Building A Living Foundation

Grace and peace to you, my beloved brothers and sisters. It is a joy to gather with you today, to share in the warmth of our fellowship, to feel the bonds of our shared faith, and to find solace and strength in the Word of God. We are indeed a family, united by the blood of Christ, bound by His love, and driven by His mission to save those who are lost. Today, we turn our hearts and minds to a topic of great importance, a topic that we don’t always state clearly, but is alluded to in sermons, that is having a solid foundation in Christ Jesus.

[Title]

If you ever had the chance of watching a skyscraper under construction, you would notice that for the first six months or so of the project, all the workmen do is make a huge hole in the ground. To build a tall building by starting below the surface level seems almost crazy. But, as you would suspect, there is a good reason for the big hole. To build a large building, it is first necessary to dig down until a strong foundation can be built, one that can support the skyscraper.

A doghouse normally does not need a foundation, and an ordinary house can be built on little more than a concrete slab. But a skyscraper, that is different. It requires a deep and solid foundation.

So, it is in our Christian life. Our upward spiritual potential is totally dependent on the foundation underneath it.

A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.

Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water?

Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?” Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst.

But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.”

John 4:7-15

I believe we all have been preached to about the women at the well in one way or another. And that is the good thing about the Bible, that one set of Scriptures can be used to provide for many different life applications. Today is no different as we apply it to the life application of us building the kingdom of God upon the foundation that was laid by Jesus Christ, and that is thru evangelism.

In building a living foundation let us look closely at how it is done by the master. To do this let us look at a contrast between this chapter and chapter 3, where Jesus is speaking with Nicodemus about being born again. In both chapters we see Jesus going about the business of winning souls. In chapter 3 Christ deals with a man, in this chapter, a woman. In chapter 3 He deals with a Jew, in this chapter, a Samaritan. In Chapter 3 He deals with a moral person, while in this chapter He deals with an immoral person. Yet He renews their way of thinking, causing them to trust in Him and be saved.

So, we read that Jesus opens the conversation with the woman by asking her for a drink. It is with this opening that Christ Jesus transcends the many barriers that would keep you and I from approaching another person to speak the Gospel of Christ. Jesus first transcends the racial barrier; as He is a Jew, and she is a Samaritan; two groups that normally would have nothing to do with the other. Secondly, He transcends the gender barrier as in those days it would be unseemly for a man to just speak with a strange woman. So, we can see that as far as Jesus is concerned soul winning should have no boundaries; and this is something that we should keep in mind as we are commanded by Christ to go out and build a living foundation.