What Basement Flooring Taught Me About My Foundations of Faith
I live in a very old house…like 112 years old. I love the charm so much! But it also has BIG issues! We have had a particularly wet summer and consequently, we’ve had a wet basement all year! Usually, rain comes in in a few spots during the Fall and Spring, but not so, this year. We are talking wet in places it’s never been wet and wet at times it’s never been wet! Hooray for me. But it has given me another word picture to use to teach my children a lesson on foundations of faith.
A few years ago, I set out to conquer my basement. It was pretty dark, dank, and just plain unappealing. We live in a semi-flood plain so finishing the basement just means paying more in homeowner’s insurance. Instead, I set out to make it livable while unfinished. I painted the ceiling white (GAME CHANGER!) and I ordered some light-colored, foam flooring. This made a huge difference in how cold it was too. A little insulating of the floor feels much better on the feet!
It helped a lot. I also re-water-proofed the walls, re-sealed all the cracks, and re-sloped the dirt around the basement, in hopes that we could get the water stopped altogether. Then, last fall, we had major rain and while, thankfully, our town didn’t flood, pretty much everyone had water in their basement…right before winter. This made for a very wet spring and when paired with a rainy summer, well…let’s just say that foam flooring hasn’t been on the floor all year.
This year, after vacuuming up the thousandth gallon of water off the basement floor, I threw up my hands! I was SO DONE WITH IT! So, I finally splurged and bought the vented floor underlayment that I had had my eye on for years before, but it was never in my budget. It still wasn’t totally in my budget, but it was either that or MOVE!
Just to give you a mental picture—this is the hard-plastic flooring that is vented. It sits on top of the foundation, but water can run underneath it and still have the venting to dry. Most often, you see vehicles parked on it, as it’s mostly made for garage floors so the water can run off the car without damaging everything else. It’s a good solution for wet spaces!
So…I’m beginning to lay that flooring in my basement and the Lord began to teach me about my foundations of faith.
The problem is not the water. The problem is my home’s foundation. Though it is a strong foundation, over time, it has become weathered and damaged. It was poured 112 years ago…not exactly with the same developments we have today.
Things are not completely level. Consequently, we must do every bit of home-improvement precisely wrong in order to make it look right.
Do you ever feel that way with either your faith or what you see as the Christian faith today?
Think of the Gospel—the fact that Jesus Christ, who was God from the very beginning (John 1:1) came to Earth in the flesh at God, His Father’s request, to hang on a cross for our sins so that the price would be paid for us—as the foundation—a cement basement.
Over the years,people have added many different things to the Word of God—different religions and denominations that have added things like praying to the saints or other gods; working for God’s grace; and most recently, a hyper-focus on the simple truth that God is love.
I hear other Christians saying, “But God is love. He just loves us.” in a direct response to calling out sin. I asked my teenager about this, and his answer was so simplistic, “Yes, but God is jealous and just. We are to fear Him and revere Him.” God is all of those things, and ignoring the other attributes of God causes our foundations of faith to crack.
Every time we ignore the fact that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are ALL God—and have been God forever, and will be God forever—we crack that foundation. Once those cracks are there, the false prophets can slip in to water down the true Gospel.
God is love, so feel free to do whatever you want—that waters down the True Gospel.
God’s grace covers whatever you do, so feel free to live in sin—no. That waters down the True Gospel.
Jesus is the Son of God, but not God—that waters down the True Gospel too.
If we work hard enough, God will show grace to us—more flood waters coming in through the cracks!
If we live well enough, work hard enough, and accomplish enough for God, we can be like him—standing water on the floor!
We can work hard at making it look nicer, like adding vented subflooring; but nothing can really fix cracks in the foundation, except to actually re-build the foundation!
Friends, the foundation of the Gospel is crumbling in this nation! We see the attacks on our faith happening and in response, most Christian leaders are waffling! They are trying to put a subfloor down to sort of smooth out the effects of a cracked foundation, but they are not willing to stand up for the True Gospel.
How about your own foundation? Have you allowed false teaching to crack the foundation and water down the Gospel? Have you ever become so hyper-focused on God’s love, that you have ignored His other attributes?
It’s time for us to examine and care for the foundation! It’s time to stop putting down subflooring and trying to fix the cosmetic issues. Is your life built on the firm foundation, or has seepage crept in?
RElated: A Lesson on Authenticity
