Matthew 16: The Church Built on a Solid Foundation

Introduction

The church in Liège (Église Project Liège) is celebrating its 70th anniversary. Its first hall opened its doors on September 1, 1956, to share the gospel with Italian immigrants, many of whom worked in the coal mines. For this anniversary service, the church invited Donato Sablone, its honorary pastor, who led it together with his wife from 1976 to 2012. He preaches in Italian, and the current pastor translates into French.

Before coming, he says, he asked the Lord what to speak about. "I have never preached without asking for God's help." The thought that came to him was to speak about the church and the solid foundation we have in Jesus Christ, who has "kept us up to this day." Like the house built on the rock, the winds came and the house did not fall (Matthew 7:24-25).

Starting from Matthew 16:13-20, he reminds us who the foundation of the church is, what the church is, what it needs in order to stand, and the privilege of belonging to it.

Message Outline

1. Keep Your Eyes Fixed on Jesus

"We want to keep our eyes fixed on the Lord Jesus." Some tell him he is "old-fashioned." He answers with the Word: "Be holy, for I am holy." We do not need to fear those who criticize us for being different: God called us out of darkness into his marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).
As a child, his mother called him a "little devil": like many children of his time, he did not want to obey and sometimes pretended to go to school so he could play with his friends. The Lord saved him when he was very young, and his mother then told him: "You have become an angel." The Lord has kept him saved until now.
He always goes to church wearing his jacket, whether it is hot or cold. Someone called him traditional, even fanatical. His answer: "We are in the presence of God." He wants to do things with respect for him.
We do not go to church only to meet the Lord: he is with us day and night, in our homes. A proverb says it well: in the dead of night, the Lord sees a black ant on a black stone.
"But he who endures to the end, the same will be saved" (Matthew 24:13). So let us keep walking on the path where we began: we came to know the Lord, so let us keep serving him and following him.

2. Jesus Is the Head and the Builder of His Church

This community has been through a lot over the years, and some of it has disappointed him deeply. "But everything is in God's hands." Jesus is the head and the builder of his church, and the plants he has planted will not be uprooted (Matthew 15:13). Even when you move to a different place, the root remains.
Many have asked him how the church held together, with an old hall and then a new one. His answer: the work belongs to the Lord.
"The Lord does not live here, but he is present every time you gather."
If we want a church that is awake and alive, we must read the Bible. His advice: "Do not fall asleep before you have read the Word of God."
To couples, he reminds them that you can be angry without sinning, but the sun must not go down on your anger (Ephesians 4:26). The verse he learned as a small child stays with him: "I will both lay myself down in peace, and sleep, for you, Yahweh alone, make me live in safety" (Psalm 4:8). If you want to live in peace, make room for the Jesus of peace in your life.
The eyes are the mirror of the heart. Many people who say they are the happiest have sad eyes. As he looks at the congregation, he sees children who have grown up and faces where God shines.

3. The Church Is Made of Saved People

When we talk about the church, "we are not talking about the building, but about the various people who have been saved."
The Bible goes further: "Every believer who has received the Lord in their heart is a mini temple of the living God" (1 Corinthians 6:19). That is why we must not be conformed to the world (Romans 12:2): there is something special in us.
To speak about the church, the Lord did not choose just any image: he chose that of the bride.
The preacher speaks about his own marriage: "When we got married, we became one body, but with two different characters." The Lord has kept them united. Some people, as soon as they see suffering or things that are not going well, want to leave. He loves his wife today as he did the day he married her. She is ill, and even though a caregiver helps her, she prefers that he be the one to put her to bed.
His advice to young couples: "Put a third person in your marriage: Jesus." And in the evening, when you go to bed, you must stop thinking about what happened earlier. "Forgive me if I speak in a practical way," he says, but he does not want to speak in theory.

4. On This Rock: The Foundation Is Christ

To Jesus' question, "But who do you say that I am?", Simon Peter answers: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." It was not flesh and blood that revealed this to him, but the Father who is in heaven (Matthew 16:15-17).
In verse 18, if the rock had been Peter himself, as some have wanted people to believe, the church would not have held. Peter was the first to fall back. "The true rock is Jesus Christ."
The preacher draws a personal lesson from this: "I have my foundation in you." He has been disappointed by people several times. Yet he wants to esteem others more highly than himself (Philippians 2:3): "I do not feel superior to others."
The church was not founded as a religion, but by people of faith who accepted the Savior. Someone once told him: "You will end up like other revivals that have come and gone." The enemy tried to destroy the church, but the gates of the place of the dead did not prevail: "After 70 years, this church still exists, despite everything it has faced."
The Lord looks to the young, who have their whole lives ahead of them, but he does not set aside those who have served him for years.

5. Sealed by the Spirit, We Belong to the Lord

"The supreme head of the church is Christ, the cornerstone" (Ephesians 2:20). He purchased us with his blood and sealed us with his Spirit (Ephesians 1:13).
The baptism in the Holy Spirit gives us power to evangelize and to live out our holiness more fully.
In the Old Testament, kings put a ring on the finger of those who served them to show that they belonged to them. Someone who buys an animal marks it to show that it is his. You and I have been sealed, "and no one will be able to take that away."
He thinks of the prodigal son: when he returns, the father has a ring put on his finger (Luke 15:22), the ring of belonging to his family.
He tells of a recent evangelism outing near the church he attends today. A young man to whom he was handing a tract replied, "I am a Satanist," looking at him as if he wanted to strike him down. He said to him: "May the Lord enlighten you." "We belong to the Lord."
"He has never abandoned me, and thanks to him, I have not abandoned him either, because he is faithful and good." Saved at a very young age, he says he has never set foot in a movie theater: the fear of God was in his heart.

6. A Work That Starts from the Bottom and Reaches the Whole World

The Lord's church was confirmed in the upper room, at Pentecost. Every community was born with one person, then another.
His own story began at home: the Lord saved a member of his family, then his father, then his brothers, and they made a room available. "God's work has always started from the bottom and risen upward, until it reached the whole world."
The church's mission is universal: to evangelize the world and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19). Today, the church in Liège welcomes people of many nationalities. At Babel, the Lord confused the languages, and he knows them all.
The church's ultimate goal is to await the return of Jesus Christ by remaining faithful to the end. Like the wise virgins, who still had oil when the cry rang out, "Behold, the bridegroom!" (Matthew 25:1-13). "The Lord is coming back. May the anointing of the Holy Spirit be lacking in none of us."

7. What the Church Needs

"We are the ones who make up the church." To have a spiritual church, each person must have faith and be spiritual.
Faith first: all who believed were together and had everything in common (Acts 2:44). "Faith is essential." It moves mountains and binds us to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Fellowship: they continued steadfastly in the apostles' teaching, in fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers (Acts 2:42). No one felt superior. Whoever withdraws does so for one of two reasons: either they are seeking their own glory, or the enemy has given them false ideas.
Unity: with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Ephesians 4:2-3). Pride goes before destruction (Proverbs 16:18).
Consecration: "As he who called you is holy, you yourselves also be holy in all of your behavior" (1 Peter 1:15-16). Without sanctification, he warns, no one will enter the kingdom of heaven (Hebrews 12:14).
Power: "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You will be witnesses to me" to the uttermost parts of the earth (Acts 1:8).

8. Sowing Without Fear of Rejection

Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you release on earth will be released in heaven (Matthew 16:19; 18:18).
He has seen people listen attentively to the gospel for 30 years without ever being converted, and others, who had opposed it, open their hearts and be used by God. "If someone tells you not to follow the gospel, do not listen to them, because it is the Lord who is calling us."
He used to go evangelizing on Sunday mornings, handing out calendars, since the service was at 5 p.m. At one door, the wife opened while her husband, who was shaving, shouted to send them away. The preacher recognized his accent and answered him in his dialect. At once the man exclaimed: "Ah, it's you! Come in." He even invited him to eat.
"Let us not be afraid of those who reject us, because the seed of God's Word is sown all the same."

Key Takeaways

The church rests on Jesus Christ, the cornerstone. That is why, after 70 years and despite trials, it is still standing.
The church is not a building: it is made of saved people, and every believer is a temple of the living God.
Sealed by the Holy Spirit, we belong to the Lord, and no one can take that seal away.
A spiritual church needs faith, fellowship, unity, consecration, and the power of the Holy Spirit.
Novelties pass, but the word of God endures forever (1 Peter 1:25). We are children of God, heirs and joint heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17).

Personal Application

What does your faith rest on today: on people, a church, a pastor, or on Jesus Christ himself?
Do you let the Word of God have the last word of your day, before you fall asleep?
In your marriage or your family, what place do you give to Jesus, this "third person"? Is there anger you are keeping beyond sundown?
Have you withdrawn from fellowship? If so, is it out of a search for your own glory, or because false ideas have taken root?
The preacher makes this appeal: "Do not stay in the state you are in. Move spiritually." What concrete step will you take this week?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

On which rock does Jesus build his church in Matthew 16:18?

For Donato Sablone, the true rock is Jesus Christ, the one Peter has just confessed as "the Christ, the Son of the living God." If the church had rested on Peter himself, it would not have held: Peter was the first to fall back. The supreme head of the church is Christ, the cornerstone.

What is the church according to this message?

The church is not the building. It is the people who have been saved. Every believer who has received the Lord in their heart is "a mini temple of the living God." The Lord does not live in the building, but he is present every time his people gather, and he is with us day and night in our homes.

What does a church need in order to stay standing?

The preacher lists five qualities: faith (Acts 2:44), fellowship (Acts 2:42), unity in humility (Ephesians 4:2-3), consecration (1 Peter 1:15-16), and the power of the Holy Spirit to be witnesses (Acts 1:8). He also reminds us that we are the ones who make up the church: for a spiritual church, each person must have faith and be spiritual.