're going to know a sure foundation under your feet, then there's going to be some kind of suffering. However it comes, wherever it comes from, it's got to come, because this is the way the Lord establishes us. He tries us, not in a nasty way. God only ever tries what is genuine. Did you know that? Even when Peter was handed over to Satan, it was only that Satan got the char. God got the wheat. If it had all been char, the Lord would have said, you can't have him. God is so loving. You'll have to wait a little while, He would have said to Satan. And Satan would have had to shut up and wait.
God never lets a person just be blown all over the place. Although in the end it happens that in our lives, trials and treasures come, God works always to get something there which is going to come through so that we can let go of everything else and hold on to what is real. Well, I just mentioned that the Lord Jesus, speaking to the apostle John in Revelation 3:18, said to the church at Laodicea, “I counsel thee to buy of Me gold refined in the fire.” This gold refined in the fire is the very nature of Christ, the very life of Christ. How do we buy it? It's given to us by grace. It's given to us. How do we buy it? We buy it with experience. Of course, it's given to us freely, but we buy it with experience. No one just gets spiritual value, spiritual character, just like that. You have to pay the price of experience. You have to suffer a little while so that the Lord may perfect, establish, strengthen you. Gold, precious stone, pearl. These are the things the city of God is made out of. These are the very character of Christ. How do I get that out of which God's eternal habitation is built? Through experience.
And lastly, it's through true fellowship. Now, I've spoken a little this morning about just leaning on one another, being carried along by one another. That's a false foundation. But neither is this kind of individualistic, independent Christian life which has no bearing to anyone else or anything else, neither is that right. True fellowship is a means by which we find the foundation. See what it says in Ephesians two. “You're no more strangers and sojourners, you’re fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God. Being built upon the foundation are the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord.”
It's a wonderful thing to have your own life with God and to be bound to others who've got a life with God. There's no strength like it. No strength like it. Everyone with their own feet on the ground, on the rock, and everyone rooted together. Isn't it lovely in the temple, how every board of the tent of meeting had its own two little sockets, its own foundation, but the bar went through them all? That is strength when we've got our own life in God and we are fitly framed together. Fellowship, foundation.
Oh, dear child of God, what are your foundations like? I fear as we look into the future, that much is coming to our nation, maybe not in the immediate years, but within a decade or two. Things are on foot now that we're seeing in Ulster, we're seeing elsewhere, which are going to become the pattern in an ever increasing way of life. You and I need foundations. What's the point of just going through life, a kind of christian life, and then when it comes time to go into the presence of the Lord, find out that it's all been hot air, at that moment to discover that our foundation has been weak. May the Lord help every one of us to know what it is to have our feet set upon the rock and to have our goings established. Shall we pray?
O thou who camest from above the pure celestial fire to impart, kindle a flame of sacred love on the mean altar of my heart. There let it for Thy glory burn with inextinguishable flame and trembling to its source, return in humble prayer and fervent praise. Jesus, confirm my heart's desire to work and speak and think for Thee still. Let me guard the holy fire and still stir up Thy gift in me, ready for all Thy perfect will. My acts of faith and love repeat till death Thine endless mercies seal and make the sacrifice complete.
Lord, we pray that Thou wilt get every one of us onto that sure foundation solidly unto it, eternally onto it, Lord, so that the building may be a building which is eternal, founded on and in Christ. We ask it in His name.
