Dear Fellow Redeemed,

The road south from Jerusalem to Gaza was a “God-forsaken” path.  But traveling along this dusty, desert road in his chariot was a man of great importance — a rich man with authority over the treasury of the Queen of Ethiopia.   We might think that he was occupied with thoughts of the work he must do when he returned to his homeland.  Instead, the Ethiopian was very busy reading the words of the prophet Isaiah:  You know the words: “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb is silent before its shearer, so He did not open his mouth.”  (Is. 53)   You know  this prophecy of the coming of the Christ and of His willing sacrifice of Himself for the sins of the world.  But the man from Ethiopia didn’t know this.

Imagine his great joy when Philip suddenly appeared along-side the chariot and then began at this passage to “preach Jesus to Him” Because of what the Ethiopian received through Philip’s ministry to him along the way, he felt an immediate bond of friendship with Philip — a friendship in Christ, deep and lasting.   But what happened after Philip baptized the Ethiopian?  We read in the book of Acts that “When they came up out of the water, the ;Spirit of the Lord took Philip away, so that the Eunuch saw him no more; and he went on his way rejoicing!”
In our time, the servants of God who preach Christ to us are not usually here today and gone tomorrow.  But every servant of Christ in the public ministry of the Gospel wants to leave his brothers and sisters “rejoicing in Christ” when the Spirit calls him elsewhere.   That’s what all of your previous pastors have wanted for you.  That’s what I want for you.   The Apostle Paul expresses this thought in our text: 

None of your pastors or teachers are God’s building that  you should hide yourselves in their person and make your boast in them.  We who are your called servants are God’s “fellow-workers.”  But YOU are “God’s FIELD, YOU are His building.  We have planted and we have watered, but what is that?  If God has kept us faithful to Him, then we have all used the same power of the same Word of Christ in our ministry to you.  With that same Word we have planted and watered, and He alone has provided the fruits in you through nothing more than the power of His own word!

Paul says in v. 8: “He who plants and he who waters are one.”  Think about that.  If your servants in the Word of Grace are ONE, then they should not be TWO. Neither should one servant put down the other so as to gain more praise for himself.   Rather, Paul reminds us in v. 8 that each one will receive his own reward NOT according ot the lips of others, but “according to his own labor.” 

The foundation of your salvation has been laid by those servants before me.  But now, just as there is more to a building than a foundation, so also you are to continue building on the foundation you have received in Christ.  Your God has given me to you to help you build your Christian faith on Christ.
 
Not long ago, a sister in Christ looked at me and said,  “I know your face,  but I can’t put a name to it.”    “That’s alright,” I replied, “it’s not important who I am; you just remember Jesus as your Savior.”    More important than WHO I am is what materials I use to build on the foundation you have received in Christ.   For 
If anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day of Judgment will reveal it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.  If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”

What does this mean?  Notice that six material are mentioned.  They are of two types:   good and bad, right and wrong.  If a pastor or teacher or member builds on Christ using good material, the building will stand in the fire of the judgment;  and he will receive a reward.  But if anyone builds on the foundation of Christ with bad materials, represented here by such flammable substances as wood, hay, and straw, then his work will be burned in the judgment.  In other words, he will suffer loss, and barely escape the judgment himself!

So, one builder will get wages for work that lasts, while the other — building on the same foundation — gets no pay for what perishes.  As your pastor, I must remember that through your baptism and conversion you are God’s building, not mine!  I must then build on the foundation you have received in Christ, using only solid material — the “right stuff” — so that we all come to the unity of the faith, increase in the knowledge of Christ, and are not deceived by the teachings of men.

Having begun in Christ, I dare not strive to make you MY disciples by the use of persuasive language or rational arguments that do not give glory to Christ.   Having begun in Christ, I must be careful not to build with the law and its demands, but only with the gospel and its free grace.  Since you are founded on Christ, your peace and hope of eternal salvation from sin rest on Him.  I dare not build by stressing any single teaching of Scripture as if it were more important to your life than the teaching of the cross.  

But each of you, as individual Christians, has a responsibility here too!   You do not want to build on the foundation you have received with flammable material like wood, hay, or straw!  You will want to use the solid material of God’s imperishable WORD — the preaching of the Law to tear down whatever is of fleshly construction in your lives, and the preaching of the gospel to  comfort, and renew your sagging faith.  Having begun in Christ, you dare not become so involved in dizzy, busy-ness that you are kept from the study of God’s Word.  Having begun in Christ, you dare not build your marriages without Him, or raise your children without Him, or face the problems of life without Him.

Each of us needs to examine his ministry and life to see if  what we are building upon Christ will endure in the judgment.  Sure, we shall be saved, if the foundation remains on Christ by faith!   But how sad, if what we have done and built on that foundation perishes because it was only of the quality of wood, hay, or straw!

How sickening to hear of a baptized Christian who sits at the feet of a false teacher, and praises that false teacher for his “way with the young,” or his “style of preaching.”  Given the opportunity, we should say to that Christian: “Do you know that you are the temple of God; that through Christ, on whom you believe, you are made the holy house of the Spirit of God?  God will not allow those who defile His temples with their false teaching to go unpunished.  He will destroy the defiler and the poluter of His temple!

By faith in Christ Jesus, dear friends, your God has laid the foundation and would continue to build His holy temple in you.  By His own perfect wisdom and gospel He has done this.  If anyone comes to you with the wisdom of this world, teasing and tickling you with fair words and speeches that do not agree with the Word of your God recorded in the Holy Scriptures, reject that person’s counsel.  Remember that YOU are the temple of God, made holy and wise by His grace through His gospel alone!  

Therefore, let no one glory in men, For all things are yours; whether the apostles, your pastors, or the world, or life, or death, or things present or things to come — all are yours!   “And YOU are Christ’s and Christ is God’s.”   I am here as a helper of this joy, so that when I am called to another field, YOU, like the Ethiopian Eunuch, may “continue you on your way”  to heaven  “rejoicing.”   Amen.