How long do you expect the house you live in to stand? I walked by a twenty-year-old Cape Cod this morning, already looking shabby. Our hundred year old bungalow, with lots of loving attention, looks better.
A key difference is the materials. The Cape Cod is sided in vinyl, our cottage is painted redwood, the narrow boards typical of the early 1900s. I've not been in that particular Cape Cod, but others of the same vintage feature plastic interior trim. Patterned with wood grain, they look like the real thing, but they will not hold up like the four-inch-wide painted pine with shaped trim that many older houses boast. Both our roofs are architectural shingles-that's one good thing that will protect both our domiciles from our Central Illinois spring hail storms.
In 1910 our house was built for railroad workers. We're the middle of three that look alike from the outside, but are different inside. What's similar, though, is the material quality. Even so, at that time, the standard, for example, of wood flooring was 5/8" thick oak. Though all 900 square feet are oak, the thickness is 3/8", thick enough for only the one sanding we did when we moved in more than thirty years ago. But it's been enough to support families for a hundred years.
St. Paul says we need to pay attention to our building materials. (1Corinthians 1:12) He's speaking specifically of our building into other's lives, but how we build our own lives counts, too. How can we build into others what we have not constructed in our own?
How do we teach our children to pray if we don't pray? How do we help others grasp the tender, fierce, love of Papa-God if we don't know it ourselves? What materials can we use to help others erect strong walls against sin if our walls are made of paper?
I want to build a house that will be a legacy for generations, don't you? Let's ask God to show us the quality of our materials. Then, if we need to, we can ask him for better defenses from the hail of temptations and lies that often assault us.
Papa, build with us the shelters we need.
