What Are The Basics Of Christianity
This morning I would like to speak a message that I believe the Lord has placed upon my heart and the title of the message is “Build on the Basics.”
If I were to ask you, “What are the basics of Christianity?” What would be your answer?
Did you know that to get better at something you build on the Basics?”
Let me give you a few examples:
If I want to get better at Math, then I need to know the basics and build on them. What are the basics of Math?
Adding
Multiplying
Dividing
Subtraction
All other formulas are built on these basics.
If I want to get better soccer, then I need to know the basics and build on them.
Passing/ shooting, dribbling and controlling the ball. A good soccer player will make it a point to continue to develop them.
If I want to get better at playing an instrument, then I need to know the basics and build on them.
So, it is in my walk with the Lord. If I want to grow in my walk the Lord, then I need to know the basics and build on them.
Now with everything that is happening in our world today, what an opportunity that you and I have to develop the basics of our Christianity.
There are not many church services or ministry duties that we need to do, that we are used to carrying out on a weekly basis.
So, this gives us a great opportunity to focus on building the basics of our walk with the Lord.
At the beginning of the message I asked, “What are the basics of Christianity?”
Well I remember when I first got saved after a salvation altar call the preacher would say ok now that you are saved, I want to encourage you to do 3 things.
- Pray – Talk to God.
- Get yourself a Bible – Spend time reading God’s word.
- Tell someone what happened to you. – Be a witness.
Prayer, reading our bible and telling someone about Jesus are the basics of our Christian walk.
The times that you and I are living in, is a great opportunity for us to focus on developing the basics of our Christian walk.
Now it is not an easy thing to continually focus on developing the basics of anything. Why because the basics don’t get much love.
The basics do not get us famous.
The basics do not get us much attention.
The basics do not get too many hand claps and shouts.
Let me prove it to you.
Where is our keyboard player?
Do me a favor. Can you play a scale for me?
Now that is not every exciting. You might not get many hand claps and shouts for the basics, but that is what you need to know to play a song that gets hand claps and shouts.
Not too many people will buy a CD of someone playing the basics, but that is what is needed to go to new levels.
The challenge though is that people do not applaud the basics, but it is building on the basics that gets us to new levels.
If I am trying to learn an instrument, then I need to start with the basics.
- If I am going to learn the drums, then the teacher will probably tell me to hit the snare.
- 1 – 2 – 3 – 4
- Then He will probably say will probably say ok now, hit the kick.
- 1-2-3-4
- Once I hit the kick then he will probably say ok now hit the hi hat.
- And so on.
Now that is not exciting, but to play a song we need to have the basics involved.
Now what can happen is, if I am more focused on the outcome, rather than learning the basics, I can lose interest in learning the basics.
Illustration: I remember when I was in the 6th grade, we had to take a class that taught us how to play the flute. I was excited because I liked music.
So, we get to class, and the teacher starts playing a nice song on the flute and I was yes, I want to do that.
Now when the class starts, we did not even get to touch the instrument, the teacher pulled out a note of paper and said read along with me. I am like what does this have to do with music.
She put the flute away and she started calling out numbers 1 – 2 – 3 and then 3 -2 -1 , 1 -2 -3 , 3 – 2 -1 but we did not even have a flute yet.
So then eventually she pulled out the flutes and we got to play the flute. Then I realized that t is where the numbers came in.
Now keep in mind I am excited to play music, I am not interested in the numbers.
So, day after day we come back to class and we are playing numbers.
So eventually I got tired of playing numbers because I wanted to play a song. I wanted to play some music, and that was not happening, so I dropped out of the class.
Years later I come to realize she wasn’t teaching us numbers, she was teaching us the basics, but since I was caught up on what you can do after you learn the basics, I didn’t want to learn the basics and I dropped out.
So, what can happen is when we do not focus on learning or developing the basics and we begin to focus more on what the basics produce, we can get drop out.
Let’s bring it to our walk with God.
Sometimes even in our walk with God you and I can overlook the basics because we focus on what the basics can produce.
Example:
It is practicing the basics that make a good spiritual leader, but what we can do sometimes is focus on being a leader and skip the basics.
It is practicing the basics that make a good preacher, but what we can do sometimes is focus on the preaching and skip over the basics.
It is practicing the basics that makes us effective for God, but what we can do is focus on the works and skip over the basics.
How many times have we focused on what comes from learning the basics and not develop or we skip over the basics?
We see the singer who is anointed but that anointing comes from the basics, it does not come from the stage.
We see a preacher that is a great preacher and people are being blessed by the message and we want that same anointing, but the anointing does not come from the pulpit it comes from the basics.
We see a spiritual leader that has influence in the lives of people, and we want that same influence, but that influence doesn’t come from the title, it comes from the basics.
Come on Somebody…
Now unfortunately what can happen is, when we do not want to learn the basics and we want the stage, or want the mic, or want the title and if we don’t get it then we drop out.
It is like me in my 6th grade flute class. I didn’t want to learn the basics, I want to play a song, but since the teacher didn’t teach me a song right away, I dropped out.
Not knowing the teacher was teaching me the basics that was needed to get me to the level of playing a song.
Not only that but she was trying to get me to learn the basics, which would allow me to play any song I wanted.
Now this leads me to my main point.
During this time of lockdown, what a perfect opportunity for you me to develop our spiritual basics.
Prayer Life – Spending time with the Lord
Word Life – Spending time in the word
Witness Life – Spending time telling someone about Jesus.
( Putting a digital flyer on our WhatsApp status, Facebook page or our Instagram)
There are not too many church services going on where we need to do our ministry duties, so this gives us a great opportunity to spend time developing our basics.
What are the basics? Prayer, reading our Bible and Telling someone about Jesus.
I wanted to encourage us to use this morning to use this time that we have to develop the basics of our Christian walk.
You might not get to many likes on Facebook, you might not get to many fire emojis on Instagram, and you might not get many hand claps and shouts, but if we develop our basics you will get an anointing.
What an opportunity that you and I have in this time to develop the basics of our Christian walk.
