The Trial by Fire of Every Man's Work

Next Part The Trial by Fire of Every Man's Work 2

"Now if any man builds upon this foundation using gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be made manifest – for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is." 1 Cor. 3:12,13

Paul preached a free-grace gospel. The sovereign, free, super-abounding grace of God, as revealed in the Person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, was the joy of his heart and the theme of his tongue; and against nothing did the holy zeal that burned in his bosom flame forth more vehemently than against any perversion or adulteration of this pure gospel. It was with this gospel in his heart, and with this gospel in his mouth, that he went forth into different places, as he was led by the blessed Spirit, preaching Jesus Christ and salvation through His blood and righteousness. God owned his testimony; the Holy Spirit accompanied the word with divine power; and many Gentile sinners, formerly worshipers of idols, and abandoned to every lust, were brought to repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ.

This was the "foundation" which he, as a wise master builder, instrumentally and ministerially laid as he speaks, "According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master-builder, I have laid the foundation" 1Co 3:10. Paul is speaking here not so much of the foundation which God has laid in Zion, though that is included, as of his own ministry. Let me explain this point, for some people seem to mistake Paul's meaning here. God has actually, truly, of His own sovereign good pleasure, laid a foundation on which the Church is built. This foundation is His own dear Son, "the Rock of Ages", and against the Church built on this foundation the gates of hell shall never prevail. But when a minister preaches this free-grace gospel, when he sets forth the Lord Jesus Christ as the only foundation of the Church, then he lays this foundation ministerially. He is thus, as the apostle says, "a laborer together with God" 1Co 3:9 ; for the same foundation which God laid in Zion he lays instrumentally in a sinner's soul.

But this glorious work, whereby through Paul's preaching, sinners were saved, the churches edified, and God glorified, raised the spleen and enmity of Satan. He could not bear to see glory brought to God and salvation to man; and therefore he stirred up erroneous men to follow in Paul's track in order to adulterate this precious gospel by mingling with it sometimes the requirements or the spirit of the law, sometimes the tenets of heathen philosophy, sometimes will-worship and a voluntary humility. The first was the case with the churches of Galatia; the two latter with the church of Colosse.

It was the legal spirit thus introduced into the Galatian churches which drew forth from the breast of the apostle that Epistle to the Galatians, which will ever be a bulwark against a Galatian gospel while the world continues. Matters were not quite so bad at Corinth. The believers in that city were too well instructed to receive a Galatian gospel, for they were "enriched by Him in all utterance and in all knowledge", and "came behind in no gift" 1Co 1:5-7. And it would appear that the preachers who followed Paul were, some of them at least, good men, for the apostle speaks of their ministerial work being burnt, but they themselves being "saved, yet so as by fire" 1Co 3:15.

They therefore in their ministry did not seek to root up or intermeddle with Paul's foundation. There they and Paul were fully agreed. But where they differed was about the superstructure. "I have laid the foundation, and another builds thereupon." Then comes the solemn caution, "But let every man take heed how he builds thereupon." We are agreed, says Paul, as to the foundation. None of the builders who have come after me have dared to meddle with my foundation. He then adds the words which are sometimes misunderstood, "For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ"--meaning, as I understand it, "You wise and well-instructed Corinthians would not tolerate it. If a man were to come to Corinth and lay any other foundation than that is laid among you by my hands, you would not hear him for a single moment; and those who have come among you being, as I hope, good men, would not attempt it. There you and they and I are all agreed. There is no difference nor dispute between us and them about foundation work. The foundation is so far safe. But now comes the hardly less important question, What about the superstructure which these men have built on my foundation? Is that right or is it not? Here we may widely differ; for the superstructure must either agree with and be worthy of the foundation, or it must disagree with and be unworthy of it."

Now let us read our text in the connection as thus explained, and then let us see what is the apostle's meaning in it. "Now if any man builds upon this foundation using gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be made manifest – for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is."

In looking at these words, then, and attempting, as the Lord may enable, to open up and lay before you their spiritual meaning, I shall, with God's blessing, and looking to Him for strength in body, soul, and spirit, endeavor to show–
1. What is the foundation which God has actually and truly laid in Zion, and the foundation which every true servant of God lays ministerially in the Church.
2. The superstructure built upon this foundation, which may be either gold, silver, precious stones, or wood, hay, stubble.
3. The fire which is to try every man's work of what sort it is.

I. Our first main point is to show the FOUNDATION on which the Church of God stands. Here we are called upon to be very clear and plain, and not darken counsel by words without knowledge.

Let us hear, then, God's own word by the mouth of His prophet Isaiah. "Therefore, thus says the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation" Isaiah 28:16 . This foundation is no other than the co-equal and co-eternal Son of God. Therefore when Peter made that noble confession, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God", the Lord Jesus answered, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona – for flesh and blood has not revealed it unto you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I say also unto you, You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it" Matthew 16:17,18.

Let us dwell for a moment on Peter's confession, for it is not on Peter that the Church of Christ is built, but on the Son of God; and it is not on the person of Peter or the pope, but on the confession of Peter and the truth therein expressed, that Christ at the right hand of God ever builds the Church. In Peter's confession there are two points, which separate and together embrace the Lord Jesus.

1. He is, "the Son of the living God." There is His Deity and eternal Sonship.

2. He is, "the Christ", the Messiah, the anointed One. There is His humanity in union with Deity. For though it was His human nature which was anointed by the blessed Spirit, yet it was so, as in union with His Deity. This, then, is the foundation which God has laid in Zion--the Person of the Lord Jesus as God-Man Mediator, Immanuel, God with us.

But the apostle speaks as if he had laid the foundation. "According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master-builder I have laid the foundation." Is there not an apparent inconsistency here? Does God lay one foundation and man another? "No" says the apostle, "we are laborers together with God. You are God's husbandry, you are God's building." 1Co 3:9. God has laid the foundation actually, and we lay the foundation ministerially. I came to Corinth. The Lord Himself told me He had 'many people' there Acts 18:10. There I preached Jesus Christ and Him crucified, for I desired to know nothing else among you. God blessed the Word to your souls; 'for my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power' 1Co 2:4. Thus ministerially, by preaching Christ and Him crucified, I laid the same foundation in the church at Corinth and in your hearts, which God has laid in Zion." There is, then, no contradiction, but a blessed harmony of purpose when the servant of Christ is a laborer together with God in laying by his mouth the same foundation which God has laid by His hands.

But be it ever borne in mind that it is one thing to hear of this foundation and another to be built into and upon it. It is one thing to hear of a rock, it is another to stand upon it. It is one thing to assent to the truth that there is a foundation laid by God in Zion, but it is another for your soul to be taught and brought by a divine power to rest upon that foundation. The one is theory, the other is fact; the one is notion, the other is experience; the one is the teaching of man, the other the teaching of God; the one a religion that stands in the flesh, the other a religion that stands in divine power.

Now on what foundation do we stand naturally? Self. And what foundation is that? Sand. Thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, myriads, have no other foundation than sand! A quicksand, a sand bank, a shoal of mud--poor miserable, fickle, false, and faithless self--on this they stand to meet the rushing waves of judgment. Now if our house be built upon the sand it must fall when the storm bursts forth; but if our house be built upon a rock it will stand unshaken amid the storms that desolate the world. But as we all naturally from ignorance and self-righteousness build on the sand, we must be brought off one foundation before we can stand upon another.

And how is this to be done? What a description God has given of the way whereby a soul is brought off the sandy foundation self to stand upon the rock Christ! Read it, mark it, digest it, and see whether you have any personal acquaintance with it. "Because you have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through it shall not come unto us"--here is carnal security here is empty profession, here is a religion that stands in the flesh--"for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves" Isaiah 28:15.

How the Lord here lays bare the hypocrisy and deceitfulness of a religion which stands in creature righteousness, putting as it were into the mouths of its professors His own view of it. This then is their language, "We have made a covenant with death." Death and we have shaken hands, and are thorough good friends. Why need we fear it then as an enemy? We have a religion to die by. "And with hell are we at agreement." Why then need we fear hell? Our religion will surely deliver us from going down to the pit; and our own righteousness will surely give us an entrance into the gate of heaven. Yes, though God Himself declares it to be a lying refuge, yet having once taken shelter in it we are well satisfied with it, and do not want to be driven out of it; and though under falsehood we have hidden ourselves, yet we would sooner take our chance and live and die in it than suffer the pain and annoyance to be beaten out of it. Such is man, such the wisdom of the flesh; such all creature religion, such the pride and obstinacy of the human heart; such the deadly enmity of the carnal mind against salvation by grace, that it would sooner die and be damned in its own way; than live and be saved in God's way.

But will the Lord let His people live and die in these false refuges? He Himself shall answer the question. "Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place" Isaiah 28:17. That is God's way of bringing the soul off the sandy foundation of self, preparatory to building it upon the Rock of Ages. The figure employed is that of a builder who works by line and plummet, and by applying it to the wall at once detects the least deviation from the perpendicular.

What corresponds to this in grace? The application of the law to the conscience, that holy, unbending, condemning law which demands perfect love to God and man. This is laying judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet, for the law is as strict and as unerring in detecting the least deviation from its commands as the line and plummet in detecting the least deviation from the perpendicular. And what follows? The thunderstorm of God's indignation against the transgression of this holy law. "The hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place." The idea is of a person taking shelter in vain from the storm and hail which in those countries was often composed of large pieces of ice, but the storm and hail battering the shelter down, and the flood drowning him out of his hiding-place.

This thunder-storm and its attendant flood breaks up carnal security. "Your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then you shall be trodden down by it" Isaiah 28:18. The covenant with death that it should have no sting--and the agreement with hell that it should have no victory--are broken up and disannulled; and the soul stands naked and guilty before God, as a consuming fire. Under these distressing sensations what sighs and cries go up out of the heart! "What shall I do? Where shall I flee? How shall I escape the wrath to come? O eternity, eternity! How shall I grapple with eternity? How shall I endure everlasting burnings? O why was I ever born into this miserable world, to be an everlasting monument of God's displeasure? O that I were anything but what I am--a dog, a worm, a toad--any vile reptile that had not an immortal soul!"

As the fire of God's holy law thus burns and smoulders in a sinner's conscience, it scorches up his agreement with death, and it falls out of his hands a defaced and useless scroll. It seems at first sight, hard that such severe measures should be needful to divorce the soul from self; but so close is the union, so grown together, interlocked, and interwoven are the two, that nothing but a divine power can rend them asunder.

Now when the Lord Jesus Christ is made known to the soul by the blessed Spirit as the Rock of Ages, the foundation which God has laid in Zion, and there is a view by faith of His glorious Person, atoning blood, and justifying righteousness, there is a coming unto Him as such, as the Apostle Peter speaks – "To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious--you also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ" 1Pe 2:4,5. Christ is the living stone, and believers are living stones. Thus stone comes to stone, the sinner to the Savior, and cleaving to Him becomes cemented into Him, by the Holy Spirit, and thus obtains a living union with Him. It is in this way that a guilty sinner, a desolate soul, is brought off the sand, and built on and into the rock which God has laid in Zion.

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