Wood, Hay, and Straw

In his first letter to the church at Corinth Paul talks about how each of us is working on a metaphorical building.

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. (1 Cor 3:10)

So he expands on this metaphor. We are "God's fellow workers" (1 Cor 3:9) and the foundation is Christ (1 Cor 3:11), and we are building on that foundation "with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw." (1 Cor 3:12) He tells us that there will come a day when our work will be tested.

Each one's work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. (1 Cor 3:13-15)

I don't think most of us are unaware of this passage or the concept in it. I do wonder how often we think about it.

There are some "givens" in this text. For all believers, you are working on this foundation. That is not optional. No one is not working. Doing nothing is building. The question is with what material. That's one. The other is that regardless of the work you do, in the end you will be saved. Some will be rewarded and some saved "as through fire," but this work is not salvation-related. So all believers are working on this building and all believers will be saved in the end. The point of consideration here is what do you wish to contribute: the precious or the useless?

If you (and I) look back at your life as a believer, what do you see as your contribution? If we examine ourselves -- our past efforts, our current work, our future plans -- do we find a trend of quality or not? I'm just wondering about our intentions here. Are we aiming to do quality work for God or are we unconcerned or even unconscious? Maybe distracted by the urgent over the important? Maybe just going with the flow without consideration of the product -- gold, silver, gems vs wood, hay, stubble? Are we simply reacting to what is put in front of us without considering what God thinks of it? When you look at your actions, would you call them "precious to God" or "flammable"?

Now, mind you, I've already said we'll all be saved in the end. I'm not threatening you with loss of salvation or anything. I don't mean this as any kind of threat at all. I'm just wondering -- first for myself and then passing it on to you -- whether we're taking any thought to the quality of work we're doing for God. He thinks that, although all believers do work, there are distinctions in the quality. Are we taking that into consideration? Are we taking care of how we build on the foundation Jesus laid?