According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and another man is building on it. Let each man take care how he builds upon it. For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each man’s work will become manifest; for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work which any man has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and that temple you are.
I Corinthians 3: 10-17
For those of us with children in school, we can track their progress on line, with periodic parent/teacher conferences and with progress reports, before the report card comes out at the end of the semester. We can communicate pretty straight forward with a teacher and assess how our student is doing and how they may end up at the end of the term, so that there are no surprises at the end.
Our faith journey isn’t quite the same. God doesn’t tell us “trending good” or “trending poorly.” We can’t know when we are at the mid-term of our lives, because no one knows what day their life will end.
In I Corinthians 3:11, St. Paul writes that the foundation laid for each of us is Jesus Christ. He is the solid foundation on which every life can be built. He has provided the foundation, it is up to us to build on it. Imagine that someone gives you a concrete slab upon which to build a home. The slab is perfect, no cracks. You are given bricks and mortar, hay, straw, stones, gold and then instructed to build. The weather on this day happens to be perfect. There will be a temptation to throw some hay or straw on the slab and then go out and enjoy the weather. Because putting down bricks and mortar will be tiring and time intensive work. The problem with the hay and straw is that on the day the weather is not good, the wind will blow away these materials, and the rain will wash them away. When it is too cold, they won’t protect a person. The only way to successfully build on the foundation is with the bricks and mortar. Yes, this will require time and effort, but these will be the materials that will survive bad weather and provide insulation when it is too hot or too cold.
Saint Paul says that the outcome of each person’s work—what they have built on top of the foundation—will become manifest on the Day of Judgment. Each person’s building will be tested with fire—God’s judgment. And that judgment will reveal the integrity of each “building.” If one has built poorly, his house will be burned up. If one has built well, he will receive a reward.
There are two questions to be examined here. First, what kind of life are we building on the foundation of Jesus Christ. Because the “foundation” of our lives is not concrete, and the “walls” are not brick and mortar. The foundation is the saving message of Jesus Christ, put into each of us through the presence of the Holy Spirit in our souls. And the walls are the kind of life we build on that foundation. Are we building lives filled with love or with hate, with joy or with anger, with hope or with despair, with optimism or with negativity, with generosity or with greed? We shouldn’t wait for the last judgment to assess these questions. And while asking someone for a progress report on how you are doing with these things (a close friend who will be objective, your spiritual father when you go for confession), these are things we should soberly reflect on periodically throughout our lives.
The second question is “how am I doing compared to other people?” While a natural question that we all ponder, it is actually a bad question. If a storm is coming, we don’t need to ask ourselves, “is my house more likely to survive than my neighbor’s house?” We need to ask ourselves “Is my house going to survive?” Because if the neighbor’s house is not built well, and yours is built only slightly better, neither is going to survive. The world puts us in constant competition with those around us. God doesn’t work like this. God has given each of us a foundation, and adequate and unique building materials to build a life that reflects Him, that utilizes the unique things with which He has blessed each of us. We shouldn’t look at the size of other people’s houses. We should be concerned with building the best “house” (life) with the building materials He has given us.
To the question, “am I doing enough?” the answer should not reflect a comparison between us and anyone else. It shouldn’t even be strictly our own self-assessment. Rather, we should think “Will God be pleased with the life I am building, based on the materials He has given me?” and “Does the life I am building honor Him, and reflect Him?”
Today’s passage ends with St. Paul’s assertion that we are God’s temple, that His Spirit dwells in each of us. Therefore, what we are building with our lives should be built around God’s Spirit and not the other way around, that we build our lives and fit the Spirit around them. If we indeed are temples of the Holy Spirit, if we really believe that this is the foundation of our lives, then our lives should reflect that, and how we use the “building materials” that God has given us should reflect that as well.
Lord, thank You for laying the foundation of my life through the death and Resurrection of Christ. Thank You for placing Your Holy Spirit in me. Help me to build on the foundation, cognizant of the unique materials You have given me, understanding of how to build with them, and grateful to have them. Help me to assess my “temple” often, and to not be tempted to look at others. May the life I am building reflect You. May it bring me through the storms of life. And may it find me worthy of Your Kingdom on the day of Your judgment. Amen.
Am I doing enough? We know our foundations are solid. We must continually assess the building materials. It is easy to throw straw on a foundation and call it a day. But straw won’t withstand the storm. Brick and mortar take time to build with, and the temptations of good weather will entice us from building something solid. We need to think of the storms of life and the final examination of God’s judgment and build appropriately.
