May 20, 2009
Clumped Together
Here in Albuquerque, we are at the bottom of a valley close to the Sandia
mountains (Sandia means watermelon, they are a beautiful pink color when the sun
hits them just right). It is just a few minute’s drive to the foothills and
mountains. There are a variety of rocks and boulders making up the mountains and
surrounding landscape.
Now, I'm not a geologist, but I believe some of the rocks are actually a
concretion. It is a whole bunch of rocks clumped together with a mass of
diatomaceous earth. Diatomaceous earth is a mix of silica filled with the
remains of billions of single celled sea creatures called diatoms (it's also the
clay used for many forms of kitty litter). To get it untold numbers of sea
creatures would have to have died and collected in one spot for burial, the sort
of thing one would expect with the run off of water from Noah's flood.
The concretion or rock will hold together for a long time, but eventually the
weather will break it down and it will crumble into a pile of mud and a bunch of
smaller stones. The process may take a very long time, but the rocks will not
hold together.
I see a similar thing happening with the belief systems of many people who
profess to be Christians. They clump a bunch of stuff they like together and try
to use the resulting "rock" as an anchor for their faith. A common example is so
called Christian-Buddhists. If these people understood the foundational beliefs
of either faith they would realize that they are actually neither. Christianity
and Buddhism are mutually incompatible world views.
We see a similar thing happen when people try and integrate martial arts or new
age practices into their Christian faith. You end up with a weakened base that
will not hold up over time. When people try to integrate the practices of the
world into the church and "blend" the two they get a hybrid more like the world
than the church and it will crumble.
We see it when people try and rewrite the Bible to accommodate evolutionary
theories or feminist or gay agendas. They chose to ignore the plain teaching of
Scripture and instead want to put what they hoped would be there instead of what
Scripture actually says.
I see that in many of the "entrepreneurial" models of Christianity. I see it in
church boards where leadership is chosen not by the depth of their faith walk
and integrity but based on their secular business skills. I see it in some of
the biggest churches in North America which confuse numerical success with
actually growing the kingdom of God (I am not against big churches, just opposed
to the concept that big means good or that bigger is somehow better).
When we bring the stuff from the world, whether business practices, other faiths
or anything else we start adding clay to the rock. We are building on sand. It
will not hold up and eventually wash away leaving us bits and pieces of
fractured faith. Jesus understood that.
Matthew 7:24-27 NET
“Everyone
who hears these words of mine and does them is like a wise man who built his
house on rock. The rain fell, the flood came, and the winds beat against that
house, but it did not collapse because it had been founded on rock. Everyone who
hears these words of mine and does not do them is like a foolish man who built
his house on sand. The rain fell, the flood came, and the winds beat against
that house, and it collapsed; it was utterly destroyed!”
The house built with sand cannot stand. How do we add sand? By not believing
what is in Scripture. We either add to it because we want to bring something
from the outside in or we take away from it because we refuse to recognize its
authority and start taking away from it. We're also warned against that.
Revelation 22:18-19 NET
I testify
to the one who hears the words of the prophecy contained in this book: If anyone
adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. 22:19 And
if anyone takes away from the words of this book of prophecy, God will take away
his share in the tree of life and in the holy city that are described in this
book.
Those words are written in the context of the Book of Revelation but they convey
an important spiritual precept. We cannot expect to add to or take away from
God's Word without some type of consequence.
What are you building your life on? Are you building it on the rock of Jesus
Christ and a biblical world view or are you building on something that looks
like a rock and feels like a rock but is little more than hardened sand.
Don’t wait to find out what your foundation is made of; find out now what you
are being taught and whether it is scriptural(solid) or has something added to
it to make it more appealing or user friendly. Be careful!
Until next time may your foundation be on the one, the only, the one true Rock.
The word of God and Jesus Christ!
Checking my foundation; Right Now!
Darrel Mason
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