The Christian is to be established.
Consider what this means—
Progress. The foundation is laid; now the superstructure must be built upon it.
Fixity. The progress is not that of a flowing river, but that of a building in the course of erection. We are to hold fast what we have attained. A periodic unsettlement, pulling down to day what we built up yesterday, will have a poor result.
Strength. The building is to be no mere bower of branches, no tent of the wilderness, for temporary occupation, but a permanent, solid house in the eternal city of God. It will have to stand the stress of wind and weather.
Order. That which is established is not heaped together in a rude formation, like the cyclopean walls seen in granite mountains. The true building follows the designer’s plan. The Christian life must be built on the pattern of its great Architect.
Elevation. The house is built up. We raise the structure tier after tier. So in Christian life we should rise nearer heaven. Like the soaring pinnacles of a Gothic cathedral, the latest aspirations of the Christian experience should rise far above the earth and point to the sky.
Room for contents. The house has its inhabitants and furniture. The established Christian should have room for Divine stores of truth and holy thought, and for thief and fire proof safes which can keep his treasures in security. The complete building is not to be a solid pyramid for the sole purpose of hiding the mummy of its owner, but a glorious temple in which God may dwell.
~ W.F. Adeney [ref. 2 Th. 3:3]
