Building

1 Corinthians 3

⁸ The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. ⁹ For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.

¹⁰ By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. ¹¹ For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. 

Jesus tells us in Matthew 7 to build on the rock, not on the sand.  Paul shows us that the basis of life as the church is the foundation of Jesus.  We build on Jesus as the foundation.  With Jesus as our foundation we are secure.  But Paul puts this in part of his letter to the church where he speaks of their divisions.  Following Apollos, following Paul, and the pious answer, following Jesus alone. 

Paul leaves it that Jesus is the foundation.  Apollos and Paul are only small parts of a whole.  Leaving them in the image of the field with seeds and water coming in.  God doing the work of making things grow.  But as Paul mixes his metaphors and moves to the building, we have no idea what planting seeds and watering means.  Walls and roof?  Windows and doors?  In the end he tells us that we (the church) build on the foundation of Jesus Christ.

We see that Paul does not attack Apollos, or any other leader who might disagree with Paul.  He simply points back to Jesus.  The history of the church has too many divisions over things that shouldn’t have divided us.  The future will likely have the same.  Regardless of whether we see divisions or not, our goal is to look at how we follow Jesus as the church.  He is the reason we are here.  He is the way we got here.  In John 10 we see that Jesus is the gate, the way in which we enter and the place where we are protected.  In John 14 we see that Jesus is the way to the place we are going.

The agreement of The Church is that we enter through the grace of God through Jesus Christ.  This is what we stand on.  This is the position of the church.  God calls us, we follow, seeking to be like Jesus. 

I have been re-watching the show Bones recently.  I am seeing in it a group of people who are all broken in their lives in different ways.  Each showing different aspects of being human; good and bad aspects in each.  While each has their own struggle, they are all working toward one goal, solving a crime, bringing justice, learning the truth.  The same basis for taking part in the story of each of their episodes.

That is an image of the church.  Each one of us broken parts in our own ways.  Good and bad aspects.  Positives we bring, things we need to change in ourselves.  But working toward the same goal of building the church into a place where others belong as we belong.  Working toward our being changed and making it a place where others have opportunities to be changed by the Spirit at work.  Appreciating the contributions of each other, even when we sometimes question the way they are here with us.  Understanding it may be questioned how we are here.  And seeing that we are all taking part in attaining the same goal, the church being present, active and effective where we are.