A Firm Faith Requires a Firm Foundation

 This last week, the nation watched in horror the video of a residential building collapse in Miami. The reason for why it fell is debatable, but one thing is for sure. Its foundation crumbled. Having grown up in Florida where we had sinkholes, and now living in Southern California with earthquakes, I know that having a firm foundation is vital for our homes. 

Our bodies also need a firm foundation. In our physical bodies, our core is the foundation. If our core is strong, our whole body is strong. I need to work on my core in my physical body, and I also need to work on my core in my spiritual body because when the core of my spiritual body is strong, the whole spiritual life is strong. Jesus taught about having a firm foundation for our spiritual lives. He warned us that when it is built on a rock, it is firm, but when it is built on sand, it comes crashing down. The problem is that most of us believe that we have a firm foundation built on rock, and yet, when trials hit, our faith crashes, which reveals it was built on sand. 

We can have a spiritual firm foundation, but like our physical bodies, it takes time to become solid and firm. When life’s troubles crash down on us, many of us do not want to take the time to repair the breakage, as we waste time complaining, but we must because we do not want our entire spiritual life to fall. 

To have a firm foundation, we must throw away the ideology of other people’s beliefs. This was and still is difficult for me. Throughout my life, I have been taught to trust the “experts.” When the experts began to become human and they failed in their own faith and expertise, I struggled to believe what was factual of their teachings and what was not. These experts had been trained in the Bible, and yet, they only spoke words and did not put their words into practice. Once I began to search for answers for faith throughout the Bible and studied the context, I realized that it was one thing to know the facts and very different to put those facts into practice. 

Putting our faith into action requires having faith when we feel as if we are stumbling around in the dark. We must trust God when we cannot see what will happen in our lives. We must trust God when the answers are not apparent. We must trust that the answers we want may not be the answers we need, and God will only give us what we need. 

Many times, when our faith collapses, we blame God. Jesus taught us where to build our foundation. If we choose to build our foundation on people or on good works that are disguised as service, then our faith foundation is built on sand, and it will crumble. We have no one to blame but ourselves. For far too long, I played the blame game. For far too long my faith, although I had extensive Biblical knowledge, was built on sand. Once I repaired my foundation and built on rock, my faith grew. I stopped blaming God for my own flaws and my acts of service that were done with disdain. We must serve with a love for God and people. if we do not love people when we serve, then how we can love God as we serve? 

Once our faith is built on a firm foundation, we do not automatically receive an easy life without troubles. James warns us in James 1:3 that we will have trials and troubles. It is how we respond to those trials and troubles. He does not write that we need to be happy about them, but to have joy, which is to be content where we are in life. We all have strife. Many of us do not share worldwide our strife, which is why we need to be kind on social media of how we treat people, as we do not know the strife of which others endure. How we treat others reveals if our faith is built on sand or on rock. 

If we have a faith built on a firm foundation with Christ being at the core, then we treat other people with the love of Jesus and as we love ourselves. We eliminate criticizing and belittling because our faith is so strong, that we do not need to tear down other buildings but bring support that the others can rebuild on rock instead of sand. Empowering others creates a strong foundation that is built on Christ because we know that we have a faith in Christ that empowers us, so we want others to have that same power. 

We need to have a firm foundation in our spiritual lives. We need to discover where our foundation is. If we have built our foundation on ideologies, we need to return to God’s Word and align our faith with God. If we built our foundation on people, we need to realign our faith with Christ. If we have built our faith on overpowering and controlling other people’s faith, we need to shift our power to empowering others to have a love for Jesus and to encourage them that Jesus loves them. 

Our world is struggling as it reopens. We all have struggles and troubles in our life. We need to have our spiritual lives built on a firm foundation. It will result with the rest of our body, with our physical, mental, and emotional health also having firm foundations. Our strong faith will affect people around us. As we pray for those who are affected with the loss of loved ones in Miami, may we also pray for our own spiritual foundations to be solid so we can create a stronger world around us. 

Do We Act and Make a Difference, or Do We Sit Back and Criticize?

For the past year and a half, the Internet has exploded with disputes over any and every subject. Some of the topics are serious and others are frivolous. No matter the topic, we have to choose. Are we going to hide behind our computer screens and criticize those who are attempting to make a difference in the world, or are we going to work with others and try to discover ways to resolve some of the issues that are hurting other people? The decision is ours to make and one that will either call us to act or do nothing. 

Whenever we take on an endeavor to make a difference in the world, there will always be critics. You know why? They don’t want the change. If it changes, it may involve them to act and not just sit back and rest on their laurels. We are living in a society that criticizes every act that people are doing. It is causing people to not act, which resolves nothing. That’s what the criticizers want. They want nothing to be done because they either want to control everything or they want to sit back and complain. If we look into the lives of people who make a difference in the world, we will discover that all of them had critics, and all of them drowned out the noise of their critics and did the work they had to do. 

Looking throughout history, we can see those who had critics from Edison, the Wright Brothers, to even Elon Musk. They refused to listen to their critics. In order to grow and make a difference in the world, we have to not listen or even engage with our critics. They do not want us to change. Our critics are not our allies. It’s easy to sit back and criticize. It’s difficult to discover solutions to complex problems. It’s time we stop taking the easy route in life. 

We need to empower others. Empowerment means we give someone control over their own life and claiming their own rights. We need to empower other people who are doing tasks to use their talents and gifts to make a difference in the world. If we become so focused on empowering others and serving others with the gifts and talents that we have, we will not have time to criticize or listen to the criticism of others. 

Jesus empowered his disciples to spread the Gospel and make a difference in the world. He didn’t sit back and criticize them. He set an example. He then empowered them after three years. They made a large impact with the foundation of the church. The church may not be what they envisioned it to be, but we can empower others in the church with us to make that difference today because sitting back and criticizing will not benefit anyone, as it will do nothing.

We must focus on our mission. I have recognized that the people who are making an impact on the world are so focused on their mission that they do not have time to bother with the insults being thrown at them. I’m trying to get to that point in my life. It’s a process. We have to determine that God has given us our talents and gifts to use, and we must begin to use them. We must be diligent. So, we have to make our decision. We decide to criticize or to act. I choose to act. We all have the decision to make. Criticizing will lead to disputes and arguing, and nothing will be resolved. Acting will lead to change, which will create solutions to the issues our world is facing. Once the changes take place, criticizing and disputing will be useless. The choice is ours to make. 

 

A Great Leader Creates Great Teams--Even in the Church

 It seems as if I can go on any social media site and see someone lambasting the church. Christians have been behaving badly and this last year was terrifying with their behavior. Many people complain on social media. I would like to make a suggestion. How about we begin to fix the broken?  It is what the church is supposed to do. It is time that the church fixes the church in order to heal the broken in the world. It will take faith, trust, and hard work, but it can be done because I’ve seen it happen inside and outside of the church. Using a mentor outside of the church, who took a broken and losing system to a very healthy program, guided me to some suggestions. 

The times are changing, and with that change comes endings and beginnings. This last week we were informed of those changing times with the announcement that Coach K will retire from college basketball after this upcoming season. Times are changing, but we can learn from a leader who has had led young people to championships both on and off the court. 

His numbers speak volumes of the impact he has made on the men’s basketball team and their legacy. In my small Bible College, our basketball team won three national championships three years in a row. Our coach was an incredible man of faith, a great leader, and a role model on and off the court. I wanted to join in on the college basketball craze that exists in many in the Midwest. My Indiana friends told me to follow Indiana University. My Kentucky friends told me that would be horrible and to follow the University of Kentucky. Here’s a little bit of information about me. I don’t go with what others tell me to do. I chose Duke University. They had good-looking players and they kept going to the Final Four and not winning, until 1991 when the dynasty began. 

Here are the lessons I have learned from watching Coach K that can be applied to leaders in the church: 

1. Believe in the people around you. So many of us as leaders complain about those whom we are leading instead of being grateful for those who God has given us to lead. We never know which ones will make a huge impact on the world. Instead of complaining about those whom we are leading, we need to guide them to improve their skills, which means we need to know what their strengths are. For far too long, the church has focused on people’s flaws instead of their strengths. It’s time we focus on people’s strengths and guide them to use those strengths in areas of service. Good leaders get the right people. Great leaders work with the strengths of those people, so they can use them in order to have a healthy and strong organization. Coach K always believed in and developed his players and assistant coaches’ strengths. 

2. Do your research. So many of us as leaders get into a position of leadership and stop learning. One element of leadership I gained from observing Coach K was to never stop learning. When the game changed, he changed with it. He didn’t complain. He did his research. He studied. He continued to learn about the changes and challenges, which led to another championship in 2015. Leaders in the church must continue to learn with culture and be proactive instead of reactive. 

3. Trust and be trustworthy. Duke University trusted Coach K, even though he had three losing seasons his first three years at the school. Coach K has continued to trust his assistant coaches, his athletic directors who are above him, and his players. Without trust, the system becomes broken. Leaders must begin to trust those they have placed within ministries. Those of us in ministries must trust our leaders and those with whom we are working. Trust builds into faith. When our churches lack trust, they lack faith. When we begin to trust, our faith in Christ grows. 

4. Never give up, even when it looks bleak. Duke had a terrible season last year, but they entered the ACC tournament with the determination to win it. Unfortunately, Covid stopped them. Coach K had so many comebacks in his career, and he knows that panic is never healthy. There are trials. We have to learn how to endure them. Events occur in our ministries that can become out of our control. We cannot give up. Many people have given up on the body of Christ and claim that it is unredeemable. That is untrue. No one is unredeemable. We have to press forward, even when all looks bleak. The church has to lead in the direction that Jesus can redeem anyone. The church must set this example. 

Coach K will enter the court for one last season as a head coach, but he will always lead. If we have been called to lead, we have to lead, even in positions that those around us might view as small. Nothing is small in God’s eyes. He can take a small item that the world sees and create a huge dynasty. It’s how He works. It may seem mysterious because we give up before we get going. It’s time for the church to rise and get going. It may be the farewell season for Coach K, but for the church, we need to have a revolution tour. It’s starting. May we rise from the ashes, heal, and begin healing others. It all begins with great leadership.