I want to talk about building upon the Lord Jesus Christ. And my question is: What have you built? What have you built today in your life?

You know, this past week I was speaking to someone and they had reminded me that about nine years ago this very week - if we remember it was the same week that Hurricane Sandy had hit. Right? And as I began to think about that I was remembering how many homes were torn apart even here in New Jersey upon our shore. Just how many homes were taken and people had so much lost and lives were affected. I recall having a family that lived on my street. They were renting a home there and they rented literally for about three or four years because they had lost their home due to Sandy. And so you can imagine that they lost everything and had taken years to rebuild, to finally leave and go back to where their homes were. But I remember also conversations with them and them saying, ‘You know Jeff I can't imagine, I can't believe what happened. Everything that I had, everything that I built, everything that I accomplished was washed away in a matter of days - so quickly.’ And it made me think just how fragile life is. Right? How fragile are the things that we build, in a matter of a moment our homes can be washed away. In a matter of a moment things can disappear. In a matter of a moment the business that we work hard to establish, the neighborhoods that we live in and our friends and family - everything can be washed away so quickly. Despite all of our efforts, despite all of our toiling to try to hold on to what we have - we must recognize today church - that it’s all temporary.

At some point it must come to an end. What do we do today? What do we do? And as I began to think about this, I asked the Lord what could God possibly be speaking. And the Lord reminded me so deeply - hallelujah, that what is built on the Lord Jesus Christ will not and cannot pass away. The storms may come, things may happen, but when we are built upon Christ, when we are built in faith, when we build our lives not about money, when we build our lives not about our wonderful things, but we build our lives on serving the King. And we’re serving in the Kingdom of God, hallelujah, there is a foundation built that cannot be trampled. A foundation that will not crumble.

See, to build upon the Lord is to decide for ourselves that we’re no longer gonna give all of our energies, all of our efforts and strength into building and storing up treasures on this Earth. Treasures that are going to - as the Bible says ‘where moth and rust come and destroy’ - but see we are to build into a lasting kingdom. A kingdom that cannot be demolished. A kingdom that will last forever. What have you built today?

"...even in the worst of things He works for the good of those who love Him."

See when we build upon the Kingdom of God, it's where a real storm may come. Even a spiritual storm of all hell breaking loose. But see, we do not panic, we do not lose heart because we know that what we've established on the Lord Jesus Christ cannot be taken away - It cannot be crumbled. See, when we build upon the Lord it's where we can be in an economy right now, right? Where we don't know that in a matter of a day the entire economy of America can fall. We know that a demonic power can come against us in our households. But praise God, when we build upon the Lord, we do not run away but we wait knowing that He can deliver. We wait knowing that God will be the one to provide. Not the government, not our job, not our boss or anything else but simply the Lord and the Lord alone.

See even in the worst of circumstances, praise God, the Lord will deliver His people.

See, even in the worst of things He works for the good of those who love Him. Those who’ve been called by God to build upon the Lord Jesus. Those who love Him. Those who have chosen this day to build upon the Lord. But sadly I find, why is it that so many Christians have decided to build on something other than the Lord Jesus Christ? It’s where we work so hard to prepare for our career. It’s where we work so hard to build up our savings and forgetting that it is the Lord Jesus Christ alone that can save us. It’s where we give all of ourselves, all of our efforts to make sure our homes are nice, to make sure that everything is situated in our life that we forget to seek first the Kingdom of God. To seek ye first the Kingdom of God and know that everything else will be taken and taken care of in the Lord.

See, I pray today that God would open our eyes to remember the words of Jesus. Jesus said ‘repent for the Kingdom of God is near.’ Again He said ‘repent for the Kingdom of God is upon you.’ I pray today that our eyes would be open to recognize that God is calling us to build into a Kingdom that is no earthly kingdom that can be taken away in a moment. But He is calling us to establish our lives in the Kingdom of God. That is a spiritual kingdom, it is a powerful kingdom, and it will not and cannot be overtaken.

But I ask again today, what have you built?

We are called to build upon the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ in this season. You see, man loves to build without God. Man loves to build for himself, loves to build life up for himself and kind of get in the grind of daily living and do his own thing - but see it is nothing new. If you turn to Genesis, and I encourage you to read the story of the “Tower of Babel.” Right, I don't know if you remember but it was all of mankind literally saying, ‘You know what God, we’re gonna build something.’ And they began to build a tower saying, ‘We’re gonna reach the heavens.’ They began to build this tower saying that ‘God, you’re no match for us. God we can build, we can establish’ but I praise God because God showed up on the scene and God - as He always does - shows man, ‘You have no match for my power. There is no match for my kingdom’ and he disperses it all.

See God is still doing the same thing today. Man is walking around, Christians are still walking around looking at God going, ‘God, I’m gonna build something for myself. God yeah, I know that you're there. I know you're calling me to you, but I wanna build something for me. God I wanna build to the heavens, I wanna do my own thing - and God is still showing up today going, ‘Oh, you thought that you were a match for my power’ and it crumbles to the ground. By His power He strikes the earth. By His power He strikes and all of it falls unless it be built on the Lord Jesus Christ. What have you built on today? He is calling us to build on something that cannot tumble. He is calling us, not to build on our own strength a tower to heaven, but that we would trust in the Lord. That He would build something on the inside. He’s looking to build heaven here. He’s looking to build heaven in my heart. He’s looking to build heaven in my children. He’s looking to build heaven in our homes - something that will never dissipate. What have you built today?

So how do we build upon the Lord? What does that look like? I'm excited to share the Scripture today, Psalm 127 it’s gonna be on the screen. Psalm 127, so important. A Psalm about building upon the Lord. Let's read together, it says, “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat – for he grants sleep to those He loves.

You see here we find a few things we’ve got to understand. If we’re looking to no longer build on our flesh. If we’ve no longer looking to build on our strength, hallelujah, today if we are looking to build into the Kiingdom. To build upon the foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ. God is showing us what we must understand in order to do so. And firstly, we must understand that we must build with God.

If we read it again it says, “Unless the Lord builds the house the builders labor in vain.” See, we are to build with God by seeking His will. When we read this verse, when we look at this house, what is this house? See this house that God is speaking about is the house of our heart. The Scriptures – the word of the Lord says in Hebrews 3 it says that we are the house of the Lord. See God is not concerned about the design of our home. God doesn't care if our grass is cut and perfect. God doesn't care if we have a nice car, a nice home or all the wonderful things that the neighbors kind of share and talk about. God can care less about it, what God is looking at today and what He is asking is “Who will allow my will to enter into the home of their heart. Who will seek to do the will of the Lord? Who will seek my design on how to do things? Who will seek my design on how to raise your children? Who will seek my design on how to pray? Who will seek my design to live this life?” If it’s not God, it will crumble. It doesn’t matter unless we build. Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. What have you built today?

Some of us think, ‘You know what, it sounds great! Of course I want to do the will of the Lord, I would love God to have His will.’ But what happens so many times? I find that as God begins to build in our lives, all of a sudden we’re not so sure about the methods that He chooses to do it. Maybe, you know all of the sudden we have a desire in our life to step out and begin to lead in the church – lead a Bible study. Maybe we have a desire that maybe God even places in our hearts to start a new career, a new path with school - whatever it may be. And we look to God and God begins to speak back and goes, ‘Listen, before you can do anything else I want to build a foundation.’ And it may look like God instilling humility. Maybe God wants to work out patience in our life or teaching us how to be a servant, and giving us just a foundation so that we would have something that wouldn’t crumble. Whatever it may be. But what happens so often, many times our response is, ‘God, you know I really didn't think I was going to have to start there. God I didn’t know you were going to have to build that. I didn’t know I was going to have to learn to walk in humility. I didn't know I was gonna have to learn to be a servant,’ and we begin to turn away from God. We reject the builder, the one who was looking to build something precious, to build something strong.

What have you built today? See, unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. Today so many Christians continue to build in vain. Coming to God, coming to church, proclaiming Christianity. But when the time comes for God to build something, when it comes time to build on Christ we push it away. Because it didn't look the way that I thought, because I didn’t know God was gonna have to tear down the old things before He began to bring in the new, and we remain in spiritual ruins. But God is calling us today church, I pray you would hear this day - what have you built? If it hasn't been the Lord I pray today that you would seek His will, that you would build with God by seeking His will for your life and that we would humbly come to the Lord saying, ‘Father, have your way. I know I've built this way before. I know I’ve been doing my own thing but Father today I open my heart. Come and build.’

See to build with God is to understand that we build with Him by seeking His kingdom. Unless the Lord builds the house we build in vain because we love to build for ourselves. But see God asks, as he asks in the Scriptures He says, ‘Why is my house in shambles? Why is my house in shambles while your own homes have lovely paneling, when your own homes are built up?’ In other words God is asking why are we so skillful with building up our life? Why are we so skillful at getting what we want? Why are we so good at going after the things that we go after, yet when it comes to the things of God we’re so blank-minded. When it comes to building for the Lord we have no clue the work of the kingdom. We have no clue what to build or how to do, and God is saying, ‘Who will seek my kingdom? Who will come back to seeking first the kingdom of the Lord, that everything else will fall into place.’

God is looking for a David. He's looking for a David in the house of the Lord. As it says in First Chronicles 28. It says that David had it in his heart to build for the Lord. Is there a David in the house of the Lord today? See we've got to repent today church, for looking to build our own way. For looking and working so hard to do our own thing and putting the kingdom of God aside. Looking to go our way, looking to build our family, looking to have our money yet forgetting that it is God and God alone who will build a foundation that cannot tremble. Listen if the hurricane comes, and I don't know if there will be a real hurricane that comes and washes things away. I don't know if there’s gonna be a hurricane of wrath and judgment. I don't know what may be coming but listen, if we are not founded on Christ. If we are not building with God - unless the Lord builds the house, the builders will build in vain. What we build that is not of God is about to fall! What we build that is not of God is about to be shown that it is gonna crumble yet if you build on the Lord – those who build upon the Lord Jesus Christ, God is about to distinguish who has built upon the Kingdom, who has built upon His power!

What have you built today? And so in order to build on Christ we must build with God, we must build upon seeking Him. We must build upon the will of the Lord.

Secondly, in order to build with God we must build upon trust. Let's read the second half of verse one again it says, “Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand and watch in vain” - “Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand and they watch in vain.” See unless we are building upon trusting God, trusting that He will be the only one who can watch over what we establish in our life and the Kingdom - that we can trust God that only His watch, only His keeping, only His eyes will protect us - we will build something that will fall away, that will crumble, that the enemy will come in and in and just rampage. But hallelujah God is calling us today to build upon trust for protection. You see we don’t have watchmen. As we read this we think about “as the Lord watches over the city” - We see in some of your versions that there are watchmen that watch in vain or guards, but what we don't necessarily have watchmen over our homes right, or over our towns. But what we do have is a whole lot of security cameras and all sorts of gadgets you can get right now for home protection. And years ago it would be unheard of but now it's so affordable. Everybody I know pretty much has some type of camera or something where you can open the door and there’s an alert. Literally when I walk the dog I look at each home and I can tell you that it seems as though every single home has a camera. You know any type of criminal activity, or if a thief were to show up I imagine they’d have a hard time. Even just, you know, I don't even know how you’d walk up to the house without some type of ring going off, right.? And that’s really the type of culture that we live in but here's the thing, I was talking to a man who lives not far from me and he’s going, ‘You know Jeff, I have all the security cameras…’ I mean he spent top dollar. He's the one that had it professionally wired. He has the screens in the home. I mean it's all over the house, you can imagine this guy is safe. He is under some good protection, I mean if you show up he's gonna catch you. But he looks at me and goes, ‘Listen, both of my cars were robbed.’ Both of the cars were robbed directly in front of the camera. He pointed it to me, the camera was there, the car was there, and what he said to me, last of his words was ‘I can't believe this, these cameras are useless. I might as well have not even watched. I watched in vain.’

You see the point is this spiritually. It's no different than many who walk around today thinking that their money, thinking that their reputation, that their abilities or anything else will be able to keep you safe and to protect what we build and establish in this life. You see unless the Lord watches, the guards and the watchmen watch in vain. Unless we are in Christ - listen church - unless we are in Christ no camera, no amount of money, no savings, nothing will be able to deliver us and spare us from the evil that is in this world. And God is calling us to build upon trusting Him. To build upon trusting Him for protection. You see, how do you know that you trust in God? It's where you're not so careful to always watch the stocks – you know, wondering if the markets gonna go up and down. It’s not where we’re striving to protect all of our assets and all the wonderful things that seem so important to us. But it's where we’re coming to God saying ‘Father I want to be in the shelter of the Most High. I wanna build where you are. I wanna build on to you God, I want to be where you are. I want your presence to walk with me. I want your presence to be over my children, Father. Because unless the Lord watches, the guards watch in vain.’

See Christ and Christ alone will be the only one to protect us. Listen, our cameras cannot deliver us from the evil wicked thought. Our money and all of our assets that we have will never be able to deliver our children from every demonic strike that looks to seek and to take them away. It is Christ and it’s Christ alone. What have you built on? What have you built on?

And so He calls us to build upon trust, to build upon trust for deliverance. See I think of Paul, and you know, this story had come to mind as I was going through this word. Paul, a man who had a foundation built upon trusting God. And he had knew that God had watched him. Paul was not afraid to follow where God told him to go. Paul knew that God would deliver him no matter what the circumstance, no matter what the situation. And I remember Paul on a ship - the middle of the ocean. What happened? Paul was shipwrecked. Now I don’t know about you but I've been on a boat before - in the bay - and I’ve been afraid in the bay. I've been scared enough in the bay that if our boat were to rock over I would be terrified to swim in the bay and make my way back. I would be wondering what fish are in there, if there’s sharks, if there’s this and that. Listen I don’t know about you but I would never want to be shipwrecked. But Paul is shipwrecked here, and think about that for a moment. It seemed like things were over. Can you imagine floating in the middle of the ocean? Can you imagine just being out there with all these men just thinking ‘God, I don’t know if this is your plan or not. I don't know what's happening’ but see listen, hallelujah God was able to deliver Paul! >He delivered him just where he needed him to be, because Paul built a foundation of trusting upon God. He knew that God would not only deliver him - but see when you are in Christ, when you are built upon the Lord not only will He deliver you but even your deliverance will deliver somebody else.

It's where you might be shipwrecked today. You might be feeling that something just isn't turning out the way that you thought but you decide to remain in Christ. You decide to trust Him and say ‘Lord, I’m gonna hold on. I don't know if this boat rocking like this is gonna work out for me, but I do know that you are my deliverer. I know that if the Lord watches, if the Lord is watching over, hallelujah, I don’t need the guard, I don’t need the watchmen. You are my watchman and you will see me through. The word of the Lord says that “He who watches over Israel will neither sleep nor slumber.” Even in our darkest night, even in the darkest times of my life where I’m thinking ‘God I don't know. I don't know if this is the end. I don't know if I'm going to come through. Father it seems like I’m out of prayer right now. It seems like I’ve got nothing left.’ Hallelujah the Lord will deliver even in the night but are we built upon trusting Him? See God cannot and will not deliver us unless we have a foundation built on trusting Him to be the deliverer. God wants to make clear in this season that only He and He alone - that His eyes, that His watch is what kept us from crumbling. While the whole world is running rampant, while the whole world seems to be falling apart. We don't know what the news is going to reveal today. What's gonna crumble next? What's gonna fall next? It may be the nation, it may be the economy, but that is okay because if we are founded on trusting on the Lord, God is going to distinguish that He has kept watch upon His people.

And see He's not gonna share His glory with another. God is gonna make it very clear that unless it be for Him, we would be in shambles. God’s not gonna share the glory with our boss. God’s not gonna share the glory with our coworker. He’s not gonna share it with our friend or anything else, but it will be Christ and Christ alone. Unless the Lord watches over the city the watchmen, the guards, they watch in vain.

See, we trust the Lord not only for deliverance but we build upon a trust for salvation. Nonstop I've noticed this week and it's been for a long time but I really thought about it this week - we see ads left and right about products and all sorts of gimmicks right, filling the shelves to keep watch over our health. You know there's a new pill, there's a new drink, there's a new this, there’s a new that. It's not just apple cider vinegar, now it's apple cider vinegar with extra apples in it. It’s apple cider vinegar with all sorts of powder and cinnamon and it just goes on and on and on. Right? In our culture there's such a huge emphasis on keeping up with that latest fad, that latest diet, whatever it may be - that supplement. And listen, I’m not saying that none of them work at all, I'm not saying that it’s all completely a gimmick, what I am saying is this - that while we watch so intently on this flesh, while we take so much care of the flesh we have lost the sight of our soul. And God is saying wake-up! Wake-up out of the slumber! Wake-up out of the being so consumed with elongating our health, with elongating our life! I am the giver of life, come back to the standard of the word! Come back to what I am calling you to do, to build upon a trust in me for salvation. I alone can save you! Where even if this body were to perish, even if this body were to be taken away, hallelujah, I have faith and hope that I will live and I will live with Him.

I’m not saying “don’t take care of yourself.” Don't get me wrong, but what does it matter if we’re so successful at watching our weight- our diet - but we’re already dead on the inside. What does it matter if we try to keep ourselves alive and going, but we’re dead in Christ and we’re dead in the spirit. We can lose all the weight that we want, we can get into the best shape of our life, but if God is not the watchman over our souls we perish in Hell and we take our families with us.

"God is calling us to look. What have you built today?"

I don’t know about you, but I wanna be under the watch of God. I wanna build upon a trust knowing that He is watching me, He is watching my family, He is watching my children. See unless the Lord watches over the city the watchmen watch in vain. In other words, unless we repent for everything else that we have been so consumed with. Unless we turn away from building so much on the flesh at the cost of our spirit, we will perish and pay for it. But God is saying ‘Will you turn today. Will you turn for being so consumed on the outside and come back to the inside.’ Will we build upon trust of God. Trust in Him watching over our life - Will we build upon looking at our children carefully to make sure that they are in the word of truth? Will we build upon trusting God to be the only one that will spare us in the times to come?

God is calling us to look. What have you built today? What have I built today? If it hasn't been built on trusting God, it will not last, it will not sustain us.

And so in order to build upon the Lord Jesus Christ, not only do we build with God but we must build upon trust. Because unless the Lord builds the house the builders will labor in vain. We will labor in vain, trust me. I don't want to look back 10 years from now. I don't want to look back - now listen, I know today I talk to many youth. I talk to not just youth, I’m talking about 20-30 year olds, and I ask them about the future. Most people don't even think past the year. But I want to think today for a moment. I don’t want to look back in 10 and 15 years and go ‘Did I labor in vain? Did all the time that I spent to do my own thing - did it really pay off?’ I don’t want to look back in 20 years from now and raise my child and think ‘Man did I raise her in vain or did I truly raise her in the foundation of trusting the Lord?’ What have we built? Because unless it be built of God, it is in vain and will fall away.

Lastly, in order to build upon the Lord we must build with a purpose. Lets look at verse two again. It says, ‘in vain you rise early and stay up late toiling for food to eat for He grants sleep to those He loves.”

”In vain you rise early and stay up late…” I really thought about this. See, we are to build with a purpose to serve the Lord. Not our own purpose and we have to really define that today. I find that so many Christians lose purpose with God. Our purpose is not just to come to church and sing songs. Our purpose is not just to kinda raise children, have a family, and kinda live happily after. Our purpose is not just to go to work and earn a paycheck and come back home. Our purpose is to serve God! We are to build with a purpose not for our self, not a purpose for the world but we are to build with a purpose to serve God and God alone. As I read this verse I started to think of a few types of people that I know, and you might know the same type of people. You have one where you know they go to bed really early so that they can wake up extra early, because they really like to get things done, right? Then I know other people, who stay up really late. They do not want to let the day end so that they can get done the things that they set their purpose - the purpose of a heart to achieve and to do right. They wake up late. They go to bed late, they wake up late but it all works so they can get it done. I think there's more people who are the latter right? I think I know more people that like to stay up late and wake up a little late. But we know those two people - yet this scripture is saying something deeper.

Follow me for a moment. It’s saying that you rise early and you stay up late. It’s saying basically listen - this is huge - right now the word is talking about somebody committed. Somebody you know willing to lose sleep, but not only willing to lose sleep in the night but even wake up early - to completely exhaust himself going after the things of this world, going after the reward of the work. To go after everything with a purpose, that's a really deep purpose, and what God is saying ‘Look how hard you strive for what you want in life.’ How many times has there been a project, right? Maybe a project in our home, maybe a project that you need to do for your schooling. Maybe something that you're just after. How many of us have stayed up late to prepare for it? How many of us have put everything else aside – I mean you eat dinner as quick as you can cause you gotta get back to those plans, right. And you even wake up early, maybe you do a little devotion with God, but you get going because we’ve got to get to that purpose, we’ve got to serve ourselves and get to where we need to be.

But see, I want to ask today. Where is that same effort for God? Where has it been that we have toiled, that we’ve stayed up as late as we could to say, ‘Father I need a breakthrough!’ Where is that effort, where is that pursuing God, that building upon seeking Him? That building of a purpose in our lives to say, ‘Father, I may wake up before the sun comes up today because I need to find you, I need to be with you. God do what it takes. I’m gonna put a few things aside today, I might not even eat dinner tonight. God I got a plan and my purpose and it is to be where you are!’

Where is the effort toward God? See unless we have such an effort, unless we build on such a heart toward the Lord we build on everything else that will crumble and fall away. Listen, there's nothing wrong with our projects, there's nothing wrong with our to-do’s. But who will wake up to see that there's more to life than serving ourselves? Who will take the initiative to say, ‘You know what God, everything that I've lived for up to this point, the life that I’m living, I know that there is so much more. There is a purpose, there is a mission that you have called me to do…’ and we decide to say, ‘You know what God, whatever it takes I’m gonna go after you. Lord, I am looking to build with a purpose.’

Church, can we stop living such vain lives. Can we stop living for ourselves so diligently. Can we stop going and pursuing this world so deeply. Can we repent for giving ourselves to exhaustion all for a dollar. Can we repent for giving ourselves to exhaustion just so we can win the medal, just so we can show up at the job and the boss can say ‘Well done.’ Can we begin to exhaust ourselves for the Kingdom of God? Can we begin to exhaust ourself to build something that will last, to give ourselves to prayer, to give ourselves to each other, to give ourselves to God, to give our children to the Lord and to not stop until a foundation is built - the foundation that is built on the Lord Jesus and no other!

See in order to build upon the Lord, we must build with a purpose to worship Him.

As we look at the toiling that this verse talks about we see someone with a purpose, as I said, to work and to get what they earn. Yet God is saying, ‘careful how you spend yourself. Don't lose your purpose.’

I’m praising God today. I praise the Lord from the depths of my heart that I was taught from my mother and father something very very important. I was taught to build on a foundation with a purpose. I was taught to build with the purpose of worshiping the Lord and the Lord alone. I was told, ‘Jeff listen, I don't care if you look to be a doctor. I don't care if you want to be a chef. All we’re telling you to do, whatever you set your heart to do, do not forget you have one purpose in this life. It is to worship the living God. It is to worship the Lord. Do not forget who has spared you, do not forget who has saved you, do not forget the foundation that you were built upon.

Do our children know their purpose? Do we know our purpose? When we begin to look at each other, when we look into our own households - is there an answer for that? Can we look into our children's lives and look at the purpose that they’ve been living for? Can we look into our families – can I look into my own life and say, ‘What have I built? Is it built upon an establishment to worship the Lord? Is it built upon worship? Is it built upon exalting God, or is it built upon exalting me? Is it built upon exalting myself?’ Our children exalting themself on every platform of social media and everything else but are never never coming to worship the living God. I asked today, what have we built? If it's not been the purpose to worship God is calling us back today.

See listen – work hard, do your best in school, do your best at work, but listen, as you do it do not forget the one who is giving you the ability to do so. Do not forget the Lord Jesus Christ who has delivered you from the foundations of darkness that you were raised in. Do not forget the power of God that delivered you from the life of apathy – that has given you the brain, that has given you the push, who has done the work in our life to do exactly what we do today.

I look at my old life. I look at one point in my life where I was just so lost in a rut of toiling for myself. Lost in a rut of building my own kingdom, doing my own thing, and hallelujah God had touched my life. I praise God today that all I can think of - despite the many things to do, despite the things that we become involved with, hallelujah my one purpose is to bring it all back to God and to worship Him.

See today God wants to bring us back to true worship. God wants us to really look at what we have built before Him. If it doesn't respond to Him, if it doesn’t look like Him, if it doesn’t smell like Him, if it does not recognize Him, it is not the worship of God. It has been the worship of everything else, but would we repent and come back today. Would we repent for worshiping everything else, building upon a foundation that is not of God and begin to build with a purpose of worshiping God and no other.

Lastly, as we build upon the Lord we must build with the purpose to come into His rest. Let's read this verse again. It says, “in vain you rise early and stay up late toiling for food to eat for He grants sleep to those He loves.” This last part after all the toiling, after all the striving for the things that are so temporal God says, ‘Listen, I give sleep to those I love.’ He's not just talking about sleep as we think about it. What God is saying, ‘Listen you can go on building and doing your own thing. You can go about your life and continue building on a foundation other than Christ but listen, those who build upon me, those who build upon my purposes – listen, even while they sleep I will bless them.’ I had to think a moment as I read this. I read this a million times. God so touched me as I began to really think about that sleep. Now many read this and they take it as – you know God brings us into a rest for ourself, and even while we rest He's doing things. And yes that's so true, that's one part - but as I really began to think about this I was thinking about sleep. What happens in sleep? See, sleep is probably the most vulnerable time throughout most of our day, right? When you're sleeping anything can happen - literally a vulnerable moment where we want to be kept safe and we think about that in our sleep we want God to be over us. But then all of a sudden God just began to speak into my heart, I began to think about my family. I began to think about the fact that each of us in our house - we have built upon a purpose to come into the rest of God. In other words, to rest from the toiling of the world, to rest from going after self. We have decided in our household - my family - we have decided to build upon the purpose of coming into Christ and no other.

But I praise God today now that I think about that sleep. Even in our most vulnerable time, even when man stepped on the scene and said, ‘Listen that foundation you have, it’s gonna crumble.’ Even when man in our most vulnerable time said, ‘You're not gonna make it, you're not gonna do it,’ God kept our household. God kept us strong!

"If we have not built upon the foundation of Christ…..it means nothing before God!"

I had to think - that even when there was nobody else there to pray and to uphold us - God kept us strong! I had to think that even in the most vulnerable times - through sickness, through darkness, when all hell just seemed to billow like weaves and like hurricanes and storms, God has kept us by His power! When we were all alone, nobody else there. Even in our sleep, God has kept us strong because He is our foundation! Because we have not built on the world, we have not built on ourselves, we have not built on our money or our savings. We have built on the Lord!

And so I ask you today – I stand here today. I stand with my family in the Spirit, saying that unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. But God has built this house! God has built it strong, and I praise the Lord for His great mercy today. But I ask you, what have you built on? Has it crumbled? Has it stood the test? If we have not built upon the foundation of Christ and Christ alone, it will fall away. It means nothing before God! He has called us for something bigger, church! Will you come back to the foundation that God has called us to build on? This verse was given to me, Isaiah 61:4. I was speaking to my sister about this and it's such a blessed verse. It says, “They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated. They will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.” Listen I know we've read this verse before, and we get happy to see right, we’re gonna restore the ancient old ruins. But listen, we have to stop and take a look for a moment today. It says that the ruined cities have been devastated for generations. Generations! We cannot build upon the Lord before we stop and we begin to cast away everything else that we’ve built on today. God is calling us to build with a purpose. To put the rest of the worldly pursuits and everything else aside. To put the rest of all that we build on and trust in, and come back to the builder of our foundations, the builder of our soul. the Lord Jesus!

I can’t help but to think as the scriptures speak, that the House of the Lord has had Moses and many of the other men and women of the scripture come in and manage God's household. But we are reminded of the foundation, all built on the Lord Jesus Christ's. Listen church, this foundation has been going for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. This is a foundation that has been laid from the beginning of time. I go back again and say, what have we built? Will we build upon this foundation that cannot be penetrated, this foundation that cannot be overtaken - the wind and the waves, the things of the world would never overcome. But hallelujah it is held strong and firm by the Lord Jesus Christ, amen!