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Houses need foundations.  Economies must have foundations.  Certainly, one’s worldview must have sufficient foundation.  Jesus taught in Matthew 7:24-27 that not every foundation is equal. Building on an inadequate foundation leads to eternal ruin.

In Psalm 11, David speaks of foundations.  He writes, “In the Lord I take refuge;  How can you say to my soul, “Flee as a bird to your mountain; For, behold, the wicked bend the bow,  They make ready their arrow upon the string to shoot in darkness at the upright in heart. If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (1-3).  There are opposing forces trying to strike at our spiritual underpinning.  Through legislatures, entertainment outlets, science, philosophy, and sensual lusts, the wicked are trying to destroy that upon which we stand.   Satan is at war against the righteous (cf. 1 Pet. 5:8-9; Eph. 6:10ff).  He wants us to lose our faith and lose our souls.

David’s question is poignant!  What can the righteous do?  The answer is certainly not “nothing.”  We can’t go into hiding, wring our hands, or simply talk about what’s wrong with the world today.  When we have the power of the Everlasting God on our side, the better question is, “What can’t the righteous do? “

We teach and worship as we do because of the foundation.  We believe and live like we do because of the foundation (cf. 1 Cor. 3:11).  However, there are many matters that come along to try and shake our foundations, to try and make us falter or retreat.  We can be confident and sure of where we stand and why.  Others need to know and have that assurance, too! 

In Matthew 28:19-20 Jesus commanded his disciples to go out into the world and preach the gospel to everyone that they came across. We as Christians should go and do the same, but sometimes we come across people that seem like they would never even pretend to listen. I would like to give three examples of these types of people, people who seemed like they might have gone out of their way to avoid the gospel, but became devoted Christians in the end.

For the first example, turn to Luke 19:1-10. In verse one Jesus came into Jericho to a large crowd trying to see him, and inside the crowd was a man named Zaccheus. Zaccheus was a short man who worked as a tax collector, and because of his position many people saw him as evil. In verse four Zaccheus tried to climb up a tree to get a better look at Jesus from above the crowd. In verse five, Jesus saw him and said, “ Zaccheus, make haste and come down, for today I must stay at your house.” As soon as Zaccheus heard Jesus talk to him, he was as excited as he could be. This tax collector, who had seemed to care only about money or gold, was eagerly coming up to Jesus. Everyone in the surrounding area had hated this man, but here he was standing in front of Jesus and repenting.

Another example is John 4, starting in verse 7, when Jesus’ disciples left to get food in Samaria. When a woman came to the well, Jesus asked her for a drink of water but instead she asked why a Jew was talking to a Samaritan. Samaritans were seen as lower people by the Jews because they were a mix of Gentiles and Jews which caused them to be looked down upon by full Jews. Instead of answering her question, Jesus answered in verse 10, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says it to you, ‘give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” This confused the woman even more, and she wondered what kind of water Jesus was talking about, or where she could even start to look for it.

In verse 13, Jesus told her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water i shall give him will never thirst.” The woman was probably starting to think Jesus was crazy at this point. He was talking about how the water from the well will only last a little bit, but then he talks about this water that he has that will satisfy someone’s thirst forever. Regardless, in verse 15 the woman asked Jesus for the special water, but instead he told her to go get her husband. The woman had five different husbands at one point or another, but she told Jesus that she had no husband at all. When Jesus told her about this in verse 18, she was shocked, and couldn’t imagine how he could have known. The Samaritan woman called Jesus a prophet.

Jesus then told her in verse 21 up to 24 what his goal was, and when he finished, the woman said, “I know that the Messiah is coming. When he comes he will tell us all things.” In verse 26, Jesus finally told her that he was the Messiah, and afterwards the woman left everything she brought to the well, and ran into the city telling everyone she could about the person she had just met. This Samaritan woman, who was seen as less by others and had sinned by having multiple husbands, turned her life around after meeting Jesus, and decided to follow him by spreading word of him throughout the town.

The third example is in Acts 8, starting in verse 9. There was a sorcerer named Simon who was amazing people by doing magic and people thought that he had the power of God. Everyone in Samaria who had met him and seen what he had done thought he was some kind of prophet. Then, when Phillip came into town and began to preach, a lot of the people who believed in Simon turned toward God, including Simon himself.

After he was baptized, Simon decided to follow Phillip and see the miracles that he was doing. Simon saw all the miracles that the apostles were performing and in verse 18 he even tried to bribe the apostles to give him their power. Instead, Peter told him that he could not buy the power of God, and his heart was not in the right place. Simon had allowed his greed to take over and he needed to repent. In response to what Peter told him, Simon said in verse 24, “Pray to the Lord for me, that none of the things which you have spoken may come upon me.” Just as quickly as he had sinned, Simon instead decided to repent of what he had done.

The idea of all of this and how it ties together is that People can be different on the inside then the outside. People can be willing to listen to the word of God if they are given a chance. Not everyone will listen, but taking a chance on someone could make a big difference. This could even apply to the opposite, which includes people in the church who may not think that they could go out and spread the word, but they might be more capable than they realize.

   When you sit down with a financial planner, they look at your age and try to help you determine how to reach retirement goals. Particularly younger clients are usually told to invest at least a fraction into new, small and foreign companies. These may be riskier, but they are key to successful investing. When you find that special someone with whom you think you want to spend the rest of your life, you become keenly aware of risk. You risk rejection by making your feelings known. You put your heart at risk for disappointment, betrayal and hurt. But, think of the payoff for taking such a risk! Marriage can bring greater bliss than one would think possible on this earth. When facing a job change or relocation, that is a scary proposition. Will it be a failure, a flop and a frustration? One never knows, but often the risk is rewarded with renewal, growth and challenge. Risk is inherent for success.

   For the church to succeed and grow, it must take risks. It must risk displeasing some people in order to please and obey the Lord. It must risk financially, stretching and challenging itself through ambitious contribution goals. It must risk emotionally and socially, when its members strive to reach out to lost souls and face potential rejection. It must risk in these same ways to reach out to other members in an attempt to build relationships needed to make a church close and strong. Yet, those who take the risk find the results rewarding and gratifying. Do we believe that God blesses those who are willing to risk themselves, their pocketbooks, their hearts and lives for the good of the Kingdom?

   Look at Barnabus and Saul (Acts 15:25-26). Their risk paid off in greater service to Christ. Look at Prisca and Aquila (Romans 16:4). They “risked their necks” for Paul. Why did they do this? Not just for the gratitude of other Christians, but also for “eternal life” (Romans 2:7). Epaphroditus risked his life for the Philippi church of Christ (Philippians 2:30). It was to bring him honor and bring the church reward in righteous giving (29-30). Churches willing to take risks for the Lord will succeed and they will also be personally blessed. Are you willing to take that risk?

Neal Pollard

Today was the first day for all but one of our 56 members to be in the country of Turkey. We will make two stops in this country. Ephesus, from which we have just left, and Bodrum on Sunday. I knew I wanted to see the city of Ephesus, not far from the modern city of Kusadasi, but I had no idea how exciting and enriching the day would be. We had an outstanding guide, a man, Cenk, in a Muslim-majority nation who considers himself a Christian and whose working knowledge of the Bible was pleasantly surprising.

We spent a full two hours at Ephesus, starting at the ancient Harbor Road which Paul would have traveled to come up from the ancient port site of the city. Then, we went into the very theatre we read about in Acts 19:29! Getting to speak for a few minutes about that moment to our group in this theatre was a personal highlight! We saw the facade of the library of Celcus, an impressive second-century building. All along the way, we saw ancient ruins of this once thriving and leading city of Asia and the entire Roman Empire.

But perhaps the most exciting part of the day (though a visit to Aladdin’s Rug Warehouse was quite the unexpected treat) had to be walking through the recent excavations of the terrace houses among the Ephesus ruins. John Moore did us the wonderful favor of scheduling this as an add-on to the tour, and it was more than worth it! Cenk stopped the group and read this passage from Colossians 4:15, which says, “Greet the brethren who are in Laodicea and also Nympha and the church that is in her house.” Laodicea is about 120 miles due east, inland from where we stood in these houses. With the thriving, growing congregation at Ephesus, it was very likely that Christians were meeting somewhere in these houses or houses just like them. Church buildings were not built until the fourth century, after Christianity was “legalized” in the Roman Empire.

It is hard to describe how exciting it was to know we were walking through a city Paul called home for three years (Acts 20:31) and where he worked so fruitfully (please take a moment to read Acts 19). Paul shed tears with the Ephesian elders in and around these now ancient buildings, teaching publicly and privately to help this influential church grow! These are faith-building days, a reminder of how unique the Bible is as not only the supreme source of truth but as a book that constantly serves itself up as a book which is verified by history, archaeology, science, and geography!

And tomorrow is Athens, Greece!