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Trinity Community Church
Trinity Community Church
Red Letters - The True Foundation
As Red Letters concludes, Pastor Scott Wines sets Jesus’ wise and foolish builders beside a modern image from Hurricane Michael: a single house left standing because it was anchored far beyond code, on pilings driven deep into the sand. Scott shows that the difference in Matthew 7:24–27 isn’t the weather but the foundation. He lays three stones for a storm-ready life: Christ as cornerstone, Scripture and sound doctrine to keep us from being tossed by every wind, and an abiding relationship with the Triune God through prayer and the Spirit. Trials intend opposite ends—Satan schemes to destroy, but the Father uses suffering to produce endurance, character, and hope. Scott resists “upper story” relativism and calls us to the objective truth of God’s Word shaping everyday obedience. Because this is the final week of Red Letters, he gathers the series’ themes into Jesus’ closing charge: hear His words and do them. The life fastened to the Rock will stand when rains fall, floods rise, and winds beat against it.
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On Wednesday, october the 10th 2018, hurricane Michael roared ashore in the panhandle of Florida and it hit a little place called Mexico Beach. The eyewall went directly over Mexico Beach and it had sustained winds maximum sustained winds of 155 miles an hour. It was a bad storm In fact, it was the first category five hurricane to ever hit the panhandle on record anyways and 59 people lost their lives across the country from deaths related to this hurricane. From deaths related to this hurricane, losses totaled $6.23 billion. It was an amazing, amazing storm. But as pictures began to surface, as they typically do after an event like this, there was one picture that caught everybody's attention and you can see it right here. This was an aerial picture taken of right at Mexico Beach. This was the center of the storm, this is where they got the brunt of the major winds and the rain and the tidal surge, and here stood this one house. All around it was devastation. Houses were totally gone, some were so badly damaged they had to be raised. You know, taken all the way down anyways, but this one, one home stood there and everybody wanted to know the question why this home? Why did this one stay here? Why did it get blown away?
Scott Wiens:And so eventually, they quickly found out who built this home, and it was built by a guy named Russell King and his nephew, lebron Lackey. And they were interviewed as to what did you guys do? Well, they had built it the year before and the Florida building code said that a house had to be built to sustain damaging winds up to 150 miles an hour. They didn't even look at the code. They said to their builder we want to build it to withstand winds up to 250 miles an hour, and so they did. This building was built with insulated concrete forms. These were reinforced with concrete and steel and the pilings went down 28 feet into the sand 28 feet. When they were watching the hurricane come in, they had live cameras on their house and they were watching it come in and they're like there ain't no way, but you know what it stood it In fact, the only damage was and if you look at the bottom of the bottom is there was a bottom floor there, but they built it so it could get the title search could just take those walls out. They built breakaway walls. The steps that were there they broke. They built it, so those steps would be broken off. It wouldn't damage it any further. This house was very strong. It had a foundation that went all the way down to where it could reach good, solid, firm foundation, and having a strong foundation for your home is important, especially if you're going to build on a coastline in Florida, but having a spiritual foundation is even more important.
Scott Wiens:We're going to talk about that today. So today we're finishing up our sermon series that we've titled Red Letters, and this has been a great. You guys enjoy this series. It's been great. If you don't, then you don't like Jesus. So there you go.
Scott Wiens:They're his letters, they're his words, right, and we've been systematically going through these words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, and we've been systematically going through these words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, and we are ending this today in Matthew 7, the very last verses of Matthew 7, in a section of scripture that's often titled the wise and foolish builders. So we're going to read the text first, so let's go ahead and read through this very short, just a few verses. So Matthew 7, verse 24, says this is Jesus again speaking. Everyone, then, who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall Because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and it beat against the house and it fell, and great was the fall of it. So this morning, we're going to do two things we're going to read through these words of Jesus and unpack the spiritual principles that he teaches us in this very short story about the wise and foolish builder.
Scott Wiens:But the second part of this message, we're going to explore this concept of what does it mean to have a rock solid foundation, solid foundation, what does it mean to have a strong Christian foundation and what is the role that you and I play in building that foundation. You guys ready to do this? Well, let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word, jesus, we thank you for these precious words that were preserved for us. And, father, today, as we unpack these words, god, we pray that you would search each of our hearts, that you would show us where our foundation may be weak, that you would teach us through these words, that you would inspire us and, father, that you would convict us so that we indeed can have that strong foundation that nothing will be able to ever push over. In Jesus' name, we pray amen.
Scott Wiens:By the way, I'm sitting there singing these songs, I'm like I think my sermon's already been given through the worship and in the words that were given, both of them were exactly right on par with that. I didn't plant them, by the way. That's just what happens. Well, let's start by doing a little exposition of the words of Jesus. On the surface, by the way, when you look at this, it may seem rather simple. The words seem rather simple. Hey, this is a real simple scout. We get it, okay next. Next, no, there is very specific words that Jesus chooses here to portray these divine principles. So we're going to. We need to give that a deep examination. So let's start in verse 24. Jesus says everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.
Scott Wiens:Now I first want to identify that Jesus is continuing to use a pattern of teaching that is called contrast. Okay, he contrasts basically two opposites, and he does this all the way through this. Chapter seven, verse seven. He talks about a good father and an evil father. Right, he does that contrast. Verse 13, narrow gate versus wide gate, all right. Verse 15 through 20, the good fruit versus the bad fruit. So he's using this, this literary teaching, right, this teaching I guess you could call it pattern to be able to continue to show these spiritual principles. And he's doing it here specifically, obviously, to make a spiritual point. And in this case, of course, he's contrasting the wise man building it on the foundation of a rock and the foolish man on the sand.
Scott Wiens:Now, the spiritual meaning begins to take shape almost immediately with the very first verse. Everyone, then, who hears these words of mine and does them and we're going to stop there. You see, he doesn't leave any ambiguity here. He's very clear. He doesn't say a good person is a person who builds his house on the rock. He doesn't say that. It's not, and we're going to explore this a little bit more this isn't just about behavior, behavior modification, it's not about just changing your behavior. It's something a lot deeper, and he specifically makes this clear that the whole thing, this whole analogy, this whole metaphor. It is rooted on him and the truth that he has been given. They've been listening to all these words, remember? They're hearing all this, and so everything is going to hinge on that, and we're going to go a little bit more into that in the second part of the sermon.
Scott Wiens:Now, how about the topic of the metaphor itself? This is a metaphor of a foundation on a home. Now, it's really interesting. As I looked at this, I thought you know, talk about a universal metaphor that everybody would get. You know, if you don't have a vineyard, it might be hard for you to grasp. About the whole fig tree, I mean, I don't know. We got a fig tree. By the way, in our yard we planted a fig tree. How many people like figs? Okay, there'll be more surveys later on. So some of us have figs and have picked figs, and some of us haven't. But everybody understands this metaphor. This metaphor holds water, no pun intended. Even today, in fact, when I read this, you probably in your mind had this vision of a house of some kind and a kind of foundation and what might be happening. It's a visual that every you don't have to be an engineer to get what he's talking about. It's a very simple metaphor. Now he says in this he says, continuing in verse now 25, and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house. Now it's interesting that Jesus uses specific types of what we call perils, specific types of naturally occurring events.
Scott Wiens:Now, I work in the property insurance industry. Okay, so we provide data and software for insurance companies and then all the ecosystem that supports them. So we have a pricing database that if an adjuster came to your home, they would use it to write an estimate and generate how much that estimate is right. Well, in the property insurance space, they use the term perils, a peril, p-r-i-l, and these perils basically talk you know your house is covered for, you know rain, wind-driven rain, and it's very specific because, of course, an insurance policy is basically a legal document. So it gets very, very specific. How many people here have ever read their housing, their homeowner's policy for their house? I didn't think so. Chad has, because he works with me, he has to. He's trying to figure it out. But listen, there's three primary perils that he talks about here and they each have a very specific impact on the foundation and their spiritual implications to them. So let's look at them real quick.
Scott Wiens:Falling rain, falling rain Well, I don't know if you've ever been. I'm sure all of us have, because it's what happens. Have you ever been in a situation where the rain has just come, coming down and coming down, and coming down, and coming down? What happens to the soil? It gets saturated, and if your house was built on the soil, versus down deep into something solid, that's not impacted by that? What happens is ground begins to liquefy, almost right, and so falling rain causes it can truly rock a foundation, especially, of course, a sand foundation, right, rising water flood.
Scott Wiens:By the way, most of you do not have flood insurance. Flood insurance is very specific, by the way, and it's put together. It's sold through insurance companies that are undergranted by the government, but because, of course, if you live in a flood zone, your probability of getting a flood loss is high and no insurance company wants to insure that. So there's, we won't get into that. Talk to Chad after he can explain it to you.
Scott Wiens:But what does rising water and floods do? Well, floods not only come in quickly, right, they can erode. Moving water can erode around a foundation and, by the way, in Tennessee. All you have to do is drive through some of these hills and look at these driveways going up and you see these ravines going down. That's erosion because of water, right? I used to have a house where I had to deal with this all the time. It kept eroding along the side of my driveway and eating into my driveway. Well, that's what floods will do. Plus, it saturates the ground. How about wind? What about wind? Well, he actually describes wind beating against the house.
Scott Wiens:Again, being in the property insurance industry, one of the things that you find very quickly is if a house, even if it quote survives a hurricane, it will become shaken. You know, if I were to take two two-by-fours and put one on end and one like this and put two nails into this, okay, now if I were to grab that and just begin to move just a little bit, what starts to happen Starts to work that nail loose and pretty soon it's like this, and pretty soon you can even see the nails between the two boards. Well, what happens is a house gets shaken so bad that, even though it's standing, it has to be destroyed because it's compromised. Its structural integrity is gone.
Scott Wiens:So from a spiritual viewpoint, we can easily see that Jesus is using these natural weather events as a metaphor for trials and tests that we, as Christians, have to go through and, by the way, so does everybody else. Everybody has this. The rain falls on the good and the evil. We all experience this and, just like wind-driven rain, flood, wind, we have different types of trials that we have to go through, and all of you I know a lot of you pretty closely all of you have talked to me about the different perils that your life has gone through. It could be health challenges we pray for people all the time Health challenges, addictions, death of loved ones, financial struggles, relationship struggles, relationship struggles, struggles within your family, maybe it's related to your employment. We all go through things some of our own doing, some not right and the reality is, trials and tests can really be viewed from two different perspectives. The first one is Satan's perspective.
Scott Wiens:Can anybody guess what Satan's goal is with a test and a trial? Well, in John 10, jesus is talking about being the good shepherd and he talks about the thief that comes to steal the sheep, and he says this in verse 10, he says the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. That's what the thief wants to do, and that's what Satan wants to do through the trials you go through. He is a thief, and the number one goal he has is to knock you off your foundation. That's what he wants to do. Let's just understand this. He wants to knock you off your foundation and for a Christian, though, we have something that should give you a lot of assurance, and that is for a Christian. We know that God uses tests and trials to produce an entirely different outcome, to rather strengthen our foundation, to strengthen it. We need to remember, by the way, that tests and trials we signed up for this. We signed up for this In John 16, 33,.
Scott Wiens:Jesus says very clearly I've said these things to you that in me you may have peace. I wish he'd stopped there, but he kept writing, he kept speaking In this world, you will have tribulation, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Now you might say well, scott, isn't that more reference to you know, being persecuted? Well, that's true, but is persecution a trial? Yeah, it is. We go through trials all the time, but he says we can have peace during these times.
Scott Wiens:You see, when you build a physical home, you don't build it for the gentle rain and the gentle winds, do you? You don't build a home with that in mind. You build a home to make sure it's going to resist, just like those guys who built that home on Mexico Beach. They built it to resist what they knew was coming. And I remember when I read the article on this, the guy says we didn't think it would be put to the test the very next year, but sure enough it did. And he said, and we're so glad we built it that way. I mean, literally it's the only house standing. It was amazing.
Scott Wiens:We build our spiritual foundation on Christ and we build it in such a way. We want to resist. We want to make sure it's strong enough to resist the inevitability of what's going to happen. That's one of the reasons why I have a real issue. All of us have an issue with the health and wealth gospel, because the reality is it's coming. The trials are coming and they're going to make you stronger.
Scott Wiens:You know, if I were to do testimony time and ask anybody here, tell me the worst thing you went through and how God used it to change you, there'd be a lot of hands coming up Some of the most difficult things I've ever walked through in my life. God used it to change me, to shape me more into the image of Christ, and I'm so grateful he did, and we can have joy in that thing. That's the thing. And, by the way, nobody really understands this better than Jesus' disciples, those that he mentored and discipled directly. Now, apostle Paul, as we know from scripture, he got mentored directly by Jesus in a supernatural way. And in Romans 5, verses 3 through 5, this is what he says.
Scott Wiens:More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings. Oh, come on, paul, can't we just slog through these things? No, he says we can rejoice in them. But why can we rejoice in them? He says, knowing that suffering produces what Endurance and endurance produces what Character and character, produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Isn't that amazing? What this tells me is it starts with suffering. This whole chain starts with suffering. I always say God's not interested in your comfort, he's interested in your character. He is building something in you, brethren, and when you come flat up against the trial, you have to realize God's doing something in your life. He's doing something in my life. This is not something just to be endured, although that's a byproduct of a trial. This is something to rejoice in, because he loves you so much. He's going to carry you through this and your faith is going to be strengthened. Wow, and that's why I said you know the wind and the rain and the rising water, the flood.
Scott Wiens:They come at the people who don't have that hope. They don't have that hope. They don't have that hope. And you can see them. It's like there's this desperation in their hearts. They have nothing to hold on to. Rejoicing is the last thing in their mind, because there is no purpose for this. Their only purpose is to get out of it. They want to get through it and move out of it. For us, it's strengthening us. Peter also writes in 1 Peter 4, 12 through 13,.
Scott Wiens:He says beloved, do not be surprised at the little, tiny little trials that come your way. Fiery trials. You think a flat tire is a real trial? It's an irritant. Okay, you think a person that backed into your car in the Kroger parking lot? I hope that wasn't a prophetic word, by the way. You think that's a real trial? No, but maybe a cancer diagnosis? That's a trial, fiery trials, and it's unfortunate today that sometimes that little accident where someone bumps into our car and bends in our left quarter panel becomes this big thing that we make. Come on, get this in perspective, get this in perspective. If you can't handle that and you start questioning God's love for you because someone backed into your car, what are you going to do when this happens? Right, see, fiery trials.
Scott Wiens:He says these are difficult things, beloved, don't be surprised when a fiery trial, when it comes upon you, to what Test you, you're like oh, come on, god, really do that. Yeah, he does, because he loves you and he wants your foundation strong, as though. And he says, as though something strange were happening to you but rejoice, there he goes again. He's like he's buddies with Paul. He's talking about rejoicing in trials, but rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. The end goal, the end goal, the glory that's what we live for.
Scott Wiens:You know, as I get older I'm turning 60 next year. Oh, I shouldn't have said that. Is that on tape? Can you scratch that off the tape? You know what I look at every year. I get older, I get closer to Jesus. I really seriously think about that. Some mornings I feel closer to Jesus than others. It's like Tyler said I've never felt 90, tyler, but I'm pushing 85 sometimes, especially when I try to do things I shouldn't be doing.
Scott Wiens:But when we experience trials as Christians, we must remember that they have a purpose. It's to strengthen us. So my question is for you what trials are you being faced with today? Maybe you're going through something now. I mean, we see the prayer list come through on the prayer, but sometimes we're not. There's a lot of times those are health ones, but we don't hear about what's really going on. With a lot of you Everybody here, I can guarantee in this room you're going through some kind of trial. Just can I encourage you that God's got you. He knows the end from the beginning and he's got you through this. He hasn't abandoned you. He's going to teach you through this. He's going to strengthen your foundation through this.
Scott Wiens:Okay, let's look at the loser. I mean the other guy, the foolish builder, verse 26 and 27,. And he basically repeats what he just said. He just changed a couple words and everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew same perils right and beat against the house and it fell and great was the fall of it. You notice Jesus again. He centers this whole contrast on his words, on him right. He once again mentions all three perils and of course, the outcome was very different. Now, I really keyed in on this as I was studying this whole, the last few words, and great was the fall of it.
Scott Wiens:I'll tell you, and I think I can get an amen from you guys, there's nothing sadder than watching a believer get hit by a trial and walking away from God. It's so hard. It's so hard to watch that Because we know that they're walking away from the only thing that really will hold them and give them purpose and meaning through this. We've all known people like that. But you know, there's one thing I want to just encourage you on their book's not done. Their book's not done. We don't quit, we don't go. Oh, you loser, I can't believe. Oh, he's probably one. No, we pray for that person, we encourage that person, because a lot of those people who respond that way and they walk away from God, just like Paul, talks about giving one over to Satan. Right, they leave and they start. I don't believe in God anymore. And you know what? Through living in life and God's calling them, they come back and they repent and guess what? They're stronger than ever and they can say something that maybe you and I can't, if we've never fallen away that way, if we've never walked away from God, they can help that person that's going through the trial and say you know, the same thing happened to me. Don't make the mistake I made and walk away from the very foundation that's going to hold me. Don't do that, so don't write them off.
Scott Wiens:Okay, second half of the sermon. We're changing gears here. We know the importance of a strong foundation, but the natural question that we should ask is how do we ensure we have a strong foundation? What's our role in that foundation? Well, I think it's very clear that Jesus is saying that the strong foundation is the one that's going to handle these tests. But we need to identify a little bit more detail than just listen to my words, because there's more in there than you think, and I propose that there are three key foundational stones that need to be a part of our spiritual foundation and I'm going to walk through them and, as I do, I want I'm going to use a few props to kind of illustrate this.
Scott Wiens:So here's my props. By the way, we are not ignoring this side of the room. You just have to watch the screen. I was assured. I wanted to tell that because they have a camera over here. So I just want to ensure you that. So this is my house and I've got some foundational stones that I'm going to bring up here in a second. I'm going to turn them so I can see them correctly. All right, they're actual stones. By the way, you can get them at Lowe's for about $1.50 apiece.
Scott Wiens:Foundational stone number one is exactly what Jesus says, and that is the words of Jesus himself. Now, it's interesting that when I say that, some people could look at that and look at those words and totally misinterpret what that means, they can say, oh, so all I got to do is obey and do things, and then that's my foundation. Well, I'm going to propose that it isn't just doing Jesus what Jesus says to do as some type of strategic action. That's not what he's really getting at. You know, we had a sermon last week and it was pretty powerful. It identified those who took the approach to just obey and do things. And what did Jesus say to them? He said I never knew you. Depart from me, you, workers of lawlessness. These are people that on the surface it looked like they were doing Jesus' work. They were casting demons out. They were doing all kinds of really powerful things.
Scott Wiens:Now there's a deeper meaning in hearing and doing, and that meaning is believing. Believing. Believing that Jesus is the Son of God, that he is the savior of the world, means that we will follow him. When you make him Lord of your lives, we will naturally obey him. You understand what I'm saying. Let's make sure that we're clear. It's not just about stepping our way somewhere by doing a bunch of things. It's about a change in the heart.
Scott Wiens:Belief is the key here. That's why it says Jesus is the foundational stone. In fact, all through scripture he's referred to as the cornerstone no more clearly than in Ephesians 2, verses 19 through 22. I want to read this so then you are no longer strangers and aliens Again he's talking to the church in Ephesus but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.
Scott Wiens:We already see there's a structure in here, a household right, a household of God built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being jointly together, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. Again, you get this metaphor of a temple now being built In him. You are also being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Jesus is the cornerstone of your foundation. Now I'm putting him here in the middle and you'll understand why, but I got the big side here. So this is supposed to be. Jesus is the main core cornerstone, and that really means that he's everything to us, and we either got to be all in or all out. There is no middle ground. I always like to say it's like being pregnant You're either pregnant or you're not. Although you know what, search YouTube enough, you'll probably find something.
Scott Wiens:You know Isaiah 28,. There's a messianic prophecy about Jesus, and some of you may already have this scripture in your mind, which I think is so beautiful because it describes Jesus as the cornerstone. In Isaiah 28, beginning of verse 16, he says Isaiah says, therefore, this is what the sovereign Lord says. Look, I am placing a foundation stone in Jerusalem. Remember. This is years and years before Jesus right, a foundational stone in Jerusalem, a firm and tested stone. Was Jesus tested? Yeah, how many of you wanted to go through the 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness and come against Satan? How many of you want to go through the 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness and come against Satan? How many of you want to go through that? And there's nobody here that can live a perfect life for even a few seconds. He did it for his whole life, firm and tested stone. It is a precious cornerstone.
Scott Wiens:When something is precious to you and no, I will not go down the Lord of the Rings path with this one I will not do the voice of Gollum. Unfortunately, that word gets twisted a lot. What is something that's very precious to you? I think about my wife. My wife is so precious to me, but I don't base my life on her. I base my life on Jesus. He is precious to me because without him I got nothing. I'm just counting days till I draw my last breath and he's everything. He's precious to us. And it says and I love this that is safe to build on. It says and I love this, that is safe to build on. Whoever believes. See this need never be shaken. You see this metaphor, it's so beautiful. Jesus should be your chief cornerstone. He should be my chief cornerstone.
Scott Wiens:The story of the wise and foolish builders. Jesus isn't talking about just obeying him. He's talking about believing in him, making him the center of your life. Jesus is the heart of the gospel brethren, he is the core of everything. The Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, is the story of Jesus and the salvation. He is the truth. Can you imagine that? It says literally he is the truth, he's everything. He's the son of God himself and we have to make sure that we make him Lord of our lives. We take up our cross and we follow him, and we follow him with every part of our lives. And this is what I want to park on for a second. Make sure you have your seatbelts on. This doesn't always happen, does it? Many people are only partially in when it comes to jesus. They only make him lord of certain part of their life, and that's usually the convenient part.
Scott Wiens:The late philosopher and theologian francis schaeffer wrote a book titled escape from reason and that he identified the unfortunate tendencies of Christians to separate their lives and compartmentalize their faith. And he did this. He used the metaphor of a two-story house and it's really interesting how he does it and it's very visual. I don't know if these guys got the visual. I sent them some stuff, but anyways. He said basically he was addressing the effects of rationalism and how it seeped into the church and seeped into the changing of the hearts of people. And he said there's a two-story house. This is what they, the metaphor. He said there's two stories.
Scott Wiens:The first story, the lower story on the bottom, was called the objective category. This is where things that represent facts belong. Okay, so things like data, logical reasoning, the hard sciences, right, these are things that you can see, touch, you can prove unequivocally. That's what they said is the lower story. But the upper story, now, these are things, they're a little different. These things are subjective. The culture said these are those things that are subjective, such things as morals, values, preferential tastes and, unfortunately, religion, religion, what you believe. The culture says that these things are subjective, they can't be proven empirically, they can't be proven with a scientific method and therefore they should not be trusted like those things in the lower story. Can you see Satan in all this? Can you see Satan working on what he's doing. And, by the way, the the culture. They literally claim that all religions fall into this category. The impact on this in the church has been significant and we see it and deal with it all the time.
Scott Wiens:People only believe and follow jesus when it's convenient, when it's not hard or when it benefits them or their're Sunday morning Christians. But when they get around their people at work or their buddies here or whatever they change. They morph into somebody different. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. What a crap line. Can I say crap? I don't know if I can. I'll get. I'll hear about that on Tuesday. I did that for you, derek. What a bogus line. I did that for you, derek. What a bogus line. You can scratch that up, but listen, is it not? What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. What happens in the deer camp stays at deer camp. What happens at the bar stays at the bar. What I watch on my TV, on Netflix, that's between me and me, because they've compartmentalized their faith and they said well, it's all subjective.
Scott Wiens:There's a bumper sticker that is called Coexist. You guys seen this bumper sticker and on the surface it really looks good and it basically says coexist, and it's got all the symbols of all the major faiths in there, right, and it says we should coexist together. Well, yeah, I agree that we shouldn't fight, and I think the meaning and the purpose of the, of the, of the bumper sticker was good. It was to say we shouldn't be fighting each other. You know, we don't go out and picket, you know Hindu temple or something. We don't do that, right, yeah, we want to exist and coexist together. However, there's one thing that sometimes it does and people can look at that like, well, they're all equal. I mean, listen, if you were to talk to somebody who's a Buddhist, right, you think they're going to say, well, yeah, you guys are right too.
Scott Wiens:No, we believe that Jesus is the only way to salvation, and it's part of Satan's plan to kind of get us to dumb down our beliefs. And so belief in Jesus Christ and making the cornerstone of your entire life is that first foundation. It has to be that you got to be all in or all out, or you might hear those words that we heard last week. Now, the second cornerstone is the word of God. Now, I just put the Bible, because the Bible is the word of God, because the Bible is the word of God, it's our foundation.
Scott Wiens:You know, jesus himself talked about scripture. In fact, he even used scripture in his dealings with, specifically, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. In fact, in Matthew 22, 29, he's talking to the Sadducees and he says you are wrong. He's identifying they're wrong and he says because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God, scripture is so important to us. In fact, at TCC Knox and thank you for bringing up that was good, by the way on TCC Knox, a lot of you already know this, but if you go there, you're going to see what we believe, the Bible, what the Bible is. And if you look at it up here I'm running a little bit out of time but it says the Bible is.
Scott Wiens:We believe that the Bible is the infallible record of God's revelation to man and it came directly from God. That's what we believe. If you don't believe that, that's going to be a problem, because we're going to always reference the Bible as our core. That's what our foundation is. And it goes on and says thus the scriptures are God-breathed and unerring. We don't believe there's errors in the Bible. All believers are exhorted to study and apply the scriptures to their lives. Brethren, you have a responsibility. I have a responsibility to know what the Bible says, knowing scriptures. I won't keep reading because of time, but he said I just want to mention that knowing the scriptures means that we know what scripture says, and it informs our doctrine. Oh no, I said doctrine. For the Christian, knowing solid doctrine is a core, foundational stone and is essentially part of our faith foundation. It has to be there.
Scott Wiens:Unfortunately, satan has found an opportunity with this. He's brought a lot of grief to the church through doctrine, hasn't he? And here's a couple of ways that he's done that. First, so many different viewpoints of scripture, so many different doctrines. And because of so many viewpoints and doctrines, many Christians just have the mindset that, you know, if I talk to this guy over here, this Christian over here, and he's Lutheran, and he starts going through and telling his doctrine, well, that's really convincing. But then I go over here and I listen to them, and that's really convincing. But then I go over here and I listen to them, and that's really convincing. And you know what? I just want to know Jesus Ever fallen into that path, that trap? I'm just going to know Jesus. Oh well, you have just fallen into one of Satan's biggest traps, because see if he can get you to say the doctrine really doesn't matter, I just have to experience Jesus. Then guess what? You're going to believe anything? And you won't have that foundation to stand on. It's exactly what he has. He's effectively taken one of the stones of your foundation away.
Scott Wiens:Another way Satan used confusion over doctrine is to convince people that experiencing God is more important than having good doctrine. I mean, you know, we put a high degree of emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit. In a church like ours, we're a word and spirit church. Right Word and spirit, spirit and word. Whatever you want to say, they are equal. We believe that Whatever you want to say, they are equal. We believe that that's why we teach. That's why we have classes that teach. It's important.
Scott Wiens:But what's lost in the approach if all you do is focus on the experience? Of course, what's lost is that doctrine informs our relationship and our experience with God, doesn't it not Absolutely? We have to think critically, we have to be able to look at that and, by the way, I understand some of you may go. Well, what are you saying, scott? Listen? I'm saying we have to have both. I'm saying there's times God's going to lead you through his Holy Spirit. But I've had this in all the pastors' experiences, a lot of you experiences.
Scott Wiens:Someone comes up and says I believe that the Holy Spirit is telling me to leave my wife. Really, god's now in favor of divorce for you, or I believe that I'm supposed to do such and such, or I believe this is and, by the way, we get this all the time. God told me this as if you can't push back on that. But wait a second. What does doctrine tell you? What does the word of God tell you? You weigh everything against that. If Tyler, mark, derek, anybody who preached up here, kelly, myself, if we say anything that's contrary to scripture, there is an expectation. Number one, we're in trouble with the other elders. But number two, you should be able to say you know what that's not. That doesn't line up. You know JI Packer.
Scott Wiens:He speaks to this tendency to downplay doctrine and it's really interesting. He really taught that doctrine. There's three things Doctrine, which is correct. Belief. Experience, which is the personal encounter with God. And practice, which is obedience to God's word. He says it's like a three-legged stool. Okay, you have to have all three. Have you ever tried to sit on a two-legged stool. You won't sit there long, depending on how good your balance is right. But this is a quote. He says and I love this Doctrine again correct belief and experience, personal encounter with God without practice meaning obeying God's word would turn me into a knowledgeable, spiritual paralytic. You get that Couldn't move. I'm knowledgeable, I'm spiritual, but I can't move. And then he says experience and practice without doctrine would leave me a restless, spiritual sleepwalker.
Scott Wiens:Ever had anybody that you know as a sleepwalker? If you talk to them the next day, what do they tell you? They can't remember a thing. I had a guy I worked for, literally he did a lot of traveling. One morning he woke up and he was really tired. He didn't know why. He went to the front desk to check out and this lady's looking in with big eyes like this and she said are you okay? And he goes what she said you came down here last week last night in your underwear with no shirt on and you asked me for a Snickers bar or something like that and I said we don't have that. And you said okay, and he's just. His face gets all red. He was a sleepwalker and he was so embarrassed he didn't remember any of that. If Christ is to be formed in me, doctrine, experience and practice must all be there together. We can't ignore that.
Scott Wiens:Paul knew the importance of sound doctrine. In Titus 2, verse 1, he says to Titus but as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine? Sound doctrine this is what he taught Titus. He said whatever you teach, always go back to that when we talk in the elders meeting about the sermon that's coming up. This is one of the things we talk about. Whoever's going to be preaching kind of tells you what we're going to go through, and a lot of times we'll run things off past each other, get really good ideas. That's important. We're accountable, just so you know I'm not up here going solo. I'm accountable to them, I'm accountable to you, but I'm really accountable to God. You want to teach. Just realize you have a huge responsibility and it's a burden. We have to make sure we teach the truth he also talks about in Ephesians 4, verses 11 through 19.
Scott Wiens:I'm going to just jump down to verse 14 on this he's talking about you know the office, gifts of the spirit. You know apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and then down in verse 14, this is one of these big, long Paul sentences, right, that go on for like three paragraphs, if there was a paragraph. But he says this so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes. You know, as I was putting this together, I had a metaphor jump in my head. I had a vision in my head of a little bird nest and little baby birds. And you know, they're in there, they're quiet and all of a sudden they hear the flutter of the wings. And what do they do? You see these huge beaks open up. Their eyes are closed and they're just, ah, anything, you know, put anything in there. And I think sometimes, as Christians, that's what we do. If the Bible preacher online that we're listening to is convincing enough and he's got enough charismatic, you know, I like this guy, we're just like that little bird, just anything you want, just toss it in. No, no, we're supposed to be discerning, we're supposed to know what we believe, and that's something we run into all the time. And the question is do you and I know what we believe? If I did audience participation right now and grabbed that microphone and said, hey, so-and-so, come on up here and tell me about why you believe in the Trinity. Would you quote some really cool sermon you heard, or would you know what the Bible says about it? See, I believe that something happens sometimes, that we as Christians, we avoid these types of conversations because we don't know what we know. How are we going to share the gospel if we don't know what we know? Doctrine's important. All right, the final stone.
Scott Wiens:I wanted to write the word relationship, but I didn't have room. So I put Trinity, because it truly is a relationship with the entire Godhead that has to be there. So I've talked about Jesus being our chief cornerstone, belief in Jesus. Right, I've talked about God's word and now abiding with the Trinity, the whole being of God, the whole Godhead, and it's so very important.
Scott Wiens:You know, last week we heard those sobering words. You know, depart from me, you workers of lawlessness. And it really hit me because the reality is you have to have a relationship. You just can't have a knowledge of God through his word, you can't just survive on that. You have to make him, jesus, the corner of the stone of everything in your life. It has to be informed by doctrine and you must have a relationship with the Godhead, and that relationship is so important. You know, jesus said some very powerful things to the disciples in the book of John, and in John 15, he's talking about the true vine, and in verse four he says Abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine. Neither can you unless you abide in me, man, that word abide is so powerful, it's so powerful. God transforms us by a work of the Holy Spirit, god informs us of truth through his word and God conforms us to the image of Christ through that relationship with him.
Scott Wiens:I lived a life of a Christian that was really based upon just doctrinal knowledge. Oh, I acknowledge Jesus as my savior and I focused on this, but I didn't really have this Savior. And I focused on this, but I didn't really have this. And I, my life, was changed when I began to listen to the entire Godhead. It was life changing. I'm not the same. The experience is informed by Jesus as being the Lord of my life, and it's also informed by the truth of God's word.
Scott Wiens:And you, you know, you've heard lots of sermons about what it means to abide. You know pray, talk to the Lord, meditate on his word, experience the Holy spirit, be open to the experience of what the Holy Spirit wants to tell you. Pray to God, the Father, all those things, but you gotta realize that there's no step by step there, it's a total surrender. You surrender to God, he will show up. He will show up and it's such an important foundation stone. So, listen, I wanna conclude by simply saying this is your foundation, it's your house and the foundation.
Scott Wiens:But you have to understand if you start taking some of these stones out, it quickly loses its stability. You take doctrine out, it starts to fall down. If you take this centerpiece out, well, if you know anything about rain and you've got a hole under your foundation and now your foundation is vulnerable to erosion, you can take any part of this out and it will be compromised. And it's so important that we look at this from all of those foundational stones. Keep them firm in your mind and keep focused on that, and I will tell you that this is an important thing to do some self-examination with. Sometimes we go away from that. We don't want to and, by the way, I never want to be a preacher and talk to you about giving you guilt trips. This is not the purpose of this Holy Spirit.
Scott Wiens:As you listen to this message and as you watch this, the question will be you can answer that question Do you have weaknesses in your foundation? I do. I hate this sermon. I'm serious. It was hard for me because I've got real serious things I need to change in my life. Oh, I wouldn't not sin, but there are things that I'm not doing correctly in my foundation and I got to change that. I don't do it out of guilt, it's because I want to stand when the 155 Mount Arrow winds come. I want to be there.
Scott Wiens:So you need to ask yourself the question is Jesus truly the Lord of your life? Have you given everything to him or have you compartmentalized him and put him on that first story? That is just subjective. Can you defend the beliefs that you have? Do you have good doctrine? Do you know what you believe and do you have a genuine relationship with God? Because he wants that from you, I want us to take just a few minutes and just silence. I want you guys just to close your eyes and just do a little business with the Lord. I'm going to do the same. And you ask him to give you that examination in your heart about where you might be All right.
Scott Wiens:Thank you, heavenly Father, our great God, the powerful God that we worshiped earlier today, the one through whom we have a solid foundation, through Christ, who is the cornerstone, through your word, which you, you preserve for us, and through the experience of experiencing the entire Godhead, father, we are coming before you, we're asking for your kindness and your mercy on us.
Scott Wiens:Father, all of us, all of us, fall short. We know that and we know that your grace covers all of this. But, father, I pray that you convict each one of us into how we can, in our role, in strengthening our foundation. Everything's based on Jesus and you want us to have that relationship. You've given us your word to know truth. Help us, father, to have that firm foundation, and we repent if we haven't put you first, and we ask that you would change our hearts and give us that desire that we wouldn't fall prey to the enemy who wants to kill and destroy. So we thank you, we rejoice, father, that with you we have that foundation and it's firm. Keep us strong, father, and we pray this in Jesus' name Amen.
