Sermon Text:

Background Material for 1 Peter 2:1-10:

Author: While there are minor arguments for the authorship of this epistle, there is overwhelming evidence for Petrine Authorship. These factors include the possibility of Peter not being alive, the excellency of Greek used in the letter, and the similarity in style to Paul. However, these factors are miniscule to the evidence in the letter itself. Peter acknowledges himself as the author in the first verse and recalls past experiences with Christ. The early church recognized Peter as the author.

Audience: The audience is a mixture of both Jewish and Gentile believers. Peter addresses believers in, “Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.” The towns marked in chapter one follow a route used by the courier to deliver this epistle to the churches and homes of believers. This route allowed for Peter’s message and letter to travel.  

Aim: The aim of this passage is to encourage believers to remain in God’s Word. For believers to trust in the Word that proclaims Jesus as the living stone, that gives life to the believer and shame to those who disobey God’s Word. God’s Word affirms the position and status of both Jewish and Gentile believers in Christ. God’s Word affirms that we are Holy Temples, in Christ. God’s Word affirms our devotion based on the work of the Holy Spirit inside of us.    

Actor(s)/Character(s)/Event(s)/Issue(s): The major players in the text are for general believers. Peter is seeking to establish God’s Word as most important for believers to change in the love and likeness of Jesus. In the face of suffering, believers have means as living stones, established by God in Christ, to persevere in this life. 

Christopher LaBelle

References:

Scripture: 1 Peter 2:1-10 (English Standard Version)

Series: “Faith Forged in Fire”

Title: “The Living Stone”

PRAY

Introduction

Rapport: Good morning RGC. It is once again a pleasure to be here this morning to open up God’s Word with you. Most of you know this about me, but…

Illustration: I work in construction and one of the great joys of working as a carpenter, is I get to see a job from start to finish. In particular, the building of new homes, is the most rewarding. One of the most important parts of a new build is the foundation. The foundation must be solid, and is essential for the house to remain long-term. All of the elements of the structure are dependent on the foundation being poured correctly, molded just right, and properly fortified. As we read Peter at beginning of chapter 2, we will see the importance of a solid foundation, presented in Christ.

Background: As we continue in 1 Peter series, “Faith Forged in Fire”, Kevin preached on the command from Peter to love one another earnestly from a pure heart. The Word of God is living and abiding in those who have trusted Jesus. Peter ends the previous passage, “And this word is the good news that was preached to you.” Peter continues that sentiment.  

Reading: 1 Peter 2:1-10 ESV

Relevance: We live in a world, where houses are built on sand. Where wind and waves crash and knock down structures. In the face of the antagonistic culture we live in, one that is growing with further animosity toward Jesus and His Church, may the Church respond by building their house on the Living Stone, found in God’s Word.  

Main Point: Believers are living stones, identified and chosen in Christ, as proclaimed by God’s Word.Transition: 

• The Living Stone in God’s Word (v.1-5). 

Explanation: After Peter explains that believers are to be changed by the truth of God’s Word and earnestly love one another, here in chapter 2, Peter calls his readers to respond to that truth. He tells them to respond to the change within them, by the Holy Spirit, in repentance. 

Read v.1

•  If we are to love one another, the command to put off these behaviors is given by Peter. These sins are the opposite of true Christ-centered love is described by these behaviors listed.
• Put away malice. Wickedness, evil a mean-spirited and vicious attitude.
• …Deceit. Taking advantage of, Crafty. (Much like the Serpent in the garden).
• …Hypocrisy. Wolf in sheep’s clothing. Lacking integrity. Acting one way before one person/group of people and different toward another.
• …Envy. Looking at someone’s positive success or fortune, and being angry over it. Similar with Saul’s attitude toward David with God’s favor over him.
• …Slander. Speaking falsely of another. Smearing someone’s character.
• For those outside of Christ, these are regular practices. The nature of sinful man is to reject God and pursue a life of disobedience in rebellion to the God that created them. These behaviors closely identify those that are lost, deceived, and wicked to the core. We see this everywhere we go. The pursuit of material things, the obtainment of power and status, or even the death of a loved one often causes people to respond out of malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. As believers, living outside of the character of Jesus, can live in these sinful patterns as well. 
• Why does Peter tell believers, to put these behaviors away? How can believers do this?
• Why? Believers are called to live holy, and to be holy as God Himself is holy. This is demonstrated by the Holy Spirit indwelling believers and working through them to love God with all their might and strength, and to love people. This work of God in the believer satisfies God’s Law, as believers seek to depend on the work of the Holy Spirit by the truth of God’s Word. 
• How? By longing for the pure spiritual milk.

Read v.2-3

• The pure spiritual milk is an interesting phrase here.
• First, we see that this spiritual milk is pure. Meaning that there is no impurities, imperfections, nor is it tainted in anyway. Much like the California Gold Rush in the mid 1800s, many searched for the purest gold in hopes of striking it rich. This pure spiritual milk, is rich, pure, and offers exactly what believers need. 
• We often see milk used in the Old Testament as describing the Promised Land, “flowing with milk and honey.” I doubt this is what Peter is describing here, even given the many Jewish references in this letter.
• We see milk mentioned twice in the New Testament in reference to God’s Word. I believe Peter is using the phrase “pure spiritual milk” in reference to God’s Word. 

1 Corinthians 3:2, “I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready”

Hebrews 5:12-13, “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child.”

• Both, Paul and the author of Hebrews, is speaking about remaining spiritual babies in the faith. The inability to grow in the knowledge of God’s truth. Some remain in this state through various means.
• However, Peter is speaking about God’s Word in a different manner. First, he describes it as pure spiritual milk. Meaning there are no impurities. We know God’s Word is inspired by the Holy Spirit, that it’s inerrant and perfect in what It says. That God’s Word is meant to be spiritual food for our souls. For believers to feed upon and grow in salvation. 

Illustration: I believe most of you can relate to what Peter is talking about. Remember what it was like when you first had a baby? When a baby is first born, their wants and desires are centered around feeding from their mama. They cry and cry and cry and scream bloody murder to get more milk. They wake you up many times through the night, and new mommies are often sleep deprived and utterly exhausted through the breast-feeding stage. Ask many of the women here what it was like raising a new-born baby. All the babies want is to be close to their mom and feed.

• Peter is telling us to do the same thing. Desperately seek and feed on the Word of God. Long for it daily. Long for it when you are discouraged. Long for it when you are encouraged. Long for it until you reach home. Like breast-milk is nutritious and rich for a baby, God’s Word is pure and rich. Able to fill your cup. Able to satisfy the longings of your hunger and soul.
• If you have tasted His goodness through the Word of God, you will grow in the likeness of Christ. You will begin to look more and more like Christ, if you long for the pure spiritual milk that is found in God’s Word.

Explanation: Peter continues on this command of longing for the pure, unadulterated Word of God. What we are actually longing in God’s Word is the living stone.

Read v.4

• We might think of a stone as lifeless. An inanimate object we can use to spread on driveway, or to skip on a lake. However, Peter here is speaking about a stone being alive. A reference to Jesus being a living Temple. We see insight to this in the book of John after Jesus clears the Temple of the merchants.

John 2:18-21, “So the Jews said to him, ‘What sign do you show us for doing these things? Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews then said, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking about the temple of his body.”

• Temple worship was prevalent for the Old Testament Saints. An act of faith by them in which they believed God would cover their sins through the blood of bulls and goats. In Christ, He was the final sacrifice on our behalf as wretched sinners. 
• Look friends, Jesus was chosen and precious in the sight of God. The prophets and the authors of God’s Word points us to the Christ. God’s Word shows us that not only was Jesus born of a virgin, lived a perfect life, tempted like we all are in everyway but with no sin, rejected by the chosen people He came to save, put to death on a cross, but He also rose again. And He ascended into the heavenly Temple to offer His blood to pay for the sins of those that would put their faith in the perfected work of Jesus Christ in the gospel. And one day He is coming back to judge the world and their deeds.
• Unlike all the other religious figures in this world, Jesus is alive. The grave is empty and the Holy Spirit testifies to the newness of life, that born-again believers experience when they are saved. And God’s Word is evidence of such a powerful truth.

Transition: If Jesus is the Living Stone, we too are united to Christ in that same reality as living stones. As Temples of the Holy Spirit and Priests. As vessels of worship and service.

Read v.5a, “you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house,”

• As Jesus was a living stone, or living Temple. Where all worship is centered on. The living Temple in which the Scriptures pointed to throughout the Old Testament. The perfect spotless lamb sacrificed for the sins of the world. We now as believers are Temples of the Holy Spirit, because of our unity with Christ.
• When you are born-again, you have actually died with Jesus on a cross. Every sin, past, present, and future was laid onto Christ. We now share in the blessings and sufferings of Jesus. Which is why Peter is emphasizing the willingness to suffer for the sake of Christ. The same access that Jesus had with the Father, we now are united to Christ, by the Holy Spirit. And if that is the case, we also have a mediator to the Father. The Trinitarian work of the gospel in the believer.
• As living stones, no longer dead, believers are being built up as a spiritual house by the work of God in our lives. And in no way, can we boast in our own strength in loving God or loving others. We must depend on the work of the Spirit within us.
• Not only that, but the Temple was also a place in which God dwelled with His people. As living stones, the church (God’s people), are a dwelling place for God. This is the new way we relate to God. No longer are we separated from God because of sin, but now have access and fellowship with God by the work of the Spirit. If we have access and fellowship with God now and are being built into a spiritual house, what are we to do about it?

Explanation: Read v.5b, “…to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

• With the knowledge of being a spiritual house, a temple of the Holy Spirit, believers are to offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.
• Those who are born-again are able to walk boldly into the Throne room to offer our lives. We now have access to repent freely, to love freely, to gently correct in truth freely. We can boldly serve God with all of our might and strength, without the threat of legalism or proving ourselves worthy before the Lord.

Romans 12:1, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”

• This means then that God has given all of us spiritual gifts and power in which we are to exercise for the glory of God and to the benefit of other believers. We are to offer ourselves, as vessels of worship, as spiritual sacrifices to proclaim the gospel. I believe a spiritual gift is the special gift that God has given you to point others to the majesty and beauty of Jesus in the gospel.
• If you are gifted in playing an instrument, let that be your spiritual sacrifice to point others to Jesus.
• If you are a good communicator, have deep conversations with others about what God is doing in your life.
• If you are good at playing video games, let that be an avenue in which the gospel is introduced.
• If you are hospitable, throw the greatest parties, prepare and make more than enough food. Invite everybody. Let that be a place of warmth and for the gospel to be talked about.

Application: Our goal here at RGC, is for everyone to discover their spiritual gifts and serve one another here. Not out of dutiful obligation, but as spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. This is for the building up of God’s church through the sanctification of one another. The more we point each other to the gospel, and work through the living and abiding Word of God, outwardly pouring our lives out in spiritual sacrifices, we will see the power of God work through this place. Why? Because we have Jesus, the only mediator between us and the Father, whom we offer these sacrifices to. Not everyone responds to this reality of the Living Stone.    

Transition: There is both honor and shame when faced with the Living Stone. 

• The Living Stone Brings Honor and Shame (v.6-8). 

Explanation: Read v.6-7

• Peter quotes here from Isaiah 28:16. This is a prophecy of the Messiah, pointing further to Jesus being the chosen and precious cornerstone, or Temple. Another example of a fulfilled biblical prophecy, and the impact of that for the original readers of the letter.
• For them, suffering and facing persecution, may have seemed like the wrong decision. Many may have questioned why they were willing to risk so much (status, livelihood, persecution, alienation) for the advancement of a Kingdom outside of the current world they lived in.
• We may often doubt and question why? When we are put to the test at our workplace. When the doctor gives us the diagnosis. When you are isolated at family parties, because of your belief in Jesus. When the people you once called dear friends, walked away.
• But look at what Isaiah said, “whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” And the beginning of verse 7, “So the honor is for you who believe..”
• There is honor for those who believe. There is a cloud of witnesses that are watching us. Former Old Testament Saints and things into which angels longed to look.
• When this world is telling you what you believe is wrong and bigoted. When the world is telling you that Jesus is not enough, don’t be discouraged. Remember the Word of God, which points us to the living stone, who then makes us living stones, alive by the Holy Spirit. We can boast in the perfected and completed work of Jesus in our lives. Because there is honor in this.
• In the NHL, when a team wins the Stanley Cup, they award the Cup for the team to lift above their heads and present to the crowds of people. There is great honor for that team who won it all. Likewise, believers can lift up Jesus wherever they go and in whatever they do, to the cloud of witnesses, to the angels who long to look, but most importantly to God as our acceptable service.
• Those that are born-again can rest assured that accompanies believing in gospel. But we know that not everyone believes this.

Read v.7

• The honor is for those who believe the gospel. But there is no honor for those who deny the gospel. There is no honor to those who deny the Living Stone.
• The Psalmist here is prophesying a time when the Jews would deny the Christ. The same ones that erected the Temple, the place where God used to dwell with His people. 

Illustration: The commentator writes, “Here is the first hint that in the ring of foes were the builders themselves, the men of power in Israel. Isaiah shows them rejecting God’s cornerstone in his own day for their ‘refuge of lies’, and the New Testament leaves no doubt that this stone foreshadowed Christ. God’s marvelous vindication of him was by the resurrection…”

• What a profound truth. We see in this reference from Psalms the rejection of God’s people. The very ones who were supposed to get this right. We often wonder why they couldn’t see the Christ. Jesus fulfilled every prophecy about the coming Messiah. Jesus checked every mark that was available for the coming Messiah, but the Jewish leaders couldn’t see it.
• People today cannot see the Christ. We live in a day and age where people want to put on their own crowns and claim kingship or queenship over this world. Be the best you. Live the healthiest life possible. Work on positivity. Make sure you eliminate all barriers that get into your path. Celebrate sin now, because this is it. Do what feels good. What does this reveal?

Explanation: This reveals that not only does rejecting Jesus mean an utter disobedience of God’s Word. The pure spiritual milk. It reveals the sovereignty of God.

Read v.8

• As Kevin mentioned last week, God commands all people to repent of their sins and turn to the Christ. To believe in the gospel that sets people from their sin and makes them a new creation. 
• We all know this isn’t the case though. We can be so dumbfounded when we see the disobedience and wickedness in the world today. When right has become wrong, and wrong become right, we struggle to understand or comprehend why people would not believe such a profound truth. That Jesus can set people free from their guilt and offer eternal life. The truth is that none of us could believe in Jesus if it wasn’t by the sovereign work of God.

Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

• The evidence of a believer in obedience is clear by the fruit in their life. The same is true of a sinner. The evidence of disobedience is seen in the works they produce. This is shameful.

Illustration: If I am driving a vehicle. It will be apparent if I am one who obeys the traffic laws or disobey them. If I am racking up a pile of speeding tickets, the evidence is clear in my disobeying of the law. If I have a clean record, the evidence of my obedience to the traffic laws are clear. I am driving according to the laws written out.

• The believer is obedient to the Word, not because they don’t want to get into trouble, but because they know God is at work in them to produce fruit. Their works will be in the open. 
• The unbeliever disobeys God, because he/she doesn’t care to do so. They want to live life their own way and do things their own way. 

Application: You might be saying at this point, “Pastor Chris, we all know this truth. We know that those who reject Christ are disobeying God’s Word.”

• Then why are we so surprised when the world rejects Christ? Why are we so surprised when they reject us? Why are we so surprised when lost people act like lost people?
• There seems to be from the church the desire to either not address truth, or respond to the change of this world with anger and divisiveness. When I say this, I don’t mean we don’t address truth when truth needs to be addressed. I don’t mean that some may be called to affect change in government. Or in personal conversations, speak truth where it is needed.
• My friends, what I am saying is this: My hope this morning is that we would all understand our role in sharing the gospel. That in loving God and loving people, we would place every conversation, every interaction with the world, at the foundation of Christ, the Living Stone. That we would not get bogged down by the distractions of controversy, conspiracy, or political disputes.
• We should also not hold the world to the standards of Christian living. Lost people are not going to act like saved people. Lost people are not changed by living good Christian lives. Lost people are changed by the gospel.

Transition: Our attitude toward the world as Christians ought to be different. Because in Christ, we are now God’s people. 

• We are God’s People (v.9-10). 

Explanation: Look at verse 9.

Read v.9

• Remember that Peter is talking to both Jewish and Gentile Christians.
• We are no longer separate, but grafted into one family as a chosen race.
• We are considered as one people, a royal priesthood, able to offer spiritual sacrifices to God, acceptable to Him through Christ.
• A people changed by the finished and perfected work of Jesus, as a holy nation.
• A people cherished, chosen, and loved by God. No one or nothing could ever snatch us away from that love.

Ephesians 2:11-17, “Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.”

• Therefore, as we consider the completed work of Jesus, the Living Stone, let us be compelled to proclaim this to the world.

Application: Tell the world about what God has done for you. Tell the world about sin, that it separates you from any relationship with God. Tell the world that God sent Jesus to die a sinner’s death on their behalf. Shout from the rooftops that Jesus died, was buried, and triumphantly rose from the grave. Tell the world that through Jesus, their sins can be erased, and they can be in right relationship with God for eternity. Tell the world that the Bible is true and share it with them. That Jesus is the chief cornerstone of God’s story.

• Let all of this be on the motivation of this:

Read v.10 

Conclusion

Clarification: As we head out of here this morning, let’s remember the mercy and grace of God. God has not only given us a foundation in which we can build our home. He has given us the Living Stone, Jesus Christ. And by the Holy Spirit, as living stones, are being changed and molded to look more and more like Jesus. There is great honor and joy to serve the King of Kings and the great High Priest. We can face the rejection of this world through truth that once we were separated from God, but because of God’s great act of mercy through Jesus, we are God’s people.

• If you are here this morning, and you are not sure if you are born-again, I want to plead with you. Know that you are a sinner. That you are separated from God, because of your sin. If you continue in your disobedience to God’s Word and Jesus, you are in fact storing up wrath until the day of judgment. The Good News is this: God gives the entire world an opportunity for amnesty from that judgment. If you believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, you can be saved. Brought back into right relationship with God as was intended at the Garden. Let’s pray.