Sermon Tone Analysis

Today we are discussing the 2nd of 3 messages from .

Last week, we worked through this idea that God is the divine architect, who has designed this institution we call the church.

The word church, means assembly.

A church is a group of people, gathered for a common purpose.

The church is not a building; the church is the assembly or gathering of God’s people.

Today we are discussing the 2nd of 3 messages from .

Last week, we worked through this idea that God is the divine architect, who has designed this institution we call the church.

The word church, means assembly.

A church is a group of people, gathered for a common purpose.

The church is not a building; the church is the assembly or gathering of God’s people.

We also saw last week that God uses people to build His church.

It is God who ultimately builds His church, because He is the architect, the one who has designed the way for us to enter His presence.

God brings growth to the church.

But, God uses human agents, which we might call pastors, elders, or leaders to build His church.

The Apostle Paul tells us about His role in the church in Corinth.

He writes,

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.

For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

(, ESV)

Two things to note here.

First, Paul says that he laid the foundation for the church while—second—other people build upon that foundation.

I want you to imagine that you were building a house.

Your construction crew comes in and lays a foundation for a residential building and it looks real nice.

It’s going to be a nice house that gets built on that foundation.

But, then the next crew comes in to start building the house and they show up with giant steel beams like you would use in a skyrise building.

If you built on the residential foundation with giant steel beams, they would crush the foundation, because the foundation was designed for a simple house.

So, you ought to be careful to build the right thing or it’ll collapse; it’ll fall apart.

In the same way, when we decide how to build Christ’s church, we look to the foundation and ask the question, ‘What is this foundation designed for?’’

What is the foundation of Jesus Christ designed for?

To answer that, I want to introduce you to a principle.

Construct Connects to Commission

When you build something, the way you build it points to its commission or purpose.

When you build a house, the buildings commission or purpose is reflected in the final construct.

The house has bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, because that’s what makes it a home.

And, when you build a warehouse, it doesn’t have bedrooms or a kitchen, but it has wide open spaces for whatever projects or storage are going to take place in that warehouse.

The construct is connected to the commission of the building.

You know just by looking at it whether it is a house or a warehouse.

In the same way, the structure of the church is going to reflect the churches commission.

Everything we do must be connected to the commission or purpose of the church, which we call the Great Commission.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you…” (, ESV)

The commission is to make disciples or followers of Christ, but it’s more complicated than that.

Making disciples, according to this passage, is threefold.

First..

1. Jesus says to go to all nations or ethnicities.

He says to go to people who are not like you.

Second…

2. Baptize them.

This presupposes that we already told them about Jesus and then when they believe, we baptize them as a symbolic representation of their new life lived for Christ in His Eternal Kingdom.

Baptism is like an initiation into God’s Kingdom.

This is the outward building of the church we talked about last week.

Third…

3. Teach them to obey or follow Jesus.

Another way to say that would be to teach them how to live as citizens of God’s eternal Kingdom.

This is the inward building of the church we talked about last week.

If I were to summarize the Great Commission, I would say it like this.

The purpose of the church is to bring all nations into obedience to Christ.

A church that is carefully building on the foundation of Jesus Christ is a church that is reaching out to the nations and bringing them into obedience to Christ.

That’s what a carefully built church looks like.

In our focal text today, Paul writes,

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—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.

(, ESV)

Paul points to different materials you can build with.

He says we can build with gold, silver, and precious stones, as is befitting the palace of a king.

Or we can build with wood, hay, and straw, which are all fine and good if that’s what you have, but that’s a common house built for a common purpose.

Notice, Paul isn’t condemning the church for building with bad materials.

Wood, hay, and straw were common building materials of the day.

Almost all homes were made from wood, hay, and straw.

They aren’t bad materials.

They’re just common.

And lots of practices of the church aren’t bad, either.

But, many church practices don’t produce fruit for the Kingdom of God; they don’t build the church.

Remember, we talked about this last week, Paul isn’t talking to each individual person here.

He’s talking to pastors/elders/leaders in the church.

When Paul points to the pastor who builds with wood, hay, and straw, he says, although his work has no eternal value, he will still be saved.

Wood, hay, and straw kinds of pastors aren’t doing anything per se evil; they just aren’t building the church.

So, the question is, Are we building the church for Jesus, the King, who has ascended on high and rules over his church from the right hand of the Father in glory?

Or, Are we building something common, something with human purposes, something for this life?

Or are we building something with lasting, eternal, value?

Paul says, the coming Day of Judgment will reveal the value of our work through fire.

The common stuff, the human focused stuff, is the wood, hay, and straw which burns in the fire.

Paul says, sure we will still be saved—we still spend eternity with Jesus—but we have no commendation for our work, no jewels in our crown to speak figuratively.

So, how much better if we actually build Christ’s church with gold, silver, and precious jewels?

How much better if our church’s efforts build the church?

How much better if our work survives the fire and we have lasting value?

[BLANK]

So, with that said, I did some research.

I wanted to know what churches that are successfully building Christ’s Church look like.

We aren’t going to worry about the wood, hay, and straw.

We’ll leave that for leadership discussions.

But, I want to look at the church building, gold, silver, and jewels.

Let’s look at three characteristics of churches that are being built up with gold, silver, and precious jewels.

I gave your four on your outline, but we’re only going to have time for the first three.

And I want you to notice, these aren’t just pragmatic.

They don’t just work.

They are actually biblical and necessary for all churches in all times.

The first characteristic of churches that are building is…

Innovative Worship