Building in the Christian Life

1 Corinthians 3:10-15

The above passage of Scripture highlights the importance of building in the Christian life. Now, I am sure that most people (especially the builders amongst the Search readership) would realise that the most important thing you need when you start building something like a house is a foundation—and this passage talks about just that—the foundation of our Christian faith.

This passage would make an excellent study for a home group because it poses some important questions which can form the basis of much discussion. Some aspects of the passage which are worthy of our attention are:

• The passage is a figurative one but it is obviously addressed to believers (both male and female) and it has real life applications. It should be noted that although verses 12-15 refer to males in the NIV , the original Greek text does not demand such a translation and therefore females should also be included in the building process.
  
  
• The Lord Jesus Christ and nobody else is the foundation of our faith (v.11). He and only He is the rock on which we should build our life.
  
  
• The building must be done on an individual basis—nobody else can do it for us. We cannot say, “My mother is a Christian and she is building, so why do I need to worry?” This counts for nothing because God has to examine our life individually (see v.10 where it says, “But each one should be careful how he builds”).
  
  
• The important thing about our building (v.13) is, will it stand the test of fire ? God often uses the element of fire as a purifying agent or to test things (e.g. see Psalm 12:6), so if we want to build in a way which is pleasing to Him, we need to use the right materials.
  
  
• There is a reward (v.14) awaiting those who build with the right materials. Paul is indicating here that there are rewards for faithfulness. The materials that last and can stand the test of fire are the gold, silver and costly stones. The materials that do not last and cannot stand the test of fire are the wood, hay and straw.
  
  

The Building Materials
Note that God's building materials are costly. Gold, silver and costly stones are valuable items in today's world and that suggests that it is going to cost us personally to build in the way God wants us to build. It may cost us in terms of time, energy and even financially!

So what does it mean for us if we are building with the wrong materials? Well it means that we can take some comfort in the thought that even if what we build burns down, the foundation still remains, i.e. our salvation is still intact—we cannot lose that—but what we can lose is our future reward that God has in store for us.

Now, there is one problem that we have with this passage and that is that we are not told what the gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw represent but I think we can get a good idea of what these symbols stand for from the emphases we observe in other parts of Scripture.

So what could the gold, silver and costly stones possibly represent? Well, I am sure we could all think of some of the important themes that we find throughout Scripture such as the following.

Loving one another
When Jesus said in John 15:12, “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you”, He didn't mean we had to go down the same path that He took and die on a cross. He meant we must love each other with the same type of love that He exercised, namely agape love. This is a self-sacrificing love—a love which goes out of its way to help others regardless of whether they be family, friend, stranger or enemy—and when we follow the Lord's command and do that, surely we must be building with the gold, silver or costly stones.

Correctly handling the Bible
In 2 Timothy 2:15 the Apostle Paul exhorts Timothy to: “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.” Therefore, we too should do our best (Greek: be eager or diligent) to present ourselves to God as an unashamed workman by correctly handling God's Word.

Preaching the Word
In 2 Timothy 4:2, Paul gives Timothy this charge: “Preach (Greek proclaim) the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.” As Christians we all have a responsibility to extract God's Truth from His Word by correctly approaching it; but further to that there is a need to proclaim His Word as the opportunity arises.

Throughout our lives we are all presented with many opportunities where we can share our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ with others and where we can also share our knowledge and understanding of a rightly divided (correctly handled) Word with fellow believers.

Prayer
When Paul writes to the church at Thessalonica (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18) he instructs them to: “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.” This verse encourages each of us to “pray continually”, i.e. to pray on a regular basis and not give up on prayer. It is not, of course, suggesting that we should be prayingfor 24 hours a day as that would be impractical.

Worshipping and Praising God
In Psalm 29:2 the psalmist exhorts us to: “Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” and this is something that many Christians around the world enjoy doing in their local churches. It can be an uplifting experience to worship the Lord in song, in prayer and by listening to a rightly-divided Word.

When you think about it, in all the above Christian activities we are uplifting the Lord Jesus Christ in some way. In all of these activities I believe we are building with the gold, the silver or the costly stones.

But what about the wood, hay and straw, what could they represent? Well, I believe these are all things which may promote ourselves in some way or another rather than the Lord Jesus Christ.

At this point, let us consider some examples of what it could mean to build with the wood, hay and straw using the contexts of love and correctly handling the Word.

Love
Remember that to show ( agape ) love towards someone is where we demonstrate genuine concern for their welfare and where we might ‘go out of our way' for them. So, using the context of love what could the wood, hay or straw represent? Well, building with wood, hay or straw would not mean not loving one another because that would be not building at all but it could mean loving with the wrong motive or attitude behind it. For example:

• Do we demonstrate love to someone because it pleases us or perhaps other people in some way? Does it make us or other people feel good more so than benefiting the person to whom we are showing that love?
  
  
• Do we demonstrate love to someone because we want to give others the impression that we are a splendid, charitable character? Once again our focus is not entirely on the person to whom we are showing love.
  
  
• Do we give money to individuals or various charities because we can claim some money back when submitting our annual tax return? Here, too, our motive may not be a genuine concern for the person or people to whom we are demonstrating love.

All of the above motives for loving others seem to be wrong and in the Lord's assessment must surely amount to building with the wood, hay or straw.

Correctly Handling the Word of Truth
Remember that, in 2 Timothy 2:15, Paul instructs Timothy that to be an unashamed workman before God he must correctly handle or rightly divide ( KJV ) God's Word. This is a necessary command for us too if we are to glean God's Truth for ourselves through a careful study of His Word. So, using the context of correctly handling the Word of Truth, what could the wood, hay or straw represent?

Well, building with wood, hay or straw must surely mean not correctly handling the Word of Truth and this must apply to situations where believers are reading and studying the Bible but are misapplying it because they have not handled it correctly. Two examples of this are as follows:

• Recently in New Zealand there was a case of a Christian couple who were prosecuted (and jailed for two years) for refusing to allow their baby to receive vital medical treatment and as a result their baby died. They had based their action on some verses ‘given' to them by God from Scripture, although where those verses came from in the Bible was not revealed.
  
  In a TV documentary relating to this case, the host of the programme referred to it as the case where the couple “preferred to accept God's Word rather than the doctor's word”.
  
  I believe that this case brought both the Word of God and God Himself into disrepute because tragically, in ignorance, this couple did not handle the Word of God correctly. This would be a classic example of building with wood, hay or straw. I believe it is so important that we handle the Word correctly so that we do not misrepresent the Lord as in this example.
  
  
• My other example of what it could mean to build with wood, hay or straw is where we base some of our knowledge and understanding of Scripture on the traditions that have been handed down to us rather than on our own careful study of the Bible. We may have taken a lot of information for granted from what others have told us and that information may, on examination, prove to be incorrect.
  
  As a simple example of what I mean here, let me just ask you this question: How many wise men (or Magi) visited the baby Jesus in the stable? To get the traditional answer that has been handed down for centuries we could simply look at a typical Christmas card or nativity set but, if we read Matthew 2, we will get God's answer to the question. There we find that the Scriptures do not in fact tell us how many Magi there were. Verse 11 tells us that Jesus was visited by the Magi in a house, not a stable, and verse 16 indicates that the ‘newborn baby' Jesus may have been almost two years old at this time.

This is a fairly unimportant example of tradition but do you see how easy it can be to build up a set of beliefs which do not agree with Scripture? We always need to remind ourselves of what the Lord said to the Pharisees: “... you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down” (see Mark 7:8-13).

If we are building with hand-me-down traditions that we have never checked out in the Bible, traditions which may not match up with God's Truth in the Bible, then I believe this is just another case of where we are building with the wood, hay or straw. Therefore, as Christians, let us encourage and help each other to lay self aside, to lay aside those building materials like the wood, the hay and the straw and instead build on the foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ using those costly materials, the gold, silver and costly stones.

Let me conclude by asking you this question: How is your building coming along these days?