Building on the Foundation

The morality of man is a hard thing to come to terms with. Or shall I say the lack of morality, because our base nature is very lacking in morality. We are all wandering around doing what is right in our own eyes, more or less, and very few of the people in the world adhere to the proper standard. When we step back and look at things, the standard we are all aiming for goes beyond simple morality since morality is usually nothing more than not doing something. As Christians, our most basic pattern of morality is the Ten Commandments, and of those ten, only two tell us to do something. Only one of those two gives us a pattern of action, the other is simply remembering to do nothing.  Ninety percent of our moral code, in other words, is what not to do. Of course, if we read the rest of the Bible we find that there are a lot of things that we should be doing, especially where walking as Christ walked is concerned, but walking as Christ walked is not simple morals. Jesus was the most m...

  Of our great Creator, we read, “It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers” (Isa. 40:22). Compared to Him, we are tiny, puny creatures. Or, as Abraham put it, “Indeed now, I who am but dust and ashes have taken it upon myself to speak to the Lord” (Gen. 18:27). Again, God says, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa. 55:9). The Almighty is so far above us, and so much greater in every way, that it boggles the mind. How, then, can we comprehend such an all-powerful and all-wise Creator as a friend to any of His puny creatures? Next to Him, we are nothing! Why would He even desire friendship with such creatures? And yet He is a friend, and He does desire such relationships! God plainly called Abraham His friend, saying to his descendants, “But you, Israel, are My servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the descendants of Abraham My friend” (Isa. 41:8). T...

“Noblest of goals, brightest of coals, though righteousness is our aim, we have only ourselves to blame.” These words stir something in me, a longing for something, a desire for a purpose higher than myself, and yet also a sense of failure as I sin again and again. No matter how hard I try, I always seem to make the same old mistakes over and over again which prompts the question, how hard am I really trying?  Do I love God with my whole heart and my whole might?  It’s a fair question and it necessitates a deep soul searching to find the answer. It also requires learning what righteousness actually is, and thankfully, there is no better resource for that than the Bible. Serving God is not easy, and it's made that much harder by trying to live with one foot in the world. We want to have our cake and eat it too.  Practically, we cannot serve two masters, for they both require our full devotion. God demands our full loyalty if we set out to serve Him. It turns out, we cannot...