Faulty Foundations

And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it. (Matthew 7: 26, 27)

Sometimes ago I posted about this by stating that the foolish builder appeared to be more logical and must have started enjoying the fruit of his labor much earlier than the wise one. In fact, without adversity, I doubt anyone would have gone to the wise builder for advice on building beautiful houses because nobody would have wanted to waste all those resources below ground.

Have you ever wondered why to this age buildings are collapsing? Do you like me ask how a building that was designed by an architect and supervised by an engineer collapses?

I have one proposal to make. When such a house collapses, instead of what the government does to arrest the owner of the project who was just an investor, why not JAIL all those experts? You see, if experts tell me a cheaper mix or a smaller pillar is strong enough and it will save me a coin or hasten the completion date and therefore occupation, who am I to question their expert advice? They are the ones who went to school to learn that.

Yet I want us to move beyond buildings to eternal things.

Do we realize that it is far more destructive when we have a faulty spiritual foundation? We could be appearing to be in perfect spiritual health when inside we are crushed beyond repair. And like the foolish builder we could appear to be epitomes of spiritual health.

Why do we have ministers falling into very foolish and destructive foibles? Why are we having ministers who were called from civilian affairs giving the same civilian affairs spiritual names to carry them out from pulpits? Does it mean a businessman earning from the pulpit is different from a civilian one? Or was the calling just a transfer from the secular marketplace to a spiritual one? How spiritual is someone hawking on the pulpit from the one doing it on the streets? Is selling my book from the pulpit more spiritual than placing it on the bookshop shelf or street corner?

This is a clear case of a faulty foundation. It is very difficult to outgrow our foundations. That is unless we ask Christ to demolish them and establish a new one to build our lives and faith on.

Like we all know, the depth of a foundation determines the height a building can attain. And it all boils on the base of that foundation. We say rock solid to talk about the stability on which a foundation rests.

We are therefore not just talking about our foundation but what it rests on. You can have a foundation so deep but still have the building collapse because there is no solid base on which it rests.

What are our spiritual foundations? Who brought us the faith we have? How did they bring it?

That is because they for the most part are determinant of how our faith turns out. Again I will repeat, until and unless we allow Christ demolish those foundations and build us on another.

I have talked about marriage and indicated that those foundations are the reason Christian marriages are collapsing all over.

This is because European missionaries brought us their cultural concept of marriage, which is unscriptural, and made us believe that it is the model for the Christian. As a result, we trashed our model, which was closer to the Biblical, and took theirs, bringing all the confusion we see.

This is also what happened with evangelism and church formation. We moved from the Biblical model to a culturally, probably politically or entrepreneurially relevant model as we sought those numbers to fill our churches, meaning we left the solid base of our evangelism for one that probably produced faster ‘fruit’ and bigger numbers.

From my observation in missions and church planting, there is one fatal fault I find being repeated almost like it is the rule.

In the push for fast growth, character is overlooked. It appears as if spirituality is a vice.

I remember one time we were having an open air crusade and our interpreter was not doing very well. The team picked a Muslim to interpret Gospel preaching. I was stunned! But I was among the youngest and there were senior religious leaders with big titles making decisions so there was nothing I could do or say.

Or this pastor friend who had Muslims for his best couple due to their societal status!

But worse is the fact that most spiritual structures will reward loyalty above spirituality. Simply saying, a crook who fights for the pastor will have a higher status in the structure than the spiritual giant who is revered for his spiritual life.

In ‘Young Elders’, I posted about young people, some even unmarried, being made elders in churches that overlook men of God who meet the scriptural standard. And the real elders are overlooked because they have their own spiritual status and so will not foolishly run around with the pastor’s folly.

You see, when Christ’s commands are treated as suggestions and His word is treated as information, that is what we will be headed to all the time.

Pastors reward loyalty to them above obedience to Christ’s commands. And it is something I have seen again and again.

I was once kicked out of church staff and the discipleship ministry I was leading killed because I refused to be the pastors’ errand boy because that is not what Christ had brought me to do. And I communicated my position with utmost respect. Yet to date I see people with no spiritual stature, some who could comfortably work in a brothel being offered key positions in such churches. You will even see persons living in sin serving in and even being given positions in them.

I suspect that is the reason churches outsource for pastors instead of growing them. Then they will be answerable to their bosses since they hold the pen that ‘wrote’ them. Of course they would not be as ‘foolish’ as I was in calling for Christ’s standard.

One time I visited a church and was told it was closed because the pastor had bolted. And I had gone there because they had a big sign board on the highway.

A missionary went there later and took the person he found there and decided he was the pastor, even sponsoring him to Bible School. And the little I knew him I doubt he had any spirituality to be a pastor. Or take this other senior clergyman who was giving a testimony of how God saved him from arrest when a deal fell through. And what was the deal? Ferrying guns in his vehicle! To imagine he had even negotiated his price.

We are in a hurry to establish churches and ministry outposts that we are always overlooking God’s standard in doing so. One verse I am convinced we always overlook is this.

Therefore said he unto them, The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest. (Luke 10:2)

We look for the laborers instead of trusting God to do it. And in our hurry, nay, disobedience, we overlook everything He has said concerning those laborers.

That is where loyalty comes in. Someone who was disqualified for spiritual office owes all to the crook who gave him that office he was not qualified for.

Sadly, this goes way back, probably to the fathers who brought the Gospel to us. And that is the reason we have some untouchables in most churches, people whose word will overrule consensus, however spiritually it was sought, people whose conduct can never be questioned, people who make pastors quake in their boots should they fall afoul of them. And they are not even clergy. In fact some of them are not even known by the general membership as I doubt they even attend services. And they are not spiritual at all. They can be equated with very powerful shadows.

Yet these are the ones who choose pastors and bishops in some of our top denominations.

Of course there is another side to this. Ministers do not argue with the monied or positioned. What I mean is that the sins of the rich and influential are beyond the reach of the church’s radar, especially if they are in the membership or support the structure or its leadership. I am sure some of these pastors wonder what was wrong with Peter killing Ananias and his wife when they ought to have made them prominent leaders of the church for their generosity.

And no wonder we are unable to tackle corruption in high places since we have their proceeds building our churches and paying our pastors!

Our foundations are faulty.

Yet I have noticed as I have ministered over the years that if I asked God to give me ministers for particular tasks He is does an excellent job of picking them, though for the most part they are not the ones I could have chosen had I taken up the responsibility.

Incidentally it also occurs whether it is a discipleship group, choir or even church members. God knows exactly who needs to be on our team and will bring them when we allow Him.

Sadly, that has not been our foundation, for a very long time.

God gave Samuel a revelation that puts this in focus. Man looks on the outward but God looks at the heart. And the outward is not only the body or stature or looks.

Visible zeal for the most part is an outside dimension.

I have been disappointed time and again by people having a very attractive external zeal when a job needs to be done. In fact some of the most unteachable characters are some with that kind of zeal.

I am not against zeal. People have called me very zealous since my youth. But zeal is one factor that can lead you astray if you depend on it to assess somebody, especially spiritually. Some of the zealous people rarely have time for any devotional time and will rarely ready the Bible, even portions as they are too busy chasing this or the other spiritual high.

‘Still waters run deep’ is a saying that is very applicable in spiritual matters. I have seen some of the most dependable believers being some you will rarely notice even in a small crowd. They will rarely give a promise but any they give will be kept. One with zeal is like the seed that fell on the rock. It catches fire immediately but burns out almost as soon as it starts burning.

They could give you all the money in their pocket if what you say touches them but will forget almost immediately when you tell them to go home to pray about it. Those are the people televangelists and TV pastors target with their preaching. That is why you will hear them say something like this

Get out that check book, send that pledge now. Then they will use guilt very effectively after that ambush.

They are simply taking advantage of their zeal.

But that is not what God has called us to do. Christ taught us about counting the cost before committing. Should our supporters also not count the cost of supporting us? Should they not hear from God about supporting us? Why the hurry to receive? And no wonder they spend that offering very lavishly.

I know I am very offensive to many who seek to support me because I tell them to pray first about supporting. I tell them not to pledge but give when they can as God prompts. And that gives them a spiritual responsibility many are not ready or willing to take up. In short they would rather support without praying than pray about support. In fact I find many wanting me to even give them the amount of support they should give.

Even that is a faulty foundation. And it has consistently affected ministry support for generations. We love speaking about the priesthood of every believer and even have coined a convenient term ‘personal Savior’ but have a problem with that same personal Savior becoming a personal Lord since we have transferred His Lordship and guidance positions to others though for many it is for the fear of where that Lordship could lead to. Of course there is a very possible reality that He will order us as He did the rich young ruler and we are not interested and so prefer proxies.

How deep is your relationship to Christ? How often do you communicate for you and not the others? How deep is your devotional life go? Who guides that devotional life?

This is because the one who guides you has or is the foundation of your faith.

And that foundation has a direct relation with whether your faith will stand or crash.

Let me ask this question.

What would happen if your favorite pastor, preacher, bishop, prophet denies the faith? What will you do if he confessed that he has realized that the faith he has been preaching is fake?

Will your faith grow or will it wilt?

Incidentally this is not as far-fetched as very recently some ‘key’ opinion shapers have denounced their Christian faith, even taking pride in that fact.

On what does your foundation rest?