Jesus told of parable of two houses, one built on sand, and the other on rock. His tale was a warning. You need to have a good foundation. We often forget that. Foundations are ... by necessity ... underneath. That is, things are built on them. So while we're looking at the building, we often miss the foundation. And that's a critical error. Satan understood that. In the garden he didn't ask Eve about the garden, but about the foundation -- "Did God really say ...?"(Gen 3:1). Most of the time, though, he's playing a different game. He'll get us discussing the merits of the building, not realizing the foundation is faulty.
Biblical Christians stand on ... God's Word ... the Bible. This is problematic for ... Satan. When he asked Eve, "Did God really say ...?", he was offering a different foundation. "Don't believe God's Word. Think for yourself." That's your choice. Believe God or believe yourself. Basically you go with what God says, or you go with what feels right to you. So when we discuss, say, how to dress in church, most people end up arguing about what constitutes proper dress or how you can tell if it is. The question -- the foundation -- is why? Why do we dress as we dress for church? But we don't really want to discuss that. Or maybe the question is, "Did Christ die to save us or didn't He?" The answer depends on ... your foundation. If your foundation is God's Word, it is evident from the beginning that "without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins" (Heb 9:22). But, of course, if you're asking, "Did God really say ...?" then your foundation becomes "What sits right with me?" And the notion that there is some angry god out there demanding blood (as it were) is too unacceptable ... to "What sits right with me?"
It all seems to boil down to that ... in the end. The real question isn't this technical issue or that theory. It is "What is your foundation?" As a rule, human beings operate on a foundation of "What seems right to me." It ignores the claim that the thoughts of the natural man's heart are "only evil continually" (Gen 6:5), that "the intent of man's heart is evil from his youth" (Gen 8:21), that "the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked" (Jer 17:9). If your foundation is you, it's a house built on the sand. We need something solid. We need God's Word (John 17:17). We need Christ (John 1:1; John 14:6; Matt 21:42).
10 comments:
I grew up in the church teaching about the discrepancy between free will and God's will. In our day, it is unthinkable that God would infringe on our will. But I have to ask, where is that coming from? Does the Bible show man making free will choices independent from the will of God? I used to argue about the definition of will. But lately I've been asking myself, "How does the Bible define it?"
Stan, you wrote, “As a rule, human beings operate on a foundation of ‘What seems right to me.’” On the face of it, it makes perfect sense for people to live this way--how else would (or should) we make our choices in life? The crucial factor is this: what forms one’s guidelines for what is “right,” becoming the criteria that will influence one’s behavior (unless, of course, one lives as a hypocrite!).
As a person born from above through the Holy Spirit, I claim God’s Word as the foundation for my faith--and for my rational and practical living. I believe that in my Christian walk, there is a proper way in which I “think for myself”: it is in seeking to understand God’s Word so as to become my truth. If I am renewing my mind through the Word (Rom. 12:2) and relying upon the Holy Spirit to guide me to all truth (John 16:13), then I must trust that the thoughts, ideas, and interpretations that come to my mind out of His Word are part of that Christlike formation in me. Having the mind of Christ will mean that the influence of my corrupted heart will diminish more and more each day--as I put off the old man and put on the new (Eph. 4:22-24)--and therefore “what seems right to me” would be looking more and more like what happens to be right to God. In that way, then, as a thinking, intentional, discerning follower of Christ, I am free to “think for myself” and do “what seems right to me”--in a way that pleases God.
I spent 25 years of so repairing and replacing foundations. I am intimately familiar with how vital foundations are to buildings. Yet even more so to our faith. Without the foundation of the OT, the NT and especially Christ's death and resurrection make little or no sense.
All to often I see folx who make assertions as if they are True, yet those assertions are based of a foundation of unproven assumptions. Foundations are critical, and cannot be based on assumptions.
Interesting note. I was building a house a few years ago, and the excavator found that about half of the footprint for the foundation was garbage fill. The fix for this was to dig down to good material, then fill the hole with compacted sand.
David, I'm not really sure how this post on foundations relates to free will.
Craig, the example of digging down to find the solid material is good. We often think we're standing on something solid in our beliefs, only to discover it's not. We need to constantly keep drilling down ... so to speak.
I'm asking where are we getting our definition of free will, from our culture, our feeling, or the Word. What is the foundation for our understanding of free will?
And I apologize, the discussion about free will has been on my mind a lot of late.
I bet we can all see the perfect analogy of the importance of a solid foundation in the very scary case of sinkholes--the ones that swallow up people, cars, buildings, above-ground pools, etc., with no warning. Just as the “garbage fill” Craig mentioned would be unstable, the lies and distortions of the world that many people build their belief systems upon will truly fail sooner or later. I can trust that my “house” built on solid ground--the foundation of God’s truth--will stand.
But ... is that question of free will a product of free will? シ
Stan, while that wasn't really the point, I agree. If we dig deep enough, we should be able to find something solid. If we don't find anything solid, maybe we're digging in the wrong place.
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